Hebrews 11:5-6-5 By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.”[a] For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
In this new preaching series, we are looking one by one at the people who are listed as models of faith in Hebrews 11. Last week, we talked about Abel and how he was counted as righteous for the faith he displayed towards God. Today, we are going to talk about Enoch. These verses tell us that his faith pleased God.
Enoch was one of two Old Testament characters who didn’t taste physical death. The other person was Elijah. Enoch didn’t have to go through the dying process. God chose to simply take Enoch out of this world. He didn’t die. His body didn’t see decay. He was simply translated from earth to Heaven without a physical death. I have to believe that experience was an incredible reward for his faith in God.
We get a little more information about Enoch in Genesis 5:21-24: 21 When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. 22 After he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked faithfully with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. 23 Altogether, Enoch lived a total of 365 years. 24 Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.
It is interesting to me that the portion of Enoch’s story that we get to read about begins with him becoming the father of Methuselah. I think we can deduce something about having that son that signaled a turning point in his faith. Having a child is life-changing in every way! Often when people have children, if they have been away from the Lord, something about having a child seems to signal a need to get right, a need to raise the child up in the fear of the Lord.
God expects us to do more than keep our children fed and clothed and keep them in school and get them to dance and soccer practice; He expects us to nurture their souls, to pass on the faith, to help them find Jesus. It may seem subtle, but it is inserted into the Scripture for a reason that AFTER HE BECAME the father of Methuselah Enoch walked faithfully with God.
I wonder how he lived before that time…before he walked faithfully with God. It’s a nuance, but this text indicates a shift in his faith, an igniting of his faith, at the point his son was born. This change took place in what would be considered late in life for us at this point. He was 65 when his son was born. How many of you men in your 60’s here today would be thrilled to be welcoming a newborn into their lives? Listen, my dad’s dad was 70 years old when my dad was born. True story. Sadly, it didn’t impact him the same way it did Enoch. This shift means he didn’t walk with God for the first 65 years of his life. What that suggests to me is that it is never too late to exercise faith in God!
Some of you here today may be thinking you have missed the boat. You didn’t surrender to Christ as a child or teenager and that it is too late for you to get saved and baptized. That is not the case. If you have breath in your lungs, you can choose to faithfully follow God. He got into the Hall of Faith in Hebrews 11 because at age 65 there was a change in his life. It is not too late for any of our seasoned folks to become commendable to God! You can exercise faith today in a way that will have your story told for generations to come! God is still revealing Himself to all people young and old. Let Him change your life for the rest of your life by activating your faith!
Names, in the Hebrew culture, often signaled some kind of divine revelation. Methuselah’s name is rich with meaning. Scholars land on two meanings for his name from the Hebrew. One interpretation is that Methuselah’s name means “Man of the Dart.” Think of a spear or javelin, something that is thrown, projected forward. Another interpretation is this phrase, “When he is dead it shall be sent.” It is widely believed that when Methuselah was born, God revealed something to Enoch about what was to come, that God communicated that there was an impending judgment coming to earth. Stick with me. Methuselah was the oldest many who ever lived. Y’all, he lived 969 years. You’ve got to exercise some faith right now to even believe that don’t you? It’s true. The very year that Methuselah died, what happened? The worldwide flood happened. That was the year Noah and 7 of his family members boarded an ark and were spared and the rest of the world was wiped out. The idea is that Methuselah’s name meant, when his life would end, the judgment of God, the flood, would come. Maybe it was a discussion between God and Enoch about this impending divine judgment that caused Enoch to place his faith in God. I personally believe the grace of God was on display in Enoch’s family by allowing his children to pass away before the judgment that came with the flood.
We know God has warned us about judgment and destruction. Enoch didn’t have a Bible to read. He didn’t have the witness of those who walked with Jesus on His earthly journey. He didn’t have the stories of Pentecost and the writings of Paul about the incredible miracles that took place after Jesus ascended. We do. We have been told about the realities of Heaven and Hell. We have been given the witness of the apostles and the witness of Scripture. We know what is to come for those who place their trust in Christ and for those who don’t. Faith in Christ isn’t just a matter of personal preference. It is necessary and urgent that we walk with Him.
While we can only speculate on some of the details of Methuselah’s name, one thing is clear. The birth of a baby, the birth of his son, ignited his faith. The world was getting darker and further from God, but Enoch made a decision to walk away from that darkness and to turn fully to the Lord. The same can be said of the condition of our world today. It is getting darker. We can walk in the darkness of the world, or we can walk in the light with Jesus.
Hebrews 11:5b-6 again: For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
The turning point in Enoch’s life, the activation of his faith, made him pleasing to God. Without faith, it is impossible for any of us to be pleasing to God. Some of you here today may say, “Well, I do have faith.” Maybe you are an optimistic or hopeful person by nature, and you just believe that everything will turn out alright. Perhaps your faith is in yourself because you are a good person or at least you think you are. You try to live to serve others and you are generous. Let me be clear this morning, having faith in general isn’t the same as having salvation that comes from placing faith in Christ alone.
Don’t miss verse 6 of Hebrews 11. Your faith must be in the God of the Bible, and your faith must be the result of seeking Him. We don’t seek God plus human effort or God plus science or philosophy or new age ideas. God rewards the faith of those who earnestly seek Him and Him alone.
Enoch was recorded here because he was rewarded for his earnest faith.
To earnestly seek God, you have to believe He exists and that He wants to be found by you.
Sin can easily blind people to the reality of God’s existence and yet the evidence for God is everywhere. Psalm 19:1-4 says, 1The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2 Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. 3 They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. 4 Yet their voice[b] goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. Psalm 19:1-4
God has created all things. Start with God as Creator. Let your faith be anchored to that reality. Understand that He has a plan, an order, a design for the universe and extend that to yourself personally. He has a plan, an order, a design for your life. The Creator hasn’t taken His hands off His creation.
We know from our Hebrews 11 text that Enoch believed in these realities. He rejected the ways of the world that included idol worship. The pagan world around him tried to control and manipulate their man-made gods, believing they could escape judgment of any kind and we know leading up to the time of the flood that the perversions of their ways were rampant, heinous, and completely vile. The rejection of God led to God’s action to send the flood. Sin will thrive whenever God’s existence is rejected. You have to start your faith with an acknowledgement that God is the Creator, and the creation is accountable to Him.
Over the years that Enoch walked faithfully with God and that his children lived those living in the world were living out of control. Look at Genesis 6:5: 5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.
How immoral, how depraved, how gross would a person become whose heart was only evil all of the time? Every inclination was lustful and disgusting. God had to judge the widespread nature of sin that had taken hold of humanity. It was in that culture, in that time period, when “everyone else was doing it,” whatever “it” was, Enoch was walking faithfully with God.
Listen, it is possible to be faithful to Christ. It is possible to say “no” to sin. It is possible to choose the path of righteousness. It is possible to hold on to the revelation that God wants a relationship with us that calls us to separate ourselves from the darkness in the world. As you come to faith in God as Creator, begin to also believe and live out of the belief that God will enable you to stay faithful to Him in the midst of the worst circumstances! This is what it means that God rewards those who earnestly seek Him. He will make it possible for you to stay the course. He will embolden your faith and strengthen your heart. He will help you in times of trial and will give you reason upon reason upon reason to keep believing in Him!
Enoch acted on what he knew. God was his Creator. Listen, faith has to start somewhere. Start your faith with what has been revealed to you. God will increase your faith as you trust Him at the starting line.
I’m not suggesting you hang your faith on some shot in the dark. Let Creation point you to an Almighty and personal God. The evidence for God is overwhelming, yet we are living in a point of history when many have now been educated on Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. What was proposed as a theory has become foundational for many who now believe that everything that exists came about by random chance from pre-existing material and over billions of years. Many believe the Theory of Evolution to be truth. They believe that over time, natural, physical, and chemical processes have impacted what we now see and that every kind of plant and animal that exists has evolved from a lower form of life due to genetic mutation and natural selection. Even though this theory can’t be proven, it is widely accepted and faith in an Almighty God who is personally connected with His creation has been dismissed by the masses.
Y’all, it takes far more faith to believe in Evolution than it does to believe in the God of Creation. To think that we as complex humans with skeletal, muscular, nervous, endocrine, cardiovascular, lymphatic, respiratory, digestive, urinary, and reproductive systems developed from something oozing somewhere in the universe is ludicrous. There is no way that the way the human body works is the result of random chance.
Satan has worked overtime to deceive millions of people because he knows if he can disrupt faith at the foundational level, faith in a loving Creator God, he knows he can unravel everything that is built upon that reality. To walk with God, you must first believe He exists, and once you do, you remove the possibility that anything in this life is random or by chance.
To walk with God also means that you continue to seek Him, earnestly, sincerely, intentionally and passionately. Enoch didn’t just believe something about God one time and then forget about Him. A faith-walk with God is a daily activity, and that is that kind of faith that gets rewarded. So, not only do you need to believe that God exists and that He is responsible for Creation, but you must believe He is a rewarder, a blesser of those who seek Him. That is the motivation for the growth of your faith. If you believe He rewards faith, you will want your faith to grow all the more.
We cannot believe that after age 65 that Enoch never had a trial or problem. As Enoch made the pivot to put his faith in God, he would have the benefit of having God working actively in his life from that day forward. Enoch lived 365 years. If this is blowing your mind right now, google Answers in Genesis and look up why people lived longer before the flood than they did after. That means that even though Enoch didn’t put his faith in God until he was 65, 300 years of his life were spent with the Rewarder of his faith. Listen, life can take a lot from us. It can be filled with lots of disappointment and pain. I don’t know about you, but I need to walk with the One who has some rewards, some benefits to hand out.
Enoch so passionately and personally walked with God and experienced His goodness, that he began to preach to others. We have this evidence in Jude 1: 14-15 14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about them: “See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones 15 to judge everyone, and to convict all of them of all the ungodly acts they have committed in their ungodliness, and of all the defiant words ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”[e] 16 These people are grumblers and faultfinders; they follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage.
He had experienced something so good that he began to warn others about the consequences of not putting your faith in God. Maybe part of Enoch’s reward was boldness to preach to others.
Are we earnestly, diligently seeking God? Is acknowledging Him a weekly habit via church attendance? Is reaching for Him what we do just when there is a health scare or some other desperate need? Is life with Him a casual pursuit or a hobby like our earthly hobbies or are we really earnestly seeking Him? Listen to the words of David in Psalm 63: You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.
I don’t know anyone who is thirsty who doesn’t try to do something about it. No one who is thirsty sits around saying, “I wish I wasn’t thirsty. Boy, it would be awesome to have some water. I wish things were different right now.” No, when you are thirsty, you take action to quench your thirst. Yet, I see people who are spiritually thirsty walking around saying, “I wish God loved me as much as He seems to love so and so.” Or “I wish God cared about me and my problems” while they take no action to turn their attention or affection to Him. What actions have you taken this past week that prove you are thirsty for more of Jesus, that you are earnestly seeking Him?
2 I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. David was regular in his worship of God. How earnest are you about being here for corporate worship? Is once every six weeks enough for you? Is that how often you need God to bless you? Once every six weeks and you can manage in the in-between times? Think about it from God’s perspective. How often are you worshiping the Lord on your own throughout the week? Does it have an earnest look to it?
3 Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. The result of an earnest faith is a lifestyle of testifying to the goodness of God. How we talk about the Lord and how often we talk about Him is another proof of our faith.
4 I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. David was saying, “Hey, there is a physical, visual demonstration of my faith.” He wasn’t ashamed if people heard him and saw him demonstrating faith in the Lord.
5 I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods; Here is one of the rewards of his earnest faith. He lived satisfied, and not just satisfied, but completely satisfied…the kind of satisfied that you feel after Thanksgiving dinner. Who doesn’t want that? Is that missing in your life today? That sense of gratitude for the ways God has rewarded your faith? If the rewards of faith are missing in your life, I submit to you that an earnest faith is missing because God rewards those who earnestly seek Him. I’ve come to the simple conclusion that you can live frustrated or you can live by faith.
David went on to say: With singing lips my mouth will praise you. 6 On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. 7 Because you are my help, (another reward) I sing in the shadow of your wings. 8 I cling to you; your right hand upholds me (another reward).
Two times in Genesis 5 we read that Enoch walked with God. It was a thing, an established pattern for 300 years. You don’t repeat something for 300 years unless it is worth it. Will you evaluate and activate your faith with me today? Upon the authority of Scripture, I tell you God will reward you. It will be worth it!
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