The Man Without A Funeral

How can anyone live a godly life in a corrupt world? Will anyone be doing so when Jesus comes?

“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.” —Hebrews 11:5

This is a brief account of the man without a funeral. We would do well to consider the life of this man who lived uprightly amidst concentrated moral corruption so dark it is without parallel. Ellen White observed, “There never has been and never will be an age when the moral darkness will be so dense as when Enoch lived a life of irreproachable righteousness” (SDA Bible Commentary, 1:1088)

In the light of today’s jarring news reports of crime, violence, and perversion of every description, such a statement takes us by surprise. With all of our advanced technology we tend to forget that there once existed on this planet a people who outlived and outperformed anyone alive today. The pre-flood people have no comparison. We are like children playing with Tinkertoys compared to them and their abilities. If they were alive today they would shatter all our Olympic records, exceed all our mental achievements, and top all records of development. “It is a mistake to suppose that because they lived to a great age their minds matured late . . . . The antediluvians were without books; they had no written records; but with their great physical and mental vigor, they had strong memories, able to grasp and to retain that which was communicated to them, and in turn to transmit it unimpaired to their posterity” (Patriarchs and Prophets, pp. 82–83).

Because Adam lived for nine centuries, many antediluvians learned first-hand his history of the two trees in the garden. It was tough for skeptics in those days! No one could deny the existence of Eden. There it stood, just in sight, its entrance barred by angels.

Despite all this, there was the nasty problem of sin. Its cancerous growth spread everywhere. Physical and mental giants produced giant sinners, who plunged into iniquity beyond our understanding.

The Bible says, “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days” (Gen 6:4, NIV). The King James Version translates nephilim as “giants,” but “there is reason to believe that this Hebrew word may come from the root naphal, and that the nephilim were ‘violent’ ones, or terrorists, rather than physical ‘giants.’ Since in those days the entire human race was of great stature, it must be that character rather than height is designated”* (SDA Bible Commentary, 1:251). The pre-flood people put God out of their lives, and the sure result was total depravity. “If the mind is never exalted above the level of humanity, if it is not uplifted by faith to contemplate infinite wisdom and love, the man will be constantly sinking lower and lower” (Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 91). Elevation of human genius, clamor for self-made idols to satisfy every craving, delight in blood-thirsty destruction of both man and animals, distortion of marriage, and excess of even what is legitimate produced a monstrous situation well described in Scripture: “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen 6:5). “The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence” (Gen 6:11).

Enoch the Exception.
In the midst of this depraved scene lived a man whose deliberate choice to head in another direction was rewarded accordingly. Faith and doubt stem from the same evidence. God provides enough evidence for an intelligent decision, but doubters selectively retain only that which appeals to their carnal natures. Enoch chose to walk with God.

People mocked his choice. Greed was the driving force in society, and Enoch found himself totally at odds with his times. “Enoch’s heart was upon eternal treasures. . . . His mind, his heart, his conversation, were in heaven. The greater the existing iniquity, the more earnestly was his longing for the home of God” (Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 87).

When Enoch was 65, his wife delivered a baby boy, and Enoch was transported toward even closer fellowship with God. “As he saw the child’s love for its father, its simple trust in his protection; as he felt the deep, yearning tenderness of his own heart for that first-born son, he learned a precious lesson of the wonderful love of God to men in the gift of His Son, and the confidence which the children of God may repose in their heavenly Father” (ibid., p. 84).

For the next three hundred years, the closeness of Enoch’s walk with God brought him more and more into harmony with his Maker. His fellowship with God was free from the urgency so often displayed today. “Now the shortness of time seems to be urged as a motive to seek righteousness.” But “should it be necessary that the terrors of the day of God be held before us in order to compel us to right action? Enoch’s case is before us. . . . He lived in a character, and became a godly man, whose ways pleased the Lord” (My Life Today, p. 98).

A close walk with God seldom frees us from perplexing problems, but it does provide ready access to divine solutions.

Enoch did not live the life of a recluse. His example of steadfast, close association with God was evident in his roles as husband, father, friend, and citizen, yet there were definite times when he excluded himself from society. After proclaiming his message, he always took back with him to his place of seclusion some who had received the warning, and some of these became overcomers and died before the Flood came.

But sometimes Enoch retired for communion apart from all people, even from those who sought him (see Spiritual Gifts, 3:56 and SDA Bible Commentary, 1:1088).

A close walk with God seldom frees us from perplexing problems, but it does provide ready access to divine solutions. Enoch was troubled about the dead, for it seemed to him that both the righteous and the wicked go equally to the dust of the grave. There was probably no funeral that troubled him more than Adam’s, who died when Enoch was 308 years old. His son Methuselah was 243 at the time. We can imagine Enoch’s emotions. Eventually they would all die, and then what? So God gave Enoch a vision of future events. We have only a snatch of it, recorded in Jude 14 and 15, but “in prophetic vision he was instructed concerning the death of Christ, and was shown His coming in glory, attended by all the holy angels, to ransom His people from the grave” (Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 85).

One day the first prophet left this world—without dying! The Biblical record says, “He was not; for God took him” (Gen 5:24). His exit was no secret rapture. “In the presence of the righteous and the wicked, Enoch was removed from them. Those who loved him thought that God might have left him in some of his places of retirement; but after seeking him diligently, and being unable to find him, reported that he was not, for God took him” (Spiritual Gifts, 3:57). He was the first person from this planet to enter heaven.

Enochs Today.
Although Enoch lived long ago and possessed strength and intellect far beyond anything we can hope to match in our present state, we can hope, even in our day, to match his character. “He was unsullied with the prevailing sins of the age in which he lived,” we are told. “So may we remain pure and uncorrupted. He was a representative of the saints who live amid the perils and corruptions of the last days. For his faithful obedience to God he was translated. So, also, the faithful, who are alive and remain, will be translated” (Testimonies for the Church, 2:122).

“As was Enoch’s, so must be the holiness of character who shall be redeemed from among men at the Lord’s second coming” (Gospel Workers, p. 54).

But is it possible?
“Some few in every generation from Adam resisted his [Satan’s] every artifice and stood forth as noble representatives of what it was in the power of man to do and to be—Christ working with human efforts, helping man in overcoming the power of Satan. Enoch and the others had the correct record of sin” (Selected Messages, 3:146).

“There are Enochs in our day” (Christ’s Object Lessons, p. 332).

A Future Visit.
Soon it will be possible to visit with this grand man who made a choice to walk with God and was honored by translation, this Enoch who was the first of many “Enochs.” May we be willing to allow Christ to develop within us a character like the original Enoch’s, one that will reflect God’s holiness amidst the moral darkness of our times. Bright is our hope. For whether we are resurrected or translated at Christ’s coming, we can know the fullness of His words, “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God” (Matt 5:8).