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.
Hebrews 11:5
We all like to hit the target. No matter what we’re doing, we want to focus on the goal and then hit what we’re aiming at. We want to be able to see what needs to be done and then do it.
I guess this is why I like to cook, wash dishes, and iron. Yes, you hear me correctly. I really do like to do these things. Just about every day I look forward to shopping for tonight’s dinner. And when I bring it all home, I start the preparation.
And after we’re done eating, I wash everything up with a smile on my face and a song in my heart. Every pot is scrubbed, and every dish is washed with soapy water before it’s all rinsed with hot water. Yes, we do have an automatic dishwasher. No, I do not use it.
When it comes to ironing clothes, I’m pretty much the same way. I always put the clean clothes that need ironing in a special closet. And then on weekends, I set up the ironing board and heat up the iron. From there, I go to work pressing the clothes. Each piece is then neatly hung in a closet while it patiently waits to be worn.
No, I’m not on any powerful drugs that make me do these things. No, there’s no one with a gun pointed at my head, forcing me into obedience. No, there’s no overwhelming shame that I’m under that someone’s using to guilt me into this.
So, why in the world do I like to do these things? Simple. I actually like them because they all have a start, a middle, and an end. You know when supper’s done because it’s on the table. You know when your done cleaning up because everything’s in the dish drying rack.
It’s hard to think about faith in this way. Cooking, cleaning, and ironing are all things that we can touch. Things we can see. You can put a thermometer into something and instantly tell if it’s done or not. With your sense of smell, you can instantly tell if something’s burned or not.
We think about faith like it’s not real. We can’t touch it. Smell it. Taste it. To us, faith’s just sort of out there somewhere. Always just beyond our reach. We can never really be sure about faith. Do we have it? Do we have enough of it.
But not Enoch. To him, faith was as real as it gets. His faith wasn’t some hobby that he played around with. Something that he did once in a while. Not on your life. Faith was in every part of his life. And faith motivated everything he did and said. How do I know this?
Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.
Genesis 5:24
We’ve probably heard these words before. Heck, we might have even heard a sermon about Enoch and his walking with God. It’s really the only thing he accomplished. He didn’t build a town, write a book, or even host a podcast. All he’s know for doing is walking with God. Let’s think about these three things involved with walking.
Learning. While we didn’t watch any videos on how to walk, we certainly did watch all the people around us walking. We then had to get up off our butts and stand before we tried to put one foot in front of another. There was lots and lots of failures, but we stuck with it.
Going. Walking always involves starting and then keeps on going. We don’t stop till we get to where we want to be. Will we hear that? Walking always, always, always has a destination. A goal. A place where we can stop once we get there.
Leaning. No one walks while standing straight up. Try it sometime, you can’t do it. To walk, we have to be leaning towards where we want to go. It might not look like we’re leaning a lot, but we have to shift our weight and everything that we are towards where we want to be.
Enoch did the same three things when it came to his faith. He had to learn faith. It didn’t come naturally. He had to fail at faith so that he’s know what to do and not do. His faith took him places throughout his life. It changed him. And his faith made him lean towards and into God.
Enoch’s life of faith pleased God. While he wasn’t perfect, he lived a life of faith. He had grown up in the faith and he kept on growing. He never stopped growing. He never stopped changing. He never stopped maturing in his faith. He wasn’t taken from this life because he had enough faith, but because he lived a life that pleased God.
Pleasing anyone means that you’re always trying to do what makes the other person happy. Not what we want, but what they want. Our target for pleasing God is to live a life that he wants. What will bring him glory. And when we put the full focus on wanting to please God, it can’t help but to create a close, personal relationship with him. He’s the one we want to please, so we chose to aim our lives towards whatever he’s called us to do. Be the people he wants us to be. Now that’s a target worth aiming at and hitting.
Noodling Questions
Why is a target important when it comes to following God?
How do we walk with God today? What does it take?
Describe your thinking when you want to do something to please someone else.
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