The faith of Enoch.
Of Enoch we know next to nothing in one sense. We are ignorant of the details of his life; not even one great striking event is preserved to us. But of the great principle and result of his life we are not ignorant, and it is quite permissible for us to make conjectures by way of illustration. In considering what is here said, we must notice the order of the argument.
I. WHAT HAPPENED TO ENOCH. He was translated so as not to see death. This must have happened in some way manifest to his neighbors, so that they might take knowledge of the event and profit by it. The translation is to he looked on in the light of a reward; but, after all, this may not be its chief significance. It may have been for the sake of others, to whom God's approval of Enoch had to be made manifest. It is no slur upon Enoch to imagine that men as holy as he have been on the earth, yet they have had to die; perhaps live in privation, and die in pain. Therefore we can hardly be wrong in assuming that Enoch's translation was in such a public way as to teach those willing to be taught, and act as a rebuke to the unbelieving. There is something eminently evangelical in such an operation of God. He would draw men to faith in him by showing what can happen to his believing ones. He shows the way of blessing before he shows the way of cursing. The translation of the holy, righteous man comes before the drowning of an impenitent race.
II. WHAT THERE WAS IN ENOCH'S LIFE TO MAKE THIS TRANSLATION POSSIBLE. "He pleased God." Long before his translation he had had proof of this. God does not defer the signs of his pleasure. He has made us so that the way of obedience is the way of pleasantness, even while we walk in it. But all that God had thus given Enoch by the way was for his own sake. The common unheeding world knew nothing of the joys coming to Enoch through his religion. Now at last, in his translation, something shall be given for a joy to Enoch, and at the same time an instruction to the world. Enoch might have pleased God and yet not been translated; but he could not have been translated unless he had pleased God. Then from this inference the writer proceeds to yet another—that Enoch must have lived a life of faith. To please God certain conditions are requisite, and in the very front of these is faith. We cannot please God unconsciously, as the heavenly bodies do in their movements, or a plant in its growth. We must do such things as the will of the Invisible requires. He will not be pleased with anything we do simply because we do our best according to the light of nature. But this is a matter which may be dealt with in a homily by itself.
III. ENOCH'S EXPECTATIONS. God translated Enoch, but it does not follow that Enoch expected to be translated. All that Enoch could be sure of was that a good present would be followed by a better future. Enoch left this world by a gate that has been very rarely opened—a gate the mode of whose opening we can hardly comprehend. It may never be opened again till that day which is hinted at in 1 Thessalonians, when Christ's people then living will be caught up to meet their Lord in the air. If Enoch had expected translation without the pains of death, he would not have been showing the spirit of true faith. True faith will go on humbly serving God on earth, and feeling that entrance to heaven will come in God's good time.—Y.