WALKING INTO THE SUNSET
Big Faith Series-Part 2
Hebrews 11:5-6; Genesis 5:21-24
Sunday, July 23, 2006
Pastor Brian Matherlee
Introduction
I was sitting by the ocean when a man and his sons came by. The father was a tall man and one son was an older teen while the younger son was no more than 8. The father was walking where footprints last until the next wave. The little boy was doing all he could to walk in his father’s footsteps. They were big strides and he had to work at staying in the footprints. He would get a little behind and the waves would wash the prints away so that he had to hurry up to where he could see them again. The older son was walking side by side with his father talking and keeping in step regardless of the waves.
Sometimes it seems we are like the little boy, trying for all we are worth to walk like our heavenly Father but having things wash away the clarity of the path we are to take. Wouldn’t we rather our walk with God to be like the older son? A fellowship where we are with Him?
Today we look at a man who knew the intimacy of walking with God.
What set Enoch apart?
1. He didn’t just live—He walked with God
a. Noah also walked with God
b. The Hebrew word (‘halak’) gives the idea that there was a constant coming and going with God
c. Everyone else in the list, lived and died but Enoch had something change when he was 65 and then he walked and never died.
d. I wonder what it was that changed for Enoch?
2. He didn’t die
a. Adam and Eve had the opportunity to walk with God and their sin separated them from that fellowship and they brought death upon themselves. They could have lived on.
b. Enoch never died. Elijah never died. These were the first two men who didn’t experience death. But they won’t be the last.
c. I Thessalonians 4:16, “For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. 18 Therefore encourage each other with these words.”
3. He pleased God
a. He was commended as one who pleased God. The original Greek word and phrase is more accurately translated in the King James Version, “before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.” Everybody has a testimony—a reputation and pleasing God was Enoch’s reputation. Someone has said Enoch had an epitaph on a tombstone he never used.
b. Nowhere does the Bible tell us Enoch was perfect. It doesn’t say he never made mistakes and certainly doesn’t hint that he was a sinless person. But his faith in God led him seek God’s presence, a relationship, a life of increasing fellowship that forsook sin and embraced holiness.
c. 1 Thessalonians 4
d. Will is the whole man active. I cannot give up my will; I must exercise it. I must will to obey. When God gives a command or a vision of truth, it is never a question of what He will do, but what we will do. To be successful in God’s work is to fall in line with His will and to do it His way. All that is pleasing to Him is a success.
Henrietta Mears, Dream Big: The Henrietta Mears Story, quoted in Christianity Today, June 21, 1993, Page 41.
e. It is interesting, and not coincidental, that Enoch is the seventh, counting Adam, from Seth’s line and is the embodiment of pure faith. Lamech, seventh in the line of Cain, embodies evil.
4. He believed God existed
a. Now, this may be too obvious but, of course, you have to believe God exists to approach faith.
b. This emphasizes the fact of God’s presence
c. I read about a small Oklahoma town that had two churches and one bar. Members of both churches complained that the bar was giving the community a bad imagine. And to make matters worse the owner of the bar was an out spoken atheist. He didn’t believe in God one bit. The church people had tried unsuccessfully for years to shut down the bar. So finally they decided to hold a joint Saturday night prayer meeting. They were going to ask God to intervene and settle the matter. The church folks gathered on Saturday night and there was a horrible thunderstorm raging outside and to the delight of the church members lightning hit that old bar and it burned to the ground.
The next morning the sermons in both churches were on the power of prayer.
But the insurance adjusters promptly notified the bar owner that they were not going to pay for the damages because the fire was an act of God and that was an exclusion in the policy. The bar owner was furious and he sued both churches claiming that they had conspired with God to destroy his business. But the churches denied that they had anything to do with the cause of the fire.
The presiding judge opened the trial with theses words: “ I find one thing in this cause most perplexing-we have a situation here where the plaintiff, an atheist is professing his belief in the power of prayer, and the defendants all faithful church members are denying the very same power.”
d. James 2:19, “You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that--and shudder.
e. The believing knowledge that God exists is not saving faith.
5. He believed God would reward the earnest seeker
a. This brings Biblical morality into focus
b. Nowhere does the Bible tell us Enoch was perfect. It doesn’t say he never made mistakes and certainly doesn’t hint that he was a sinless person. But his faith in God led him seek God’s presence, a relationship, a life of increasing fellowship that forsook sin and embraced holiness.
c. Enoch’s life was different at a point in time. The Scripture says he lived and then he walked with God. You can do a lot of living and not be walking with God.
Remember the story I told at the beginning about the two sons walking with their father? Which one are you more like? Are you like the older son, walking side by side and stride for stride with the father? Are you like the younger son, trying to follow the footsteps but having trouble keeping up because life is washing the clarity of the path away? Are you not even on the beach?
The song we played earlier, “Just Give Me Jesus”, is the key to a life like Enoch lived.
