Draw near to God and He will draw near to you (James 4:8)
This has been God's heart cry throughout the ages: a people who would desire to know Him in response to His desire for us. God actually yearns for us. This has been His deepest cry since the beginning of time. After Adam sinned, God's first words were not a proclamation of judgment; rather, ''Adam, where are you?'' Can you hear His earnest heart cry, ''Why are you hiding from Me?''. This week we will trace God's longing for man through the course of History. We will start today with the story of Enoch, Adam's great, great, great, great grandson.
I believe the day came when Enoch went to Adam and asked him to tell of his time in the garden. He wanted to know what it was like to actually walk with the living God. You may wonder, how could Enoch speak with his great, great, great, great grandfather? In answer: when you live to be 930 years old, you will see your great, great.......grandchildren. Adam was only 622 years old when Enoch was born. Mathematically, the Bible tells us Adam was 687 years of age when Enoch approached him at the age of 65. This is deduced from the Genesis account of Enoch's walk with God lasting three hundred years though he lived to be 365. ''Enoch walked with God three hundred years, and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years''. (Genesis 5:22-23).
It is probable therefore, that at age 65 years of age is when it all changed for Enoch, when he drew the blessing and heartache from the lips of the patriarch Adam. I can only imagine, and I have no writings to back this, that it took Enoch years to muster up the courage to go to his renowned ancestor to inquire of the garden, because Adam was not one to freely talk about it. All of Adam's descendants knew this, and more than likely warned Enoch from a young age not to discuss it with Adam.
Historic Jewish writings tell of the depression Adam suffered after being driven from the garden. The weight of it was almost unbearable. Some writings tell how Adam and Eve sat in darkened caves unable to look at one another for the shame of what had happened.
Adam had lost his splendor. It is one thing to hear of the promise of walking with God, but quite another to have lost the tangible actuality of dwelling in His glory. Adam had suffered an unspeakable loss, but Enoch pressed in and took Adam's ancient account of heartache and mixed it with faith and expectancy. Though generations had muttered among themselves their disappointment at Adam's loss, Enoch perceived a promise, ''I will walk with God.''
I can just imagine the encounter between the two. Enoch trembled, but his passion finally outweighed his fear. Through the trembling shadow of defeat, he pressed in and believed for the light of something more. For him, Adam's story was more than a tale of failure; it was a revelation of the ultimate desire of God to walk with man. I have to wonder if Adam caught a glimpse of Enoch's fire as he transferred the distant blessing found in the memory of his life in the garden of paradise.
Adam wept as he relayed his heart-wrenching account: ''Enoch, I walked with God.... in His glory. The Creator of the universe, the Maker of all you see, walked beside me! He shared the intimate wisdom of His master plan; how He placed and arranged the stars of the universe with His fingers. Those very fingers created me as well as held my hand. He called each star by name and set them as signs for navigation and seasons. He showed me how He balanced the earth with gravitational and electromagnetic fields, and created a perfect climate. He shared the secret of the seed and how it brings forth life after its kind; how it was watered by the springs of the deep, strategically placed throughout the earth. Enoch, He trusted me with the privilege of naming all the animals-over five billion species of them! We discussed them together, but He left the final choice to me!''
The more Adam spoke the hungrier Enoch became, until the passion overwhelmed him. He must walk with God as Adam had; he would not be denied.
Enoch even inherited something Adam did not; the dust of Adam returned to the earth, but Genesis tells us, ''And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him'' (Genesis 5:24). He left this earth without seeing death.
In his life Enoch was a great prophet. He spoke to his day as well as prophesied to our own. He prophesied of the impostors who would arise in the church in the last days, acting as if, and even believing, they were saved by grace, and the judgment that would follow (see Jude 1-15). He saw the visions of God's judgment, declaring the Lord's second coming thousands of years before His virgin birth.
Why did God take him when he was only 365 years old? Was it because of this great prophetic ministry? No, it was because he ''walked with God,'' and the book of Hebrews tells this ''pleased God'' (Hebrews 11:5). Don't get me wrong, His walk with God produced a powerful and effective ministry, but it was his burning desire to know God intimately that pleased the Lord. He had touched the longing in God's heart, an intimate relationship with Him, the way He longs for us.
I pray that the Holy Spirit will put in your spirit a burning desire to know and walk with God. God bless you richly.
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