Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #13 of Genesis 33, and we will read Genesis 33:15-17:

And Esau said, Let me now leave with thee some of the folk that are with me. And he said, What needeth it? let me find grace in the sight of my lord. So Esau returned that day on his way unto Seir. And Jacob journeyed to Succoth, and built him an house, and made booths for his cattle: therefore the name of the place is called Succoth.

I will stop reading there.  Jacob refused the people that Esau wanted to leave with him.  They represented people of the Law.  It certainly reminds us of God’s program for the time of the end of saving the great multitude and of cleansing His temple.  This is laid out in the two major fishing expeditions that the Bible speaks of, so let us go to Luke 5:1-3:

And it came to pass, that, as the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he stood by the lake of Gennesaret, And saw two ships standing by the lake: but the fishermen were gone out of them, and were washing their nets. And he entered into one of the ships, which was Simon's, and prayed him that he would thrust out a little from the land. And he sat down, and taught the people out of the ship.

The fact that Christ is in the ship teaching points to the church age.  That is because the ship can represent the churches, such as the ship in Acts 27 that was shipwrecked, and it represents the end of the church age and the destruction of the churches.

Then it says in Luke 5:4-6:

Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net. And when they had this done, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake.

Here, we see the Gospel proclamation over the course of the 1,955 years of the church age.  They let down the net, and they caught a great catch of fish, a great multitude of fish. By the time of the end, there were about two billion professed Christians in the churches of the world.  That is a tremendous number, a great multitude that was far greater than the great multitude that was later saved out of Great Tribulation.  But the only problem is, the vast majority of those in the churches were not saved – they were the tares.  So this is why God pictures this as a great multitude that were taken up out of the sea (which represents hell), and they were taken up into the net, which represents the kingdom of God in its safety and security.  Within that net, you would be safe and secure.  But the only problem in this picture is that the net broke, and when a net breaks, the fish come out of the net.  And that is what happened over the course of the church age.  They heard the Word (many are called), and they went into the churches and filled the churches across the face of the earth.  And yet, the net of the kingdom of God broke.  They came out of the eternal kingdom, in the sense that when anyone responds to the Gospel, it is as though they became saved, and if you became saved, it is as though you received eternal life, but if you never truly become saved, it is like you “slipped out of the net.”  There is a problem with the net.  So there were multitudes of professed Christians who say they are Christians with their tongues, but their hearts were far from God.  And this was the first main fishing expedition that was carried out over the 1,955 years of the church age.

However, God had a plan for a second major fishing expedition, and we can read about this in John 21.  If you read the Gospel accounts, there are only two major fishing expeditions.  Yes, one time Peter went to the sea and cast in a hook to catch one fish, as Christ had told him to open up the fish’s mouth, and he would find a piece of money to pay the tax with, but that was not a major fishing expedition.  There were only two.  The first one was in Luke 5 when the net breaks.

It says in John 21:3:

Simon Peter saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, We also go with thee. They went forth, and entered into a ship immediately; and that night they caught nothing.

By the way, we saw a similar thing in Luke 5, did we not?  Go back to Luke 5:4-6:

Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.  And when they had this done, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake.

It is interesting that with both of these two major fishing expeditions, they had toiled (fished) all night and caught nothing. Again, it said in John 21:3-6:

Simon Peter saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, We also go with thee. They went forth, and entered into a ship immediately; and that night they caught nothing. But when the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore: but the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. Then Jesus saith unto them, Children, have ye any meat? They answered him, No. And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.

It is very curious!  It is very curious that they fished at night both times before Christ arrives, and then He tells them where to cast the net, and then they have a great catch of fish. 

What did their fishing the night before represent?  You know, we can liken the two major fishing expeditions to the two outpourings of rain that the Bible speaks of, as the New Testament church experienced the “early rain,”  and at the time of the end, the people of the world experienced the Latter Rain.  There were two rains, or two fishing expeditions.  We can make that association.  They both represent the same thing, the sending forth of the Gospel to specific locales – one within the churches, and the other outside the churches.

What about the fishing period before the great catch of fish, in Luke 5, and this fishing trip before the great catch of fish, in John 21, where they put forth effort and  worked but they caught nothing?  We can understand them to be representing the periods of famine between the rains.  We have talked about this before, and Mr. Camping had laid out in his teaching that during the three and a half years of Christ’s ministry, hardly anyone became saved.  It was like a spiritual famine.  Then after Christ had gone to the cross and the day of Pentecost had fully come, then the “rain” began, did it not?  Three thousand became saved in one day.  It indicated that the early rain was falling, and the firstfruits unto God were beginning to come in.  But prior to that fishing expedition, they caught nothing.

Then we came to the end of the church age when the early rain had ended.  And then came another period of grievous famine that the Bible refers to in Daniel 8, and it gives us a time period of 2,300 days.  It was the 2,300 evening mornings, and it was the famine between the rains.  The early rain stopped on the date of May 21, 1988, and then began this famine of 2,300 days that lasted until September 7, 1994, and then on that date the Latter Rain began outside of the churches.  So these dark periods of fishing at night was when they caught nothing, which is why we say that virtually no one was saved.  I personally think that no one at all was saved, but due to the use of the word “silence” in Revelation 8:1 where it says, “…there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour,” the word “silence” allows for the slightest bit of sound.  And that is the reason I say that virtually no one was saved, but I do not think anyone was saved, and, definitely, no one was saved within any of the churches during that 2,300 days because the Holy Spirit had departed out.  But if a handful of souls happened to be saved within a world of billions, it would have happened outside of the churches.  But, again, given that this passage in John says that they caught “nothing,” it seems to be fairly definitive.  There was no fish taken into the net in the night before, and that night before typifies the 2,300 evening mornings.

But we are here for a reason, and that is due to the fact that the net did not break.  We are told in John 21:6:

…They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.

Then let us go down to John 21:10-11:

Jesus saith unto them, Bring of the fish which ye have now caught. Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land full of great fishes, an hundred and fifty and three: and for all there were so many, yet was not the net broken.

The net did not break, unlike the previous fishing trip.  The 153 fish is “9 x 17,” or “3 x 3 x 17,” is showing forth the purpose of God to bring all the fish in the net to heaven.  They are in the net, and, again, the net represents the kingdom of God.  Within the net there is safety and security, and when you are in a net that does not break, it represents the eternal kingdom of God where you are eternally secure.  There are no fish wiggling through a hole in the net and escaping.  All 153 are safe, representing the great multitude that was saved out of Great Tribulation, from every tribe, nation, and tongue of the peoples of the world.  They all came into the kingdom.  They were all washed and cleansed and justified in salvation, and they would remain saved for evermore.  They truly received the gift of eternal life, and they would never lose it.

You know, you cannot lose “eternal life.”  Some people say they are saved, and they say they have eternal life, but that is just the word of man.  But when God does the saving and when God gives the gift of eternal life, you cannot lose it.  Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, the Bible tells us, as well as a long list of things listed in Romans 8:33-39:

Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

There is no possible separation.  He will not put us away.  He will not divorce us.  He will not leave us nor forsake us.  He has obligated Himself through His Word, and the Word of God is the promise of God, and God cannot lie.  He has saved certain souls, and they are His people.  They are part of His family.  He has adopted them into the royal family of the kingdom of God.  They will now live for evermore.  What a glorious and tremendous blessing it is to be saved and to have eternal security and eternal safety.  Our souls are saved in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He is seated at the right hand of the Father.  You cannot get more security than that.  So the net did not break.  We will not come out of this condition.  We will not lose our salvation.

One of the points that God is making when He tells us the net will not break is that all taken into that net are saved.  And that was not true of the net of the churches in the Gospel proclaimed over the course of the church age.  Of course there were elect that were chosen and saved during the church age, and they were safe and secure in the kingdom of God.  But coming into the net of the churches really represented the external kingdom of God, and the net broke, and the fish could escape, so there was no guarantee that every professed Christian that entered into the congregations and became a Presbyterian, a Lutheran, or an Episcopalian, was saved.  And the Bible indicates that, for the most part, the overwhelming number of them were not saved.

So this is the wonderful thing about the Gospel that went forth outside of the churches over the course of the last part of the Great Tribulation period because God was dealing with people individually, one on one.  He was not calling them into some corporate body any longer, as He did over the course of the church age, and people just streamed in.  But He went forth with the Gospel, and if someone was elect, He saved them, and it was as though He drew them out of the sea like a fish, and put them in the net. 

And then there was another one over there that heard the Gospel, and that individual was not saved.  He heard.  Maybe he believed.  Maybe he responded in some way.  He could have listened to Family Radio.  He could have gone on tract trips.  Maybe he even went to a fellowship group.  But none of that was in God’s program as far as that man was concerned, and as far as salvation was involved.  God made no promise to that individual.  That individual never made it into the net.

So when we entered into Judgment Day, and the Lord began testing and trying and bringing us through another “tribulation” to see what we are made of, whether we were “gold, silver, precious stones” and taken like those fish in the net that did not break, or whether we were “wood, hay, stubble” and heard the Gospel, and maybe even responded in various ways by doing “good works,” but they were not brought into the net, the kingdom of God.  They were never in the net, and being “wood, hay, stubble,” they will be burned up over the course of the prolonged Judgment Day period.  And the evidence of their spiritual burning will be their turning back – going back to the churches, or going back to the world, or going back to former doctrines, and so forth.  This is what took place as God was purifying His kingdom and cleansing the sanctuary.  And that is what we are going to look at next.  Let us go to Daniel 8, which I have referred to a few times, but we read in Daniel 8:13-14:

Then I heard one saint speaking, and another saint said unto that certain saint which spake, How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot? And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.

Here, the 2,300 days is mentioned.  But what is the reference to the sanctuary being cleansed?  The 2,300 days will pass, and following that, the sanctuary will be cleansed.  How are we to understand this?

Lord willing, when we get together in our next Bible study, we will look at that, and we will try to explain this and how it fits with the major fishing expedition, and all the things we have been discussing.  And, of course, this is all stemming from what we read in Genesis 33 concerning Jacob’s refusal of the folk that Esau wanted to leave with him.