Two principles.  One story, one miracle.  Fishes in the deep sea, fishes in the shallow sea.  Jesus speaking, Jesus on the beach.

“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that was cast into the sea and gathered some of every kind, which, when it was full, they drew to shore; and they sat down and gathered the good into vessels, but threw the bad away.  (Matthew13:47-48)

The dragnet brings all sorts of sea-life to the beach to be sorted.  The good fishes are taken out and the rest discarded.  The militant Church of Jesus is the dragnet that goes out with the Gospel and draws many with the Message of hope and peace.   Just like the parable of the sower, there are those who respond to the Word and grow to bear fruit, others that fall away easily.  The diversity is great – good and bad – all in the net, all in the Kingdom.

The separating and sorting are done by the angels.  Judgment is reserved for God and his celestial beings.  The burden of judgment does not rest on fellow-worshippers and church members.  This principle is of supreme importance.  God will judge in his own good time – the fullness of time.  (13:49-50)

The militant Church fights the strategies of the enemy to live and carry the Message.

In John 21 we read of a remarkable miracle after the Resurrection.  Jesus told Mary to tell the disciples to wait for him in Galilee.  They are fishermen and in the waiting process, decides to do the thing their hands find to do at that moment – to go out and fish. (Ecclesiastes 9:10)  After a whole night at sea, they head back empty-handed.

Jesus is waiting on the beach and when they arrive, asks whether they had caught something to eat.  Unaware that it is Him, they tell of a fruitless night.  On his command, they toss the net on the other side of the boat.  It is suddenly so full that they could scarcely drag it ashore.  They were not far from the beach – about a hundred paces. (21:8)

The miracle opens their eyes.  John (who calls himself the beloved disciple) calls out to Peter:  It is the Lord!  Peter grabs his shirt and jumps out of the boat to run to the shoreline.  Love recognized Jesus.  Love had the perspective to “see” Jesus in the ordinary, the everyday things.

The other disciples tend to the boat and bring the miracle-catch to shore.  On the beach was a fire with fish and bread ready when they arrived.  (Jesus does not need our efforts to provide.)

Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish which you have just caught.”

Simon Peter went up and dragged the net to land, full of large fish, one hundred and fifty-three; and although there were so many, the net was not broken. 

Jesus said to them, “Come and eat breakfast.” Yet none of the disciples dared ask Him, “Who are You?”—knowing that it was the Lord. 

Jesus then came and took the bread and gave it to them, and likewise the fish.

The net was full of good fishes, not a mixture.  Good fishes are the Church, the true Church, the Church triumphant on the beach where the resurrected Lord stood.  All 153 fishes – a very precise amount.  The net did not tear.  The New Jerusalem, the perfect cube, with enough for all without one being snatched out of the Hand of the Father.

The number, 153, baffles the scholars and there are various interpretations to it.  For me it is enough to know that Jesus counts his Church and knows exactly who belongs.  It is not a number rounded to be an approximation.  It is not uncertain – it is precise – counted.

God has the measuring line in his Hand.  He “measures” his Church with care and precision. (Zechariah 2:1; Revelation 21:5)

He knows your name.  (Isaiah 45:4)  We are the Church triumphant.

The Church builds the Kingdom.  It is our work here on earth.  Just like Nehemiah built the wall of Jerusalem (symbolic of the Church), we build in the spiritual dispensation after the Resurrection and the birth of the Church on the day of Pentecost.

Nehemiah’s building of the wall gives us precious insight in the strategy of the enemy in our task as the militant Church.  The enemy will do anything to shift the focus away from the building.  Our purposeful, faith-foundation that underscores our calling in the Kingdom is the only weapon against a constant, relentless attack of the enemy.

Four times Nehemiah was invited to come and “talk” on the Plain of Ono.  He was already done with the building, but the work was not done until the doors in the gates were hung.  Nehemiah knew that the city was not secure without the doors.  His work was not complete.

Nehemiah was so sure of his calling and the priority of the work, that he gave the same answer to the invitation – four times.  The enemy will try to tire you out. 

When we allow “conversation” with the enemy in our thoughts, we tire ourselves out for the work of God.  It will distract us from the work of the Kingdom.

The devil comes as an angel of light – it is the inspired thought that you think is yours – thoughts fear and defeat.  Fear will move you to take action – wrong action – to preserve your person and to defend your actions.

Not so for Nehemiah.  He is certain of his calling.

So I sent messengers to them, saying, “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down. Why should the work cease while I leave it and go down to you?”  (6:3)

The fifth time they sent an open letter so that the contents would be public – almost like social media today.  The contents were an outright lie.  They accused Nehemiah of ambitions to be king and to be organizing an insurrection.

Then I sent to him, saying, “No such things as you say are being done, but you invent them in your own heart.”

For they all were trying to make us afraid, saying, “Their hands will be weakened in the work, and it will not be done.” (6:8,9)

As we have already discussed in previous pieces, Nehemiah was the master of the short prayer.  He diligently records his cry to God in every situation.

Now therefore, O God, strengthen my hands.

Still, the enemy is not done.  They send a prophet to Nehemiah to inform him of a conspiracy against his life and that he should take refuge in the Temple.  The devil will appeal to your religious senses and convictions.  He also knows when we are tired and sick to attack more fiercely and furiously against the work of the Kingdom.

Jesus was tempted with words of Scripture.  The “prophet” urges Nehemiah:

“Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple, and let us close the doors of the temple, for they are coming to kill you; indeed, at night they will come to kill you.”

Again, Nehemiah had the perfect answer.

“Should such a man as I flee? And who is there such as I who would go into the temple to save his life? I will not go in!”

Only after Nehemiah made his stand, he perceived, he discerned the false prophecy as corrupted and crooked, in the service of his enemy.  Had Nehemiah fled into the Temple, it would have destroyed his reputation and made him an object of gossip.  (6:12,13)

Fear leads to sin.  If you are humiliated by the sin in which  your enemy leads you, you become the laughingstock of the very people you feared would think wrongly of you.  Fear of man leads to humiliation and shame.

The only answer to fear is love.  Love drives out all fear.

There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. (1 John 4:18)

Repentance is the path to triumph.  Repentance restores perspective.

Again the prayer, the cry.  His enemies are recognized as the source of fear and they are rendered to God.

My God, remember Tobiah and Sanballat, according to these their works, and the prophetess Noadiah and the rest of the prophets who would have made me afraid. (6:14)

The wall was completed in 52 days.  The people could not accomplish it in seventy years (a lifetime), yet Nehemiah managed to bring it about in a season.  His militant, purpose-driven calling blazed the way through enemy territory.

The end of the story?  The Church – triumphant.

And it happened, when all our enemies heard of it, and all the nations around us saw these things, that they were very disheartened in their own eyes; for they perceived that this work was done by our God.  (6:16)

afraid and lost their self-confidence (NIV)

frightened and humiliated (NLT)

afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem (ESV)

This is the state of the enemy under the foot of the triumphant Church.

Back to the fishes.  Jesus on the beach, triumphant over death on the waves of the sea of life, He counts his Church, his own.

In the words of one commentary.

The main points are these. The two Miraculous Draughts represent the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant. The one gathers together an untold multitude of both good and bad in the troubled waters of this world. The other gathers a definite number of elect, and though they be many contains them all, taking them not on the stormy ocean but on the eternal shore of peace.  John 21 – 153 big fishes as opposed to the dragnet full of all-sorts. [Cambridge Commentary]