Intro: Genesis is a book of beginnings. Here in the fifth chapter of Genesis it is called the book of generations of Adam (5.1). However, as you take a stroll down the verses of chapter five it is more like taking a walk through the cemetery. Again and again we read and he died, and he died, and he died. It has been called the desert of death. Here it seems there is no purpose or promise other than death and taxes. But if you look close enough in the desert of death there is a lily of life. There is a bloom in the barrenness. The name of that flower is Enoch. Here in the Old Testament we have only 51 words about this man. How can we learn about leaving a legacy in so few words? We also have ninety-four words in the New Testament that tell us about the legacy of faith that Enoch left. How can we learn anything from 145 verses in the Bible. Remember that we are told of the creation of the universe in 31 verses in Genesis chapter one.
Man has the problem of using many words and saying little. God has the ability to say volumes with simple words.
Some examples: John 3.16, John 11.35 Jesus Wept, Genesis 1.1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. God can say so much with so few words. Here in this barren desert of death he says there is hope, there is life.
Hope is found in four simple words, “Enoch walked with God.” The real measure of our life is not how much people say about us when we are gone instead, it is found in what is said about us.
I. By faith we can know God
If you look closely at what 5.21, 22 you find out that Enoch was just like us. Enoch did not always walk with God. The Bible clearly says that he lived 65 years became the father of Methuselah and then walked with God. What made Enoch turn toward God and away from the world? What could have impacted him in order to change the way he walked. In the Bible and the ancient world walk tells us about one’s continued course of action, and life in other words the habitual habit and manner of your life. Something happened to change the manner and habit of Enoch’s life. Can we find out what it is form the Bible? Certainly we can!
A) The Danger of walking without God
The answer is found in the name of the child that Enoch fathered. You may know that Methuselah is the said to be the oldest person that ever lived. Methuselah is said to have lived 969 years and he too succumbed to the desert of death. But what else can we find out about Methuselah’s name. Methuselah means “When he dies it will be sent, or it will come.” But what was to be sent? Methuselah was the warning of the great flood to come and judge the world of its sin and rejection of God. How can we know this? Listen closely for just a moment.
Genesis 5.25 tells us Methuselah was 187 years old when he became the father of Lamech.
Then the Bible tells us that Lamech was 182 when he became the father of Noah. Whne you add 187 and 182 you get 369 the age of Methuselah when Noah was born. When did the flood come? Genesis 7.11 in the 600th year of Noah’s life. When you add 600 and 369 you get 969 which is the age of Methuselah lived according to Genesis 5.27.
Methuselah was the warning to Enoch. Enoch was shown the danger of walking without God. It was the birth of His son used to prophecy his need for God. In the same way Immanuel, Jesus, God with us, it was His birth that showed us the need for a Savior, our need for God.
B) The Declaration of walking with God
Genesis 5.22 “Then Enoch walked with God.” After realizing the danger of walking without God and receiving the grace of God Enoch walked with God.
All of us must declare like Enoch I walk with God. How do we do that? We first recognize that we are sinners. Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. We confess we are sinners agreeing with God’s assessment of us and we confess Jesus as Lord.
We declare our walk with God through Baptism. We follow in scriptural Baptism as an outward sign of an inward change. It is not only by our words but by our actions that we declare our walk. Enoch Walked with God. His manners and habits changed. He was no longer conformed to the world but was being shaped by the hand of God.
II. By faith we can please God
Hebrews 11.5”By faith Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death; and He was not found because God took Him up; for he obtained the witness that before his being taken up he was pleasing to God.”
He pleased God. You say that was easy in His time. Enoch didn’t have the pressures and problems we do today. Oh really! Why did God send the flood? Why was God sorry He made man and grieved in the heart? Genesis 7.5 “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
God sent the flood to cleanse a world that was completely wicked. We are just like the days of Noah. These were the days in which Enoch lived. He did not live in a vachum only surrounded by Christians. He didn’t have it easy. For Enoch to walk with God meant he was swimming upstream. He was walking differently than most of the people of his day. Yet he pleased God!
The little book of Jude the book before Revelation tells us a little about the day of Enoch.
Jude 14, 15 “It was also about these men that Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold the Lord came with many thousands of His holy ones, to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.”
Enoch pleased God in a very ungodly time. It was by his faith that he pleased God. What is faith? Faith is believing what God says. Somehow the word of God came to Enoch and he believed God. He believed God and named His child according to that warning.
Do you remember someone else that God said this about? When Jesus was baptized the voice of God trumpeted from heaven, This is my beloved son in whom I’m well pleased. It was Jesus! When you please God you are Christ-like.
III. By faith we can leave a legacy for others
What is the legacy left by Enoch? He walked with God and pleased God by faith. That is the legacy that will live on forever. When we leave this life if we did not walk with God by faith it is impossible for God to be pleased with us.
Many of the people you have seen on the screen today left a legacy. I didn’t have the privilege of knowing many of them, but I have learned of some of their legacies. I heard about that man, or woman was such a godly man, such a great teacher of the Bible. They walked with God. They believed what God said and passed it on to others.
I wonder what God would say if he looked at the churches that are meeting around the world today, in the US, in MO, here at Perche? Would God find many that please Him? Enoch walked with God. Enoch was not for God took Him. We find out in the New Testament He was taken because He pleased God. How many today that sit in pews, or seats, or on dirt floors, or bleachers could that be said of? He or She pleased God.
No matter what others think I believe Adrian Rogers was a man of God and great wisdom in God’s Word. He said something that all of us should hear, “For if I displease God, it doesn’t matter who I please and if I please god it doesn’t matter whom I displease.”
Conclusion: What is so important to leave behind to friends and family? Is it a great fortune, a huge estate, a grand reputation? The greatest legacy we could ever leave is that we walked with God and pleased God. When all is said and done with your life what will your legacy be?
