O.T. Enoch raptured prior to global flood
“Real Life Adventures – Enoch”
- Good morning and welcome to Cross Creek… We’re glad you’re here!
- We’re in a series entitled Real Life Adventures, where we look at real people that experienced life like us… People born and raised, married, built families, suffered and triumphed… Expressed Spiritually…
- The Bible is the authoritative Word of God… God’s very Words communicated to us in written form
Romans 15:4 For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.
- Everything was written to teach us… To help us understand our lives… God, Jesus, death, sin, eternity…
- Many people today search for answers to life from within our own intellect, philosophers, religions
- This morning we’re be looking at a man named Enoch… A tiny story woven in scripture with huge meaning… A little story that carries a big lesson! Is the return of Christ soon? What will it be like? More importantly am I ready?
- It’s been estimated by scholars there’s over 1800 references in the Old Testament concerning the second coming of Christ back to earth… In the New Testament there are over 300… Huge emphasis
- There also seems to be a growing hunger to know the future… What’s happening in our world today?
- We find a very interesting story in the opening chapters of Genesis about a man named Enoch…
- We read about God’s creation… Adam Sin entering the world… “In the day you eat of the tree you will surely die”… He ate, he died… We read over and over again “and he died…” Until we come to Enoch…
- Who just vanished without a trace… Look at the man, the multitudes, the message, and the mystery!
Background…
- The MAN – Enoch’s faith relationship with God.
Genesis 5:21-24 21 [Father was Jared] When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. 22 And after he became the father of Methuselah, [Remember him, we’ll come back to him soon] Enoch walked with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. 23 Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years. 24 Enoch walked with God…
- Something changed for Enoch AFTER Methuselah was born that most likely rocked Enoch’s world…
- But notice Enoch’s faith… Enoch walked with God… Enoch walked with God… Mentioned twice places a special emphasis on his relationship with the Lord… The longevity of human life just after creation and before the flood was because of many reasons… Good DNA gene pool, few biological mutations causing cancers, illnesses, diseases… Canopy surrounding earth before the flood produced perfect environment, filtering harmful radiation… Enoch was 65 when Methuselah born, he walked with God means he was in fellowship with God… A personal relationship of faith lasting another 300 years
- Why the birth of his son prompt him to walk with God… Perhaps God gave him a warning… The name Methuselah actually means, “when he is dead, it shall come” or “when he is gone it shall come”… Enoch perhaps moved in fear with this warning from God… Speaking of coming flood
- Like Adam, Enoch was the 7th from Adam walked with God… Enoch knew God personally… Trusted Him
- The book of Hebrews in the New Testament also speaks of Enoch’s faith relationship with God…
Hebrews 11:5 5 By faith Enoch… was commended as one who pleased God.
- Enoch is listed in God’s hero’s of faith… Along with Moses, Abraham, David, Abel, etc
- We’re given a little more information that Enoch was commended as one who pleased God… If we want to please God we must do so in faith… From start to finish our salvation rest upon our faith… But not faith in just anything or anybody… ONLY faith resting in a person named Jesus Christ… Son of God
- We cannot go to heaven via good works, giving money, volunteering time for good things… we are save by grace through faith plus nothing! Genuine Faith in Jesus is what saves us and pleases God!
- The MULTITUDES – Enoch lived in a culture of corruption.
Genesis 6:11-13 11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.
- Many verses… After mankind was plummeted into sin, sin manifested through wickedness, evil, murders, violence, anger, jealousy, drunkenness, immorality, hatred… Why we have issues today, why we have death itself today… The soul that sins, it shall die… Death reigns king of terror… Corrupt culture was everywhere… ALL the people had corrupted their ways… Earth filled with violence…
- Consequence was devastating destruction of the people and the earth itself… Hence Noah’s flood…
- Today, evidence is seen everywhere on earth, every continent… global flood as the fountains of the deep aquafers burst forth and the canopy collapsed, raining forty days & nights…
- We cannot look around our world and not see so much corruption and evil also… We only see surface sin… God sees deep into the hearts of men… God declares that all have sinned… Even you and me…
- Enoch walked with God, he had a personal relationship with the Lord in a godless generation… The short book of Jude in the New Testament gives us insight on Enoch’s activities… He was a preacher…
- The MESSAGE – Enoch preached the 2nd coming of Christ.
Jude 1:14-15 14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men: “See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones 15 to judge everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of all the ungodly acts they have done in the ungodly way, and of all the harsh words ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”
- His message was about the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ! This ties in exactly w/ Rev 19:11-16
- Jesus Christ returns to earth w/ His heavenly angelic armies of heaven & fights battle of Armageddon
- Enoch was preaching to the godless culture of his days… The Lord is coming… He will judge!
- The Man Enoch was righteous… The multitudes godless… The message was Lord is coming to judge
- The MYSTERY – Enoch’s translation before coming judgment.
Genesis 5:24 24 Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.
- Remember Methuselah? His name means, “when he is gone, it shall come”… The very day Methuselah died, the deluge began… God’s judgment fell destroying all life except those on the ark of safety… Interesting too Methuselah was the oldest recorded person in the Bible at 969… Ties in with 2Pet 3:9 “God is longsuffering, not willing that anyone perish but everyone come to repentance”
- God waited in the days of Noah as Enoch preached, as Noah preached… God’s Word went forth… Yet for the moist part the multitudes rejected their message, rejected truth, rejected God… And perished
- Noah’s flood struck the earth with devasting consequences… But before the global deluge God’s man Enoch was taken away, he was no more… Ties in perfectly to the coming 7year tribulation period on earth… The prophetic signs are everywhere… Culture of corruption, getting in & out of marriage, escalation of wickedness, even post birth abortions, apostasy, evil, terrorism & violence, sophistication of sin… Time is ripe for the appearance of the Antichrist and his identification mark! Lots of verses…
- Before the flood, Enoch walked with God, then he was no more, because God took him away!
- Old testament is clear concerning Enoch’s translation… New testament broadens it out more…
Hebrews 11:5 5 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.
- Enoch was taken from “this life”… Enoch did not “experience death”… Enoch could not “be found”…
- Reason why… Because God had “taken him away”… “he was taken”… He was caught up, he’s raptured before the worldwide flood… Just as Christians will be raptured before the worldwide 7yr tribulation
- Enoch is an Old Testament “picture” of a future “rapture” event… Look at these words…
1 Corinthians 15:50-53 50 I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, [you & I are flesh/blood… Can’t survive in heaven… Like fish] nor does the perishable [those who died, rotting] inherit the imperishable. 51 Listen [pay careful attention, listen up], I tell you a mystery: [something previously unknown, now God reveals it] We will not all sleep [die], but we will all be changed-[made different]- 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead [believers who have died] will be raised imperishable [nondecaying, immortal], and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.[deathlessness, forever alive]
- The coming of Jesus is Imminent (could happen at any time, nothing more needs to be fulfilled)
- The coming of Jesus is Sudden (God tells us in a flash, the twinkling of the eye 1/150 of a second)
- The coming of Jesus is Selective (Only those who are ready, sins forgiven thru God’s Son Jesus)
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 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.
- Global supernatural disappearance of all believers… The left behind will blame it on UFO’s, aliens
- Hundreds of verses (Rev 3:10, 1Thes 5:9, Mt 24, 2Thes 2:1-9, Dan 9:24-27, Rev 13, Rev 22:12-21, etc)
- Each person within hearing this message MUST answer the question… Am I ready? You can be!
Application… Running a race… A race called life… We must get it right
- Remember the cost! God loves you, sent Son for you, He died for you, Receive Him into your life!
1 Corinthians 1:18 18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
- Rekindle the walk! If there ever was a time to come clean and walk with your Lord it is now!
Colossians 1:10 10 “… that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God…
- Rescue the lost! Who can you pray for, who do you love enough to make a difference? Share ur faith!
Matthew 24:37-39 37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
- Reap the reward! How we live our lives matters… Let’s win the race and receive eternal rewards!
1 Thessalonians 1:9-10 9 for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead–Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath. Rev 22:12 “Behold, I am coming soon, my reward is with me, to give to everyone according what he has done”