Robert McLaughlin Bible Ministries |
The New Testament analogy of the Old Testament Fish Gate. Part 2.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
O.T. Shadow [Sheep Gate]
N.T. Reality =[Positional truth]
O.T. Shadow [Fish Gate]
N.T. Reality – Witnessing-Lips:Life
The Fish Gate, with the substance of witnessing for Christ.
MAT 4:18-19, And walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon who was called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. And He said to them, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
/This is said to every believer because every believer is an ambassador for Christ representing God to a lost and dying world, 2CO 5:20; EPH 6:20; Phile 9.
EPH 6:19-20, “And pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in proclaiming it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.”
The Fish Gate is unique in that this gate is also related to the invisible impact for Christ with the phenomenal testimony to millions of angels.
Acts 1:8 “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and in Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.”
All of you have a ministry whereby you can provide the information to other members of the human race so that they can be reconciled to God.
a. The witness of the life, 2CO 3:3.
b. The second area is the witness of the lips.
1CO 4:9 For, I think, God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men.
The Sheep Gate in the N.T. speaks of salvation and the Fish Gate in the N.T. speaks of the filling of the Spirit because the Holy Spirit is the sovereign executive of witnessing.
ROM 9:24, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles, the analogy to the Fish Gate in the Old Testament is the filling of the Spirit in the New Testament.
For the Jews in the Old Testament we have the shadow of the Sheep Gate referring to Salvation followed by the shadow of the Fish Gate referring to the ministry of the Spirit for the Old Testament believer.
For the Church-Age believer in the New Testament we have the reality of salvation followed by the reality of the Filling of the Spirit resulting in the witness of our life and the witness of our lips.
COL 2:17 these things from the Old Testament were a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.
What is the substance of the New Testament shadow of the Old Testament Fish Gate?
It is ministry of God the Holy Spirit to the Church-Age believer.
(a) The grace of God the Father in eternity past used His divine omniscience to program the divine decrees, sent our Lord into the world, imputed our sins to Christ on the Cross and judged those sins.
God the Father planned salvation = unlimited atonement, redemption, reconciliation, propitiation, imputation, and justification.
(b) The grace of God the Son is revealed by the fact that He received the judgment of our sins on the Cross – willing to become true humanity in order to be judged for our sins, HEB 10:4-10.
(c) The grace of God the Holy Spirit takes the gospel and makes it a reality to those who are spiritually dead, the unbelievers, as a part of common grace.
The Holy Spirit makes the divine call to believe in Christ by making the gospel understandable.
The Holy Spirit also makes our faith effective for salvation as a part of efficacious grace.
The unbeliever is under total depravity, total separation from God, and total helplessness to do anything to gain the approbation of God.
Grace is all that God is free to do for mankind on the basis of the saving work of Jesus Christ on the cross. Salvation is the work of God TOTALLY.
At the moment of salvation we received perfect righteousness from God. Faith is the one thing that God the Holy Spirit can make effective.