SPEAKER_00: Let's uh let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, thank you for today.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for a great time to laugh and encourage each other and have joy.
SPEAKER_00: We are grateful, as we've been talking about, through the month of November, and as we talked about Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: We're grateful for Jesus for salvation in his name.
SPEAKER_00: I'm grateful for the time we have these guys to we're able to encourage each other each week.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray, Father, now you'll encourage us from your word.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you most of all, and we are grateful most of all for the gift of salvation that comes through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: In his name we pray, and everybody said, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we uh are gonna embark on a fascinating journey as a church family.
SPEAKER_00: Starting January 1, we are going to do as a church the study of the chronological Bible.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna read, we have a reading plan, we have resources that support that.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna read our way in chronological order through Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: So Nahom does not happen chronologically where it sits in your Old Testament structure, right?
SPEAKER_00: The Bible is structured according to topics and types of books for, you know, back in the history when they put it together in that order.
SPEAKER_00: They felt like that was the right way to do it, but that chronologically it's important to sort of study that.
SPEAKER_00: So this Sunday, I'm gonna be casting vision for that in both of our churches and uh both of our campuses and talking about why we're gonna do that.
SPEAKER_00: One of the many reasons why it's good to study the Bible in an orderly fashion like that, in a chronological fashion, is it means that we cover all of it, and there are all kinds of fascinating, incredible things tucked away throughout the expanse of Scripture that we never stop and either catch or pay attention, pay enough attention to.
SPEAKER_00: And so as I've been preparing for January and working my way through that, and as I was preparing for Sunday to cast vision on while we're doing that, I just ran across one of those moments.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Charlene keeps me on track.
SPEAKER_00: December schedule, make sure you have all that, and uh and what we're doing.
SPEAKER_00: So December 15th through January 4th, kitchens closed.
SPEAKER_00: That's what matters to us.
SPEAKER_00: Uh this Sunday uh we have our churchwide celebration and Christmas musical Sunday afternoon.
SPEAKER_00: Love to invite you to come, bring somebody with you.
SPEAKER_00: All right, so here's what we're gonna look at: the life, the value of a life well lived with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Genesis chapter 5, verse 21 tells the story of a man named Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: We have about six verses in Scripture that mention Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: We have a couple right here in Genesis.
SPEAKER_00: We have one in the book of Jude, and we have one in the book of Hebrews, chapter 11.
SPEAKER_00: And so you think, how many times have you heard a sermon on Enoch?
SPEAKER_00: When's the last time, if you have heard one, when's the last time you heard anybody preach a sermon on Enoch?
SPEAKER_00: And yet here's an incredible story and picture and spiritual uh impact uh tucked away here in the book of Genesis, and it's actually in the list of genealogies.
SPEAKER_00: So if you go to Genesis chapter 5, the whole thing, it's nothing but a list of genealogies.
SPEAKER_00: And as we are wont to do, most of the time we skip over stuff like that to get to the interesting parts, right?
SPEAKER_00: But here, tucked away in this uh deal is an incredible man of value, and he shows us the value of a life well lived with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So let's take a minute and look at Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 21 Enoch was 65 years old when he fathered Methuselah.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm only 60.
SPEAKER_00: I can't imagine in five more years.
SPEAKER_00: I just can't figure that out.
SPEAKER_00: My wife etched this verse out of her scripture.
SPEAKER_00: She said, Don't get any delusions of grandeur.
SPEAKER_00: We're not doing that.
SPEAKER_00: Enoch was 65 old when he fathered Methuselah.
SPEAKER_00: After the birth of Methuselah, Enoch walked with God 300 years and fathered other sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: So Enoch's life lasted 365 years.
SPEAKER_00: Enoch walked with God, then he was not there because God took him.
SPEAKER_00: It's an incredible picture right there, tucked away in this list.
SPEAKER_00: And so, just a few thoughts as I considered that and prayed my way through that, I want to share with you.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the first thing: God desires a life lived in fellowship with him.
SPEAKER_00: This is what God's picture is, and this is the heart of God, and this is what he desires to happen.
SPEAKER_00: He wants to walk in fellowship this same way with every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: It is powerful in this moment.
SPEAKER_00: When you think of all the stories of Elijah who calls down fire from heaven, and Noah who builds the ark, and Moses leads the people out of bondage, and King David and King Solomon and all the riches, and Paul plants churches all over the known world, and all these guys with all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Right here is a guy who has such value that God took him before his body died.
SPEAKER_00: And his value is told to us in Scripture, he walked with God.
SPEAKER_00: And God values more than anything else his desire to walk with you.
SPEAKER_00: That's why he planned salvation from the very beginning, because he wants to walk with us.
SPEAKER_00: His greatest desire is to be our Heavenly Father and for us to walk with Him.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, this walked with God is a compound word and it's a beautiful picture.
SPEAKER_00: It actually means a number of concepts put together.
SPEAKER_00: It means they lived alongside each other.
SPEAKER_00: It means they lived together.
SPEAKER_00: It means they were in agreement as they lived alongside one another.
SPEAKER_00: It has all those pictures all crammed together.
SPEAKER_00: And it's this beautiful picture of a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_00: It is walking with Him in relationship.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that you learn from a chronological study of Scripture is the entire theme of the Bible is God's desire to be in relationship with man.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it is the heart of God.
SPEAKER_00: He created us in his image for the purpose that we could relate with him.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we were made in his image, so we would understand and we could worship him and we could love him in return for his love for us and we could communicate together and see the same things and have the same heart, and we could appreciate who God is as the creator God and worship him and be in relationship with him.
SPEAKER_00: He created us so that he could express his love and that we would be able to have some inkling of that love and return it to him.
SPEAKER_00: It was his desire to be in relationship.
SPEAKER_00: As soon as Adam and Eve sinned and they broke that relationship, God began making the prophecy and casting the vision for one day a Messiah who would take away that sin all throughout the Old Testament, over and over and over and over.
SPEAKER_00: Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham has a promise.
SPEAKER_00: All of these things that go on all throughout Scripture, and here you have, tucked in this genealogy, a person who is memorialized for all of eternity in the eternal, living, powerful word of God because he walked in fellowship with God.
SPEAKER_00: God wants to walk with you.
SPEAKER_00: In those moments when you get up and you're too busy to have a quiet time or you're too tired or you're too mad at your grandkids or your wife or whatever's going on, you're just gonna go out and go fishing, and so you don't have to be spiritual today because you're just gonna spend the day on the lake or whatever's going on, all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00: We are walking away from a God who wants to be in relationship with us.
SPEAKER_00: His call to us is to walk with him in relationship.
SPEAKER_00: In agreement alongside one another, seeing the same things, thinking the same things, having the same heart about things, being in an agreement over things, fellowshipping through things, us depending on him and him expressing his grace to us, allowing us to be to bend it, and him providing for us and all of those things.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's what I also love about this.
SPEAKER_00: You see in this passage of scripture here, and you have it on your notes, it tells us that he was 65 when he fathered Methuselah.
SPEAKER_00: So, like a lot of men, there was a trigger point in his life that deepened his walk with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Because the Bible says very clearly, and after the birth of Methuselah, Enoch walked with God.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's never too late to begin walking with God.
SPEAKER_00: There's never a time that you cannot change course or reconnect with him or whatever might be the decision in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Either engage with him and become saved, or to reconnect with him, or if you've been wayward to repent, or if you've just wandered off to come home, whatever the structure is, 65 years, and then there's a trigger point, and he begins to walk with God in a new way, in a deep way, in agreement with him, and because of that, his relationship was so intimate with the Lord that he just took him home.
SPEAKER_00: And the power of that picture that you would see this man, that that is all we know about him, except for one small verse in Jude.
SPEAKER_00: And in Jude, it says that he was a preacher and a prophet who called out sin and called people to repentance.
SPEAKER_00: That's other than that, that's all we know.
SPEAKER_00: The Hebrews verse says exactly the same thing as that.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's all we know.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's what we do know in this period of time, this is a time heading towards the generation of Noah.
SPEAKER_00: So this is a time when the culture is deteriorating, when sin is rampant.
SPEAKER_00: He was a man calling out sin, so clearly there was plenty of sin in his life.
SPEAKER_00: So living for Jesus, walking with God in his culture is not any different than us walking with God in the world that we live in.
SPEAKER_00: Same deal, same process, same journey.
SPEAKER_00: And God elevates this man to this level of eternal recognition for walking with him.
SPEAKER_00: And God highly values a man who walks with him through the person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Next.
SPEAKER_00: God celebrates a life lived by faith in him.
SPEAKER_00: So how does this happen?
SPEAKER_00: Well, God uses him three times in Scripture by name.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the Hebrew passage.
SPEAKER_00: By faith, and he tells us how he did it, what Enoch's secret was.
SPEAKER_00: By faith, Enoch was taken away so that he did not experience death, and he was not to be found because God took him away.
SPEAKER_00: For prior to his removal, he was approved since he had pleased God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, without faith, it is impossible to please God.
SPEAKER_00: Now that verse, chapter verse 6 of Hebrews 11, that is one of the most common used verses in Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: I use it all the time.
SPEAKER_00: It is the biblical definition of what faith is.
SPEAKER_00: And if you will pay attention to how this is written, Enoch is literally the example of faith.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know the others are, and they say by faith, but look exactly what it says about Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: He was approved since he had pleased God.
SPEAKER_00: Without faith, it is impossible to please God.
SPEAKER_00: For the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and rewards those who seek him.
SPEAKER_00: So literally, God gives us Enoch as the example of the man who believes that God exists and walks with him and believes that God rewards those who seek him.
SPEAKER_00: He is the very essence of that.
SPEAKER_00: And God has celebrated the faith of Enoch to the point that he uses it as the example of what faith is.
SPEAKER_00: To walk with God on a daily basis is to walk by faith that he exists and he rewards those who seek him.
SPEAKER_00: It's incredible to think through a man that we have about two sentences for in Genesis in the midst of a long just description of genealogy, is elevated in the New Testament to the very example and illustration of faith and how you walk with God.
SPEAKER_00: It's just an amazing thing when you think about it.
SPEAKER_00: And so what we get from that is God is celebrating that life of faith.
SPEAKER_00: God is elevating him as a standard.
SPEAKER_00: It is a call to us that that is the nature of life that we should have.
SPEAKER_00: It should set the standard for a daily, purposeful relationship with who God is.
SPEAKER_00: And then here's the final thing God grants eternal life to those who walk with Him through faith and the promise of salvation through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is fascinating right here.
SPEAKER_00: There are two guys that we know of in Scripture that the Bible says God took them before their bodies physically died.
SPEAKER_00: Now that's an important question because in the book of Romans, the Bible says, for the wages of sin is death, and all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: So the Bible tells us that death happens for every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says every one of us has a set number of days.
SPEAKER_00: There is an appointed number of days.
SPEAKER_00: If you think through the book of Romans, you can repeatedly read through there in times when it describes death entered into the human race by one man, Adam, and because of him all of us die in him.
SPEAKER_00: And it sets forth why there is salvation.
SPEAKER_00: So now you come to a picture of Elijah and Enoch and you think, they didn't die.
SPEAKER_00: What's going on?
SPEAKER_00: We know they were not perfect because nobody's perfect.
SPEAKER_00: All have sinned and fallen short of God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: So how does that happen?
SPEAKER_00: We also know in Enoch's life, something happened after the birth of Methuselah where he elevated his spiritual life.
SPEAKER_00: I mean the Bible makes that point, and it must be there for a reason.
SPEAKER_00: So clearly at some point in his life, he wasn't the guy who was walking with God to the level that God would take him home before his body physically died.
SPEAKER_00: And so you have this question.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, when you read through the line, this is kind of how it reads.
SPEAKER_00: Adam was 130 years old when he fathered his son in his likeness.
SPEAKER_00: Adam's life lasted 930 years, then he died.
SPEAKER_00: Seth was 105 years old when he fathered Enosh, he lived 807 years.
SPEAKER_00: So Seth's life lasted 912 years, then he died.
SPEAKER_00: Enosh was 90 years old when he fathered Canaan.
SPEAKER_00: He lived 815 years after he fathered Canaan.
SPEAKER_00: He fathered other sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: So Enosh's life lasted 905 years, then he died.
SPEAKER_00: And it goes on like that.
SPEAKER_00: Here's a guy named Jared.
SPEAKER_00: Jared was 162 years old when he fathered Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: He was Enoch's father.
SPEAKER_00: Jared lived 800 years after he fathered Enoch, and he fathered other sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: So Jared's life lasted 962 years, then he died.
SPEAKER_00: All throughout this chapter, every one of them died, died, died, died, died.
SPEAKER_00: And now you stick here with Enoch, and you got him right in the middle, and it says that his life lasted 365 years.
SPEAKER_00: He walked with God, then he was not there because God took him.
SPEAKER_00: So what's happening here?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it is a picture of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: If you go back to Hebrews chapter 11, without faith, it is impossible to please God.
SPEAKER_00: For he who would draw near to God must believe that God is and that he rewards those who diligently seek him.
SPEAKER_00: No doubt, down through the quarters of time, we understand that they were teaching them about animal sacrifices, about the lamb and sacrificing lamb.
SPEAKER_00: It began as soon as Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden.
SPEAKER_00: God taught them to do that.
SPEAKER_00: And we know from the story of Cain and Abel that Adam and Eve taught that to Cain.
SPEAKER_00: They taught it to Abel.
SPEAKER_00: Down through the they understood without the shedding of blood there's no remission of sin and all of that.
SPEAKER_00: But Enoch walked by faith, and he walked with a faith that was described as being alongside together with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He was an example of faith.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what the Bible tells us in Hebrews chapter 11.
SPEAKER_00: These all died in faith, although they had not received the things that were promised.
SPEAKER_00: But they saw them from a distance, greeted them, and confessed that they were foreigners and temporary residents on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: He was looking forward to the Messiah that would be promised.
SPEAKER_00: He was walking by faith with the Lord in repentance and in belief of God's method of redemption.
SPEAKER_00: His faith was in the promise of God of the Messiah who would come.
SPEAKER_00: And so Enoch's faith in the Savior that God would provide was the only difference between mine and yours is that Enoch's look forward and ours looks back.
SPEAKER_00: But it's the same provision of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: It's the person of Jesus Christ, it's the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And Enoch was looking forward to God's provision for salvation, and he lived by faith.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says he died in faith because he saw that.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says, confess that they were foreigners and temporary residents on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Enoch knew that one day he would walk with God, not just physically on this earth, but in his presence in eternity because of the promised redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: The promise that God would provide.
SPEAKER_00: And it was such a standard of faith that God elevated him as a standard and example for our faith.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you think about it, we're not really any different than that verse in Hebrews 11.
SPEAKER_00: We're called to the same walk.
SPEAKER_00: We may look back to the fact that Jesus died for our sins and provided that means of salvation, but we are still called, if you'll listen to these, to receive the promises, to greet those promises, and confess that we are foreigners and temporary residents on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Our home is in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Our home is eternity with God.
SPEAKER_00: The ultimate biggest promise of salvation is that we will spend an eternity in the presence of God through the person of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: My father died four years ago last week.
SPEAKER_00: He died in faith.
SPEAKER_00: And he is with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have any grieving.
SPEAKER_00: We told stories about my dad.
SPEAKER_00: We had fun thinking about my dad, but we didn't grieve my dad because we know where he is.
SPEAKER_00: We had a great moment.
SPEAKER_00: One of my nephews, um, one of my sister's sons, thought it was a good idea to grow all this long, shaggy hair.
SPEAKER_00: And he came in and he had all the first time we'd seen him in a while, and he all his long hair, and he kept pushing it back, and he was looking for a rubber band to put it in a ponytail or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: And I leaned over to one of my sons' boys, their cousins, and I said, Hey, you need to go tell him he needs a haircut.
SPEAKER_00: And that's my, we call my dad gra.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, that's my gra moment because that's what grah would have said.
SPEAKER_00: They all started laughing.
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly what gra.
SPEAKER_00: And so we had a good chuckle about that.
SPEAKER_00: It was a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we didn't grief my dad.
SPEAKER_00: Because my dad is with Jesus, because that's where his citizenship is.
SPEAKER_00: He has a spiritual passport that says he's a resident of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And he had it since the moment that he gave his life to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And so Enoch may have been looking forward to the coming of the Messiah, but the promise is the same.
SPEAKER_00: He knew he would spend an eternity with God in heaven, and he was a temporary pilgrim here.
SPEAKER_00: We have the same truth.
SPEAKER_00: This is not our home.
SPEAKER_00: The stuff that we chase, the things that we do, priorities that steal our time, all those kinds of things, that is not our life.
SPEAKER_00: This is not where we are citizens.
SPEAKER_00: We are citizens of heaven if we know Christ is our Savior.
SPEAKER_00: And God, again, by raising this issue of Enoch, challenges us with that thought.
SPEAKER_00: And He challenges us to explore what that life of faith was that Enoch had.
SPEAKER_00: And it challenges us to realize I am living for eternity.
SPEAKER_00: I am living for my true citizenship.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm living on the promise of Jesus' return to make all that happen.
SPEAKER_00: Enoch was waiting for Jesus to come.
SPEAKER_00: We're waiting for Jesus to come back.
SPEAKER_00: But it's the same faith and it should elevate us to the same standard.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm looking forward to when we do the Bible recap study and we go walking through these things and we don't miss these incredible moments like a life well lived, like Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray for us.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we thank you for today, and I just thank you for just the depth and beauty of Scripture and these moments that are placed here for us in your word.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that as a pastor, you will help me to be wiser, to have a greater sensitivity to these full, rich moments in Scripture that we don't take the time to stop and study and see and learn from and grow from.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray, Father, as we prepare for this as a church, as we go through the study, that you will really deepen my wisdom, my understanding, my insight.
SPEAKER_00: Help me not to miss these things.
SPEAKER_00: Help me to be more effective as a pastor, to be able to see these moments and to call them out to the body of Christ here so that we can all grow from them.
SPEAKER_00: That's why you put them there.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray you'll help us to have that sensitivity as a church to see these moments and to grow from them.
SPEAKER_00: Father, I pray you bless these men as they go about their week, as they go about their day.
SPEAKER_00: Father, I pray for all of us you will challenge us and encourage us to the standard of Enoch.
SPEAKER_00: That we will actually walk with you.
SPEAKER_00: It is in your name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: And everybody sit?
SPEAKER_00: Hey, y'all have a great week.
SPEAKER_00: Good to see you guys.