God Took Enoch by Gerard Hoet
If you’ve read many folk tales or children’s stories, you know they often feature repeated lines or refrains. These refrains not only help us remember the story, but they often show us its main point.
Take the tale of The Three Little Pigs, for instance. When you hear “Little pig, little pig, let me come in,” you probably know exactly what comes next. Who can forget all the repeated lines in this story?
Once a story’s pattern of refrains is established, we know to watch for something to change. In The Three Little Pigs, the wolf “huffed and puffed” twice, and each time he blew down a little pig’s house. But at the third little pig’s house, the one built with sturdy bricks, the wolf “huffed and puffed, but he could not blow the house down.” This change in the refrain points to the story’s lesson: Wisdom and hard work paid off for the third little pig, and they will pay off for us, too.
When we read Genesis 5, which is the Old Testament passage containing the story of Enoch, the second person in the Hebrews 11 hall of faith, it helps to read the text a bit like we would read a folk tale. Of course, it’s true history, not a folk tale, but to record the history, Moses used a series of repeated lines with some unexpected changes. And just as the changes to the refrains of children’s stories are significant, so are the pattern changes in the historical account in this chapter. There’s a whole lot of meaning smuggled into small differences in the wording.
Genesis 5 is the genealogy of the main line of Adam’s descendants. It includes nine men, and follows a pattern—a series of repeated phrases—for each man on the list. Each one lived a very long life, had children, “and then he died.”
Except for Enoch. The record of his life doesn’t follow the pattern.
Enoch was 65 years old when he fathered Methuselah. And after he fathered Methuselah, Enoch walked with God 300 years and fathered other sons and daughters. So Enoch’s life lasted 365 years. Enoch walked with God; then he was not there because God took him. (Genesis 5:21-24 CSB).
Like the other men, Enoch lived and had children, but just when we expect to hear, “and then he died,” there’s a twist. “Then he was not there,” we read, “because God took him.”
This is a mysterious statement, isn’t it? What does it mean to be taken by God? One thing is sure: Enoch didn’t die, or Moses would have ended his account of Enoch’s life with the same line he used for the others. The other eight men died, but something different happened to Enoch. He just disappeared one day when God took him.
Enoch lived his life differently, too. The other eight men just lived their lives, but Enoch “walked with God”—and Moses described his life this way twice for emphasis.
When I was a child, I heard this phrase and imagined Enoch taking an afternoon stroll with God. But of course, “walked with God” is a figure of speech, and not meant to be understood literally. From Moses’s description of Noah, who also “walked with God” we know walking with God means living a righteous life (Genesis 6:9). Or to put it another way, to “walk with God” is to live a life that pleases him, which is why the Septuagint, a Greek translation of the Old Testament, translated “Enoch walked with God” as “Enoch pleased God.” This is what the figure of speech “walked with God” means.
These three verses are all the Old Testament says about Enoch, but it’s enough for author of Hebrews to include him in the hall of faith in Hebrews 11. Here’s what he wrote about Enoch:
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.” For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 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 (Hebrews 11:5-6 NIV?).
Just as he did with Abel, the author reasoned that since Enoch “pleased God” (He followed the language of the Septuagint.), and since it’s impossible to please God without faith, Enoch was a man of faith. Enoch knew God was there, he believed God was good, and he regularly sought him out (verse 6). We might say that Enoch had a deep and lasting relationship with God. And he lived his life waiting patiently for the reward he knew would come.
The author of Hebrews noticed the way the refrains changed in the verses about Enoch in Genesis, and knew this was significant. He saw the different ending of Enoch’s life—being taken from this life without experiencing death—as the direct result of the different way he lived. God rewarded Enoch for his faithfulness by bringing him to himself.
For the first readers of Hebrews, who were feeling cultural pressure to abandon the Christian faith, Enoch’s life is an example of someone for whom remaining faithful paid off. And it probably wasn’t easy for him to live a life of consistent faithfulness. After all, he lived only three generations before the flood when God wiped out all of civilization because of its wickedness. Do you think the culture was a whole lot less evil in his time? It’s likely Enoch was pressured to abandon his faith, but he kept on trusting God.
Like Enoch, if we are going to please God, it will be by faith. Yes, he is delighted by our obedience, but true obedience is the fruit of a faith. It can only come from a heart that loves God. Like Enoch, we will only truly walk with God when we trust that he is good, and that his goodness overflows to those who seek him.
It is by faith that we will receive our reward, too. We won’t skip death like Enoch did (although those who are still alive when Christ returns will), but we will be raised from the dead. And we will be with him, which for those who desire him more than anything else, is the best reward there is.
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