WALKING PLEASINGLY BEFORE THE LORD

“Enoch walked with God” (Genesis 5:24). The original Hebrew meaning for walked implies that Enoch walked arm in arm with God, continually conversing with Him and growing closer to Him. Enoch lived 365 years—or, a “year” of years. In him we see a new kind of believer. The Lord was his very life—so much so that at the end of his life, he did not see death (see Hebrews 11:5).

Enoch learned to walk pleasingly before God in the midst of a wicked society. He was an ordinary man with all the same problems and burdens we carry, not a hermit hidden away in a wilderness cave, “hiding to be holy.” He was involved in life with a wife, children, obligations and responsibilities.

“Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him” (Genesis 5:24). We know from Hebrews that this verse speaks of Enoch’s translation, the fact that he did not taste death. But it also means something deeper. The phrase “he was not” as used in Genesis 5 also means “he was not of this world.” In his spirit and in his senses, Enoch was not a part of this wicked world. Each day as he walked with the Lord he became less attached to the things of the world. Like Paul, he died daily to this earth life and he was taken up in his spirit to a heavenly realm.

Yet, while he walked on Earth, Enoch undertook all his responsibilities but none of the demands of this life could keep him from his walk with God.

Hebrews 11:5 says clearly: “Before [Enoch’s] translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.” What was it about Enoch that pleased God so much? It was that his walk with God produced in him the kind of faith God loves.

These two verses cannot be separated: “Before [Enoch’s] translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God. But without faith it is impossible to please him” (Hebrews 11:5-6). We hear this latter verse often, but rarely in connection with the former. Yet, throughout the Bible and all of history those who walked closely with God became men and women of deep faith. If the Church is walking with God daily, communing with Him continually, the result will be a people full of faith—true faith that pleases God.