What can we learn from Enoch?

Walking with God doesn’t mean running from ordinary life: Enoch did it for three hundred years while raising “sons and daughters” (Gen 5:22). Pleasing God comes through faith: believing that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him (Heb 11:6). In a generation marked by violence, one faithful man can announce God’s judgment clearly (Jude 14-15). Death does not have the last word: Enoch’s being taken up feeds the hope of life with God beyond this earth (Gen 5:24).

The early world · before the Flood

Enoch in the Bible

The man who walked with God. Name meaning: Probably “dedicated” or “consecrated” (the Hebrew sense); the New Testament also speaks of him as Enoch (Heb 11:5; Jude 14)

Seventh from Adam through the line of Seth, Enoch is the father of Methuselah and the great-grandfather of Noah. In the genealogy of Genesis 5, where nearly every life ends with “and he died,” his is the exception: “Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him” (Gen 5:24). Hebrews 11 holds him up as a model of the faith that pleases God, and Jude records his prophecy of judgment.

Main books: Genesis

Key moments

Born to Jared, seventh from Adam Genesis 5:18
Fathers Methuselah at sixty-five Genesis 5:21
Walks with God for three hundred years Genesis 5:22
Prophesies the Lord’s coming in judgment Jude 14
God takes him: he does not see death Genesis 5:24
Named among the heroes of faith Hebrews 11:5

Strengths

Closeness with God
Faith
Perseverance
Everyday faithfulness
Prophetic courage

Weaknesses

Scripture records no failing of Enoch’s, but it also says very little about him. That doesn’t make him a man without sin: it was “by faith” that he pleased God (Heb 11:5-6).

Lessons for today

Walking with God doesn’t mean running from ordinary life: Enoch did it for three hundred years while raising “sons and daughters” (Gen 5:22).
Pleasing God comes through faith: believing that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him (Heb 11:6).
In a generation marked by violence, one faithful man can announce God’s judgment clearly (Jude 14-15).
Death does not have the last word: Enoch’s being taken up feeds the hope of life with God beyond this earth (Gen 5:24).

And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.

Genesis 5:24

By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God. But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

Hebrews 11:5–6

And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

Jude 14–15

People around Enoch

Jared — Father
Methuselah — Son, who died at nine hundred and sixty-nine
Noah — Great-grandson, who also “walked with God”
Adam — Ancestor, still alive for 308 years of Enoch’s life (by Gen 5)
Elijah — The other man taken up without experiencing death

Stories with Enoch

Enoch Walks with God

Quiz: how well do you know Enoch?

How old was Enoch when God took him?

Which son did Enoch father at the age of sixty-five?

Complete the verse: “Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for…”

There are many more questions like these in Bible Academy, each with its explanation and verse. Start your free trial.