Bible Study Genesis Part 57-And Enoch Walked WIth God

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We are in the midst of the book of Genesis.

We are now in the fifth chapter.

We're really only getting started, but that doesn't mean much because it's a short chapter.

Should only be a few more weeks before we're through this and on to chapter six.

Not that we're trying to hurry, not that it's unimportant.

It's just the way it lays out.

There's not a whole lot of, you know, concrete facts there for us to talk about.

So let's continue with verse five.

You'll understand what I mean tonight.

Verse 5, Genesis 5.

And all the days that hang on a minute here.

What are we doing here?

There we go.

Sorry.

And all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died.

Yes, I do believe Adam lived to be 930 years old.

We could actually discuss some scientific reasons as to why he lived so long, lay down a few facts here and there, and here and there that would make such a thing less fanciful in the minds of those who lean toward doubt.

But what good would that do?

Science is not the place we need to turn to when attempting to validate scripture.

It's not that we don't do that.

We do that quite a bit.

We'll be doing that a lot in chapter six.

But for right now, how about we just believe?

Let's just accept it as fact.

Without faith, it's impossible to please God as scripture tells us.

So let's just do that before satisfying our curiosity.

John, are you against an intelligent approach to Scripture?

Of course not.

But we should never base our faith on a sated intellect.

I mean, the letter to the Hebrews says it perfectly.

Chapter 11, verse 1.

Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Yes, study diligently.

Be prepared to give an answer for your faith, but lean not on your own understanding.

Back to Genesis, chapter 5, verse 5 again.

Genesis 5:5

And all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died.

J.

Vernon McGee refers to this next section of chapter 5 as the graveyard.

Over and over, God mentions someone and then proceeds to tell us what happened to them.

Spoiler alert, they all died.

Among other things, with this, God is making the point that when he says something, it happens.

When he said regarding that frickin' tree, as Gene Scott used to say, in the day ye eat thereof, you shall surely die.

That wasn't a suggestion, it was a fact.

And all of these men mentioned here prove God is true to his word.

They all die.

Well, except for one, we'll cover that briefly when we get to him.

Let's go back a couple verses, verse three, and catch up with the context.

And Adam lived 130 years and begat a son in his own likeness after his image and called his name Seth.

We talked a lot about that last time.

Verse 4.

And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were 800 years, and he begat sons and daughters.

And all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died.

And Seth lived 105 years and begat Enos.

Here we go.

And Seth lived after he begat Enos 807 years and begat sons and daughters.

And all the days of Seth were 912 years and he died.

And Enos lived 90 years and begat Canaan.

And Enos lived after he begat Canaan eight hundred and fifteen years and begat sons and daughters.

John, is this necessary?

If God put it in, it's necessary.

Verse 11.

And all the days of Enos were 905 years and he died.

And Canaan lived seventy years and begat Mahalalil.

And Canaan lived, and after he begat Mahalaleel 840 years and begat sons and daughters.

And all the days of Canaan were 910 years and he died.

Verse 15, and Mahalaleel lived sixty and five years and begat Jared.

And Mahalaleel lived after he begat Jared eight hundred and thirty years and begat sons and daughters.

And all the days of Mahalaleel were eight hundred and five years, and he died.

And Jared lived and hundred and hundred and sixty and two years and he begat Enoch.

And Jared lived after he begat Enoch eight hundred years and begat sons and daughters.

And all the days of Jared were nine hundred and sixty and two years, and he died.

God is making a point.

When he said you were going to die, they died.

This is grim reality.

Men come and men go.

No one's talking about paradise anymore.

No one's talking about places of protection or walks in the cool of the day.

We're not even talking about the bringing of sacrifices anymore.

This is just one unremarkable life followed by a barely noticed death.

And none of this was the way God wanted it to be.

It's foreboding, it's dark.

But as always in his word, a little light breaks in.

Verse 21.

And Enoch lived 60 and 5 years and begat Methuselah.

And Enoch walked with God after he begath.

Listen to this.

And God walked with God after he begat Methuselah.

He's the only one that gets that.

Everyone else lived a certain number of years.

We are told that Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah 300 years and begat sons and daughters.

That alone ought to tell you something interesting is on its way.

And all the days of Enoch were 360 and five years.

And Enoch walked with God and he was not, for God took him.

Up to this point, we had almost forgotten that this is a book of extraordinary events.

We were sort of starting to settle into, well, a mundane pattern.

And then it goes and says, something like this.

And all the days of Enoch were 360 and five years.

And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.

Here we have mentioned one of the most famous names in all of human history.

And little wonder, there aren't too many people of whom it can be said that they walked with God.

And as if that's not amazing enough, we are given this rather enigmatic statement.

And he was not, and Enoch was not, for God took him.

Now, I don't really plan to spend a lot of time here, but it is worth covering because I mean he was not for God took him.

But first, let's deal with this statement.

And Enoch walked with God.

It's here twice in three verses.

That makes it pretty hard to ignore.

But what does it mean?

Here's where we walk a very fine line.

There are some who say we are to take this literally.

They claim this isn't actual walking with God.

They tell you with this and other pieces of scripture, if it says that, then it's that.

You know, God never expected us to do that.

God expected us to use our brain.

There are times when if it says that, then it's that.

And then there are other times, like this one, where we have to stop and ask ourselves, does that make sense?

For example, Jesus said he was the door to the sheepfold.

Do you think Jesus was a door?

It's written that way.

Sometimes you have to think about what God is actually saying.

There are some that tell us this isn't actual walking with God.

They're telling us that Enoch actually walked with God.

And in defense of that position, those people, those scholars will remind us that Enoch was not the first to do so.

After all, they tell us his distant ancestor Adam famously did as well.

They'll say, no one argued against a literal translation back there.

Why should we hear?

Well, I'll tell you why.

Common sense.

Knowing your Bible will stop you from doing so.

Scripture tells us that at least six generations before Adam was expelled from the garden.

Adam and all of his family expelled from the garden.

That means expelled from God's presence.

When Adam was in God's presence, yes, they literally walked together, but that's not possible anymore.

Not for Enoch, not for anyone, not since the expulsion.

I mean, even Adam himself never again after the garden literally walked with God.

Why should we think such a thing possible now?

Why would it be possible in Enoch's day if generations ahead it wasn't possible?

Generations behind, I should say, it was not possible.

The expulsion wasn't undone.

Sin still stood between God and man.

No matter how good of a man Enoch was, he could not have overcome, he could not have undone the expulsion.

The only one who can undo the effects of the expulsion was Jesus himself, the Son of God himself.

Enoch was a great man, but he wasn't the son of God.

That's why we all need the gospel.

Therefore, I concur with the majority of the experts who say this was a figurative walking.

In fact, you already know that walking is a metaphor for how we conduct ourselves in this life.

Remember our study in Ephesians, chapter 4, verse 1, Paul speaking.

Ephesians 4:1

I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called.

Same chapter, verse 17.

Paul again, this I say therefore, and testify in the Lord that ye henceforth not walk as other Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind.

Next chapter, chapter five, verse eight.

For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord, walk as children of light.

In these and many other instances throughout the Bible, walking is a term used symbolically as a representation of how we conduct our lives.

Now, before I go any further, I do concede that this was a little bit more special of a walking than perhaps you and I are doing in honor of what Paul told us to do in Ephesians.

I will say that Enoch and God walked in a very special way, in a special related way.

It tells us they walked together for 365 years.

That's meaningful.

God told us that twice.

So please keep that in mind.

I'll come back to that probably next time.

Nonetheless, when we walk with God, when Enoch walked with God, it meant that the manner of his life reflected something symbolic.

The Cambridge Bible commentary puts it this way: quote, it is the picture of one who has God with him in all the various scenes of life.

I wish someone could say that about me.

I would love for someone to say that very thing about me.

So that is why we can with confidence say and should say that when we read that Enoch walked with God, it means he lived a life of piety and faith.

In fact, we get a little more information in support of this theory over in the New Testament.

In Hebrews again, chapter 11, verse 5.

We won't read it quite yet, but there we are told that Enoch pleased God, and one of the ways he did so was by his faith.

That's going to be important for us to unravel this mystery.

So Enoch walked with God means that he was obedient, pious, righteous, and had faith, faithful.

But that doesn't mean, by the way, there wasn't anything miraculous going on here.

In fact, quite the opposite.

Verse 24, and Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.

Now, as written in the King James, I always read from the King James.

You read from your Bible, but whenever I reference scripture, most of the time it's from the King James.

As written in my Bible, this is a bit of an awkward statement, kind of difficult to interpret.

The phrase, he was not, is a bit strange.

It's structured in such a way that makes it difficult for me to understand.

But if I were to look at it in the original, it actually says two things, two related things.

Let's read from the Cambridge commentary again.

I like what it has to say here.

Quote, he was not in the original, denotes.

Now listen to this, he was not in the original, denotes an unaccountable disappearance.

Who said the Bible was boring?

Enoch was no longer around, but more amazingly, he was no longer accounted for.

In other words, his whereabouts were unknown.

But this phrase is this is amazing.

This phrase is structured in such a way as to eliminate the possibility of whomever is whomever is reading that statement, it eliminates the possibility of that person assuming the one who disappeared is dead.

When you read that, you hear that he's disappeared.

He's unaccountable, but accounted, unaccounted for, but we can also read that he isn't dead.

Very mysterious.

But the Bible actually gives us the explanation of this non-dying disappearance.

It doesn't make it any easier for us to understand, but at least we get the facts.

We are told that he disappeared for God took him.

Here again, the statement is structured to make sure.

Did you hear that?

God took him.

God took Enoch.

That's why he wasn't there.

That's what the Bible said.

This is too hard for me to believe.

What does that even mean?

He took him.

Hang on.

This statement is structured to make sure that you and I don't, if we could read the Hebrew, that we don't get the impression that God took Enoch like he does everyone else through death.

That is not how that statement is read.

God took him, yes, but not through death.

That's what that statement is telling me.

In fact, the Septuagint, as you remember, that's the Greek language version of the Old Testament.

The Septuagint uses a word that translates from the Greek, interestingly, into our word translate.

Actually, remember how we referenced the letter to the Hebrews just a moment ago.

Hopefully I can clear it up with this statement.

Well, it too uses the same Greek word as the Septuagint, obviously, the same language.

There in the New Testament, the translation is very similar.

By faith, Enoch was translated.

Remember, I said it was translated into the word translated?

Right there, there it is.

By faith, Enoch was translated.

This is the same uh event.

Hebrews 11, whoever wrote the letter to the Hebrews was talking about this very event they were talking about in Genesis 5.

By faith, Enoch was translated that he should not see death and was not found because God had translated him.

For before his translation, he had this testimony that he pleased God.

God took Enoch, not through death, he took him, he translated him.

So Genesis 5, 24, the King James says, for God took him.

The Greek says, for God translated him.

Now, for some, this may seem like an odd choice of words, but if we look at Webster's definition and we put on our thinking caps, we can see that the second entry reads this translate to bear, remove or Or change from one place, state, form, or appearance to another.

Now, we normally, especially here in our Bible study, we use the word translate all the time to mean to change from one form to another.

Well, that's just only a part of the definition.

The definition says change from one place, state, form, or appearance to another.

Now, quite interestingly, the next entry states another use of the word.

I'm talking about the next entry in the Webster's dictionary.

You ready for this?

Translate, to convey to heaven or to a non-temporal condition without death.

That's the translation or that's the definition of our word translate.

Well, that's exactly why the Septuagint and the New Testament use that word, or rather the Greek counterpart.

Genesis 5, 14 is reporting that Enoch was no longer on the earth because he was translated, received up, changed from here to there, to God alive.

Enoch did not see death.

Now, just as a quick side note, Enoch is not the only one in God's word that he, God took in this way.

Enoch was not the only one God translated.

We are told that the same thing happened to that very famous prophet Elijah.

Now, no time for details now.

We'll get to that story eventually.

So Enoch is in God's presence without seeing death.

He was translated.

But why, and how, and where?

Well, according to the writer to the Hebrews, we have the why.

By faith he was translated.

That's, by the way, our key to understanding this very mysterious verse.

Now I want to admit something to you.

This has caused me some trouble.

For some weeks, I've been musing on this.

But let me say, first of all, I believe it to be true.

I believe Enoch was translated.

I believe God took him to himself.

But I've spent a great deal of time trying to figure out why.

Now, one of or two of you may answer my question by saying, look, it's simple.

Didn't the letter to the Hebrews tell you that Enoch by faith was translated?

That it was his faith that did that for him.

And then others, though agreeing that faith was a factor, will also include the fact that Enoch's piety was involved.

After all, he walked with God.

Walking with God, as we've said, was a mud is a metaphor for good, virtuous, godly living.

And I agree with all of that.

I know all that to be true.

He was a man of faith and goodness and piety.

The Bible tells us all of that.

It was what Enoch was known for, and not much else, by the way.

So I guess my real question is why him?

And let me add another question.

You don't mind if we do this, do you?

We're in this together, aren't we?

It's okay if your Bible teacher is honest enough with you to say that there are some things in Scripture that give him pause, right?

I cannot honestly teach you something that I'm not so sure about.

At least giving it a shot.

Eventually I may not understand it completely and just tell you that.

And I've done that already.

But I've got to give it a shot.

I've got to try, don't I?

Listen, I hope I've never given any of you the impression that I'm an expert of any sort.

Hey, if you're as dumb as I am, why should I listen to you?

It's a fair question.

And I guess my answer is that you don't have to listen to me if you'd rather find someone who's got this whole thing figured out.

I mean, good luck with that.

But my biggest hope is that you'll learn that it's okay if you sometimes find eternal things hard to process with your mortal brain.

I hope we're teaching that the value of trust and love is higher than the value of analyzing and knowing.

Have you ever met one of those precocious kids whose favorite phrase is, I know.

Look, there's the Big Dipper.

I know.

The president lives in Washington.

I know.

You know, if you eat slower, it's easier on your tummy.

I know.

That type is impossible to teach, impossible to guide, impossible to influence.

The best learners in life, no matter the topic, are those who feel the need to learn, who constantly feel that they don't know.

I started this Bible study in part because I wanted to get to know God's word better than I had ever in my life, which wasn't a really far-ranging goal, but I keep pushing that further out.

I just knew the only way I could be effective in spreading the gospel is if I studied it as hard as I could.

I'd be of no use to any of you if I went into this assuming you're going to feel blessed by my brilliant take on scripture.

When neither you nor I are afraid of saying, huh?

Then I think God can work with us.

It's okay to ask questions.

It's okay to be puzzled about things that are far beyond our capacity to understand.

God puts those things in his word to see how important these things are.

Are you going to give up or am I worth the effort?

So back to Enoch.

Why did God take Enoch?

Why him?

If it was only as a result of his faith and piety and righteousness, then does that mean he was the only one who was able to achieve such a level?

Now, I won't even remind you at this point of the fact that, as I said, Elijah was the other person in the Bible that was translated.

And I don't think, I don't think we can credit him with the same level of faith, piety, and righteousness.

I have to be careful about what I say about Elijah.

The Jewish people love him, but he wasn't perfect.

He had lots of flaws.

We don't know about any of Enoch's flaws because he didn't stick around long enough.

God took him.

So again, I ask why?

Why, Enoch?

It's taken me a long time to figure it out.

I'm not saying I have figured it out, but I have come to a conclusion that it can be nothing else, as far as I'm concerned.

Well, I though I believe the answer is simple, it may take us a little time to work out.

So with that in mind, I think it's probably better for us to pick it up right there next time.

See you then.

We hope this study has blessed you.

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It is our prayer that this will be so for all of our listeners.

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