Kingdom Focused V
Notes
Transcript
Today as we finish out our Kingdom Focused study we will be looking at a parable that represents Gospel Growth and Gospel Judgment, but here the main focus is on Gospel Judgment. we are going to see how things will be when Christ returns and mankind faces God’s final judgment. We will see three points as we move through the parable of the Net. 1) God’s judgment of all people (48). 2)The gathering of the righteous (49). 3)The discarding of the unredeemed (50). This parable is similar to the wheat and the weeds.
47 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind. 48 When it was full, men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad. 49 So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous 50 and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
51 “Have you understood all these things?” They said to him, “Yes.” 52 And he said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”
47 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind.
Here we see again Jesus using the parable to show what the kingdom of heaven is like. He compare is it to a net used to catch fish. Now in Jesus time they used three different types of nets to fish, and the disciples whom He was teaching would have understood this well, for we know several of them were fishermen. The dragnet is the type of net being talked about here, then there was the trammel net and a cast net. EXPLAIN the difference. Using these types of nets you would get all kinds of fish, and as the net was pulled to the shore they would then separate out the fish, good from bad. The focus of this parable is not that good and bad dwell together, but that they will all be gathered in the end.
48 When it was full, men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad.
Once the net was stretched out and back to shore they would begin to pull the net to shore working on both sides to pull the entire net in, and as it would they would start to gathering and sorting the fish. They would all be gathered together at the same time, and this is the point, at the final judgment we will all be gathered together and then separated out. All people will be judged. We will all come before the throne. The righteous will be set apart and the unrighteous will be cast out.
49 Thus it will be at the end of the age. The angels will go out and separate the evil from among the righteous 50 and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!
Here we see the gathering of the righteous. The righteous will be separated out from the unrighteous. Matthew 25:32-34.
32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
49 So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous 50 and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Once the righteous are separated the evil will face God’s eternal judgment. They will be cast into the fiery furnace, they face God’s judgment because they have rejected the truth of God’s word, they have rejected the Good News of Christ. Because of this they face an eternity separated from God, an eternity of anguish.
35 all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?”
No one at that time can say why me, but God I am a good person. There will be a lot of good moral people who will spend an eternity in Hell, because it is about more than just being a good person, doing good things. Without Christ’s righteousness credited to our accounts we are bankrupt, and we pay the penalty for our sins “the wages of sin is death”.
51 “Have you understood all these things?” They said to him, “Yes.” 52 And he said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”
Jesus knowing that before the disciples only had a partial understanding, He wants to know if they have an even better understanding now.
Jesus was ushering in a new time, the kingdom was at hand, and the disciples were a part of this. They were not to reject the old, they are not to favor the new, but they are to show how the tow work together. How one points to the other and vise versa. As the scribes were trained, and would then teach others, so are we to do the same, take what we learn and teach it to others. Statistics from the University of Houston state that we remember 10% of what we read, 20% of what we hear, 30% of what we see, 50% of what we see and hear, 70% of what we discuss, 80% of what we personally experience, and 95% of what we teach to others. It would be the responsibility of the disciples to take the old and the new and show the people how they pointed to Jesus. To show the world who Christ is, what He has done through His sacrifice. God equips us with everything we need, the old and the new, we have access to it all. Because the same responsibility the disciples had now falls to us. As Christ’s ambassadors we are to be pointing the world to Him through our words and our actions. We should be as John the Baptist was calling the world to “repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”, repent before it is to late.
Kingdom Focused V
Kingdom Focused V
As believers who have a true saving relationship with Christ these verses should give us confidence, a confidence in our future. A confidence that no matter what the world tries God’s plan will prevail. A confidence in the providence of God, He has given us everything we need to accomplish the things He has set before us. He has defeated sin and death through Christ.