The Parable of the Net

This morning we come to the last parable of Jesus’s kingdom parables from Matt. 13. Along the way we have seen that the kingdom of God is like a field where seed is spread. In some cases, that seed grows and produces fruit, but in other cases it does not. Just so, the Gospel of the rule of king Jesus is spread throughout this world, and as it spreads, some people believe and live by it, and others reject it in various ways. The kingdom of God is also like a field where good and bad seed are planted and the resulting wheat and weeds grow up together until the time of harvest, when the wheat is saved, and the weeds are burned. So it is with the kingdom that there are those who are part of the elect people of God, who trust in the Gospel of Christ, and there are those who harden their hearts. Those who harden their hearts will be gathered at the end of the age and thrown into hell. Jesus also compared the kingdom of God to small things like a mustard seed and yeast, which start out insignificantly, but then grow to bless others. So too, the kingdom of God starts with the foolish act of preaching the Gospel. It starts with the small grain of faith in the heart of those who hear. But then it flourishes and grows so that it benefits the world. Then, last week we saw that the kingdom of God is like treasure that is worth selling all that one has to buy. So, the kingdom must be rightly valued above everything else in this world.

Now we come to one final, ominous parable. It is helpful, as we approach this parable, to remember the main theme of all of these.  Remember, Jesus is responding to the rejection that he experienced in Chapter 12. His disciples want him to just announce his kingdom, but in these parables, Jesus is showing that the kingdom is not for everyone. It is not for those who reject it, those who half-heartedly accept, those who do not produce fruit, or those who do not value it above everything else. So, with that in mind, let’s read Matt. 13:47-50 together. There are two points I want you to see from this parable: the carelessness of unbelief, and the certainty of judgment.

First, consider the carelessness of unbelief. This parable deals with a subject that would have been very familiar to his hearers. Jesus is preaching this parable from a boat on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. Those hearing him were fishermen, farmers, and merchants who experienced this very scene every day. All along the shores of the sea, fishermen could be seen driving a post into the shoreline, then attaching a giant net to it. In some cases, the net could be as long as half a mile. On one side of the net were affixed floats, and on the bottom side, lead weights. With that one end attached to the shore, the fishermen would tie the other end to their boat, and then they’d row out into the sea until the net was tight. Once the net was tight, they’d sweep in a giant arc, back towards the shore. When they made it back to shore, they’d untie the net from their boat and begin to draw in the net. The fishermen and their wives would wait as fish began to jump out of the water, desperately trying to escape the press of the net. As they collected fish, they’d take the valuable, editable fish and stuff them into jars. But, as you can imagine, this giant net that drug the bottom and could encompass a half mile radius would not just drag up these valuable fish. It would also bring up shellfish, weeds, and unmarketable fish. These they would either throw back or throw away.

In this parable, the net is a picture of the kingdom, and the fish represent humanity. As we’ve already seen with the field of the other parables, the kingdom of God will expand into all the earth. Right now, throughout this world, the Gospel is being preached. The net is being drug out into the sea so that it might encompass all peoples. And, just as that net is drawn to shore to collect the harvest of fish, so too the net of the Gospel will one day be drawn in for judgment. While I was in school at Auburn, I worked for the fisheries department. That department has a large tract of land, north of Auburn, that is covered in ponds where they experiment with methods for farming fish. I had the opportunity, working for that department, to go help them sane these ponds to collect specimens. We did, in miniature, what the fishermen on the sea of Galilee would do. We got about chest deep in these ponds, holding the ends of a sane net, and we’d drag that sane net from one end of the pond to the other, entrapping fish. On one such occasion we were saning a pond full of carp. As we began, you could occasionally feel a fish bump into the net, but besides that, you would think that the pond was empty. But, as we closed the circle, the bumps against the net increased to a frantic rate. At one point, a giant carp leapt out of the water and hit one of my companions in the chest. You can imagine what is happening under the water. When the net first bumps a fish, I’m sure he thinks nothing of it. Perhaps he swims a little bit away and goes back to eating. He’s bumped again, and thinking nothing of it, he swims away. But then, the press of his friends causes a bit of a panic, and he swims in haste to free himself, only to bump into the net. He turns again and again, running into the net or the crush of fish collected by it. Finally, he is drawn up out of the water, suffocating and flopping in desperation.

So, it is with the Gospel and those who reject it. God, in his good grace, is patient with those who reject him. Perhaps the Lord first uses a friend who tells them about their sin and need of a savior. In disgust they respond, “You can’t judge me”, and they pull away. Happy to live by their own terms, they go along merrily until a Gideon hands them a Bible on their way to class at university. They take it and read a few chapters and decide, this stuff isn’t for me. Throughout their life, they see Christians on TV arguing for life and holiness and they bristle, or they see a believer on Tik Tok offering defenses for the faith and they scoff. Lying on their death bed, a chaplain comes by to pray. They think, what harm could it do, but as the pastor prays their heart swells with anger at the audacity the pastor would have to pray for salvation. All along, the Gospel has encircled them, pointing out their sinfulness, calling them to salvation, calling them to obedience to Christ. And, like that fish who swims a little further away, they reject it time and again, only to find that in the end they are entrapped by hard-heartedness.

This truth leads me to my second point – the certainty of judgment. The more I study the teachings of Jesus, the more I am convinced that the American church has patently misunderstood and misrepresented the Gospel for at least the last 50 years. Some teach that Jesus is silently, tenderly calling, just waiting and wishing for us to respond. As Jimmy Wayne’s country song, “I Love You This Much”, portrays Jesus, hanging on the cross and pleading, “I love you this much and I’m waiting on you to make up your mind, do you love me too?” But that is not the Jesus we have in Matthew 13. He is not pleading. He is the farmer who plants and then distinguishes the wheat from the weeds. He is the fisherman that drags his net across the lake and sorts good from bad. Others teach that Jesus draws circles, not lines – that he is inclusive and seeks to bring people in, not cast them out. Andy Stanley has recently said this about homosexuals, claiming that the church needs to be more, not less inclusive. But the Jesus of this parable draws a line with a net. Now, certainly he draws a circle, too. However, it is not the circle of inclusion, but the circle of judgment.

You see, I think we in the American church have turned the Gospel upside down. We teach that man is the ultimate judge – that he is given a choice between heaven and hell, Jesus and Satan, and he is the one who must decide. This view of the Gospel has made us weak and mush-mouthed. It has caused us to feel as though we have to be winsome and accommodating because we don’t want people to be turned off by our talk of sin, judgment, repentance and faith. It has caused us to make Jesus into a kind-hearted hippy who wouldn’t hurt a fly. Yet this is not the Jesus of these parables. The Jesus portrayed in these parables is the king of kings who marches in to take rightful claim of his world. He is the conquering king who will one day bring final judgment over all that he has made. We must stop apologizing for Jesus, because Jesus made no apologies for the truth he proclaimed. He is the conquering king, and you will either bow the knee in obedience, or you will burn in the everlasting fire of Hell.

Notice, this is exactly how he ends this sermon of parables. In verse 50, he says that the angels will gather all who are unrighteous and “throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Did you know that Jesus speaks about Hell far more than he speaks about Heaven. In fact, Jesus speaks more about Hell than all the other teachers recorded in Scripture, combined. It is a major feature of his teaching, and of the parables we’ve been studying. He does this because he is the great, conquering king who will one day judge the world. But, he also does it to call you to repentance. He does this because he is the merciful king who came first to serve as the sacrifice for sin so that he might rescue those who trust in him. Yet, if you will not turn, you will be judged. And the judgment of Hell is painful and mournful. Notice that Jesus uses two ways of describing it. First, he compares it to a fiery furnace. Now, Hell is far more than just a physical pit of fire. Hell is both a physical and spiritual torment, and the only thing we can understand like it is a furnace of fire.

Second, Hell is a place of unending mourning and anguish. Jesus says that it is a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” In Hell, there is unending wailing and weeping because of the pain, loss, darkness, missed opportunities, regret, guilt, and shame. In Hell, there is the scratch-scratch-scratch of grinding teeth under the burden of that sorrow and anguish.

Hell is no place that you want to be, so repent and believe on Jesus as your savior, and you will be saved. The king is coming. Jesus will return. And when he does, the net will be closed around all of humanity and all will be called to judgment. Those who have believed in Christ and bent the knee to him will be brought into everlasting life with him. Those who have rejected and despised him, who have half-heartedly acknowledged him, or who have been fruitless in their belief, will be thrown into the lake of fire. So repent, bend the knee and follow Jesus.