"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."
We see here an unnumbered "multitude" of fishes. This is the latter rain "multitude" which no man can number. True, the number 153 comes out once they get to shore, but that is only once they get to shore, which likely is a picture of heaven at the end of time, when the true exact number of believers will finally be revealed.
One other curious thing, though. The verse says "and *now* they were not able to draw". What does this mean? God does the drawing, does He not? After all, we read in John 6:44, "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. "
So what does the "now" mean in John 21:6? Well, I do not think it implies that prior to that the discples were, in themselves, able to draw anyone to salvation. There are thus two possibilities I can think of. One, the word "now" draws our attention to the concept of *time*. Prophetically the passsage points to the Latter Rain era, which, of course is an era of time. Another possibility is that in the church age, given the churches' visible structure and given the fact that the visible and invible churches were then so intertwined, there was the *appearance* in the church age of believers doing the drawing. It could be that God is calling our attention to the fact that believers never were the ones doing the drawing despite the outward appearance of doing so that the church exhibited.
This latter possibility is given some weight when we consider the presence of Christ on the shore. He, after all, was the one who instructed the disciples to cast off the right side of the ship. And then, once Christ was explicitly recognized, His presence drew everyone to shore, as emphasized by Peter's jumping into the water.
Well, there are probably a good number of readers out there who know this passage a lot better than I do. As always, I welcome input and correction from the Bible.
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4 comments:
It seems to me that your understanding here of the 153 fish might preclude them as a time reference bridge to the five months of Rev. 9 ...but I guess that is "a whole nuther" study.
Given that I know virtually nothing about how the 153 day timepath is developed from the Bible, I don't have much of a response, other than to say it is possible 153 days as a prophetic time period can perhaps be developed from other passages if it does not relate directly here. What those passages might be, I have no idea.
I am sorry, Ron. It wasn't my intention to buttonhole you for someone else's doctrine. I was just "thinking out loud". I agree with what you are teaching here. I have difficulty seeing 153 fish representing time...but perhaps there is a twofold meaning to those fish, and God just hasn't been pleased to convince me of it at this time even though I have heard the verses used to explain the timepath.
jackie, not one iota of anything to be sorry for. I was simply trying to fully disclose my ignorance on the 153. My understanding of the 153 is limited to its veiled featuring of the number 17 which has to do with heaven.
I am way, way, WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY behind on the endtimes studies, and thus may (probably) have an inferior vantage point from which to comment on some of these questions.
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