Walking With God

Walking With God

Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away. –Genesis 5:24 (NIV)

Enoch’s whole life is told in six verses. We don’t know all that much about him except that he is a standout in a long list of genealogy. He stands out for a couple of reasons. First, he stands out because he “walked with God.” For all of the others in the long list of descendants from Adam to Noah, we read that so-and-so “lived” X number of years. But it doesn’t say that Enoch lived three hundred years; it says Enoch walked with God three hundred years. You see, there’s a big difference between walking with God and merely living.

The second way Enoch stands out is that for all of the other descendants the text says, “then he died.” But for Enoch, we read, “God took him away.” He never experienced physical death. He walked with God on the same path, at the same pace, toward the same place. Enoch enjoyed the presence of God so fully, God simply brought him to himself.

We read about Enoch again in the list of heroes of faith found in Hebrews 11. “It was by faith that Enoch was taken up to heaven without dying—‘suddenly he disappeared because God took him.’ But before he was taken up, he was approved as pleasing to God” (Hebrews 11:5). To be commended as one who pleased God seems out of our reach, doesn’t it? When we read of someone who “walked with God,” someone “approved as pleasing to God,” we quickly dismiss the possibility as available only to an elite superspiritual few, people who lived in Bible times. We assume that it will never be possible in this life to actually walk with God, to truly be pleasing to God.

But the truth is, you can walk with God and please God. As you walk with him in faith, simply and consistently—by talking with him, listening to him, and sharing your life with him; by not running ahead of him or dragging your feet in what he has called you to do; and by diligently seeking him—you bring him pleasure. Are you seeking the approval of God? He is not looking for great feats of faith or some super-self-denying commitment to service. He simply wants to walk with you day by day. He wants to begin and end the day with you, for you to be aware of his presence every moment in between. Won’t you keep walking in his direction and enjoying his presence?

God, I don’t want to wait for heaven to begin to walk with you and bring you pleasure. And I don’t want to merely live. I long to walk with you and experience your presence and pleasure in my life.

DIGGING DEEPER