Enoch is easily and often passed over when looking at the different people we find in the Bible. Yet he shows up throughout, including the accounts from Genesis, Hebrews and Jude. The two most notable features of his life were the way he lived and the way he was taken from creation. It is not since the days of Adam and Eve while still in the Garden that someone is noted as walking with God. Enoch appeared to live his life in the way that God was hoping that everyone would live. At the conclusion of his time on earth we find that instead of dying like all the others listed, God takes Enoch.
As the telling of Enoch's story goes through the ages what is held in regard by the people of God is not that God took him, rather the example of faith found in Enoch. It is easy for us to focus on the whole disappearance, or taking of Enoch. The New Testament writers accept Enoch's being taken by God as a given and really do not question it. Perhaps we focus on the wrong thing in his story because it is easier to wrestle with the unknown of being taken than it is to compare the faith of Enoch with our faith.
The way our life ends is not nearly as important as the way we live it. Enoch had a very strange ending to his life. The strange ending was minimal compared to how he lived. According to Jude the people around Enoch were grumblers and complainers, let's throw in whiners just for fun as well. Their focus was satisfying their own desires and whatever stood in their way, even God, became an object of grumbling and complaining. Enoch lived different than that and the end of his life was profoundly different than the grumblers and complainers.
As we look at marriage grumbling and complaining can be one of the most damaging thing to the marital relationship. When the actions of our spouse are met with whining more than anything else, there is sure to be trouble ahead. More challenging is to look at the root of our grumbling and complaining. Usually we complain when we do not get our way, or when we have to put our desires on the back burner. In marriage the willingness to push our desires away without grumbling or complaining is a key to showing love and respect to our partner. It is also key to living in marriage in a way that creates unparalleled benefit in the end. When we live our marriage walking with God, like Enoch, the blessing God pours on to the marriage is beyond our wildest imagination.
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