"He Walked with God"

First thing every morning , over the past year, it has been my habit to walk for an hour with my friend, Micheline.
As we walk we notice the weather, enjoy the valley view, and point out to each other the daily changes in the vegetation. We admire people’s homes or landscaped yards; we greet the people we pass, step aside for the young boys on bikes on their way to school, smile at people walking their dogs, comment on the activity of life around us.
And we talk…. about everything, our faith, our families, politics, our hobbies, our friends, our experiences, our worries, our sorrows, our joys or disappointments.
We have gotten to know each other, how we think and feel, what makes us happy, what upsets us, what fills our days.
We have learned the answer to the question of Amos 3:3 “Can two walk together, except they are agreed?”


There are two people in the bible that walked with someone.
One was Enoch and the other Noah.
About both of them it says, “He walked with God”.
Don’t those words thrill your soul and make you want that to be true about you too?

There is an intriguing detail these two men share in their bible stories.
Have you ever noticed that neither of them has a single word recorded of what they said?
I wonder….. Did they know the One they walked with so well that their words were no longer necessary? That they walked in such peace, they listened instead of talked?

We know very little about Enoch. His story is contained in two short verses, and yet what volumes those two verses hold.
We know he lived for 365 years, “walked with God” and “he was not, for God took him”. (Gen. 5:23,24)
What a walk that was. I like what one little girl said about it. “Enoch and God went for a walk, and then God said,’ It’s closer to my house than to yours, so why don’t you just come over to my house”.
Can you imagine what it must have been like for Enoch? To just ‘go home with God’?
We have a commentary on Enoch in Hebrews 11:5 , that tells us it was Enoch’s faith that caused him to step over death. Faith so strong, so focused God-ward that turning back to earth one day was out of the question, and he was translated directly into the Presence of God - because ‘he pleased God’.
Enoch is an example of those of us who are ‘walking with God’ when Jesus returns and we too will be translated! Taken from this earth into the reality of Eternity !! What glory that will be!!

We have a longer account of Noah’s life but through the chapters that tell his story, we have not a single word spoken by him.
Even though God asked him to do what would have seemed a very futile exercise – to build a boat on dry land- Noah replied not a word, he simply obeyed.
Walking with God, he had no questions, no arguments.
God spoke, he heard, what was there to say?
I’m sure he built the boat aware of God at His side, helping him, showing him how to do it. The mocking voices of the people were like far away static and didn’t deter him from focusing on the One whose voice he loved.
He is also spoken of in Hebrew 11:7. It says his life’s motivation was fear – fear, the beginning of wisdom- and it was his faith that made him so sure that what God said was true, even though what he saw in the natural was contrary.
Because of his faith, that pleased God, he inherited the righteousness that comes not by works but by trusting God.
Noah, even though the New Covenant was still a long way off, stepped over the ordinances and rituals of the Old Covenant and inherited the same salvation that you and I are offered through the cross – through faith!

What examples these two men are to you and me even though they lived so long ago.
Can you and I ‘walk with God’ as they did?
I don’t mean just as a way of saying that we are His child and have been ‘born again’ into His family. I mean in a very real conscience sense, where we are aware of Him every moment of the day.
Is this what the verse is talking about th at bids us ‘pray without ceasing’?
A habitual awareness of Him walking with us, beside us, our very thoughts melting into His?

From the time I first read of these two men, that they ‘walked with God’, my heart’s desire was to be like them.
I have not always done so…. The noise and cares of this world have at times pulled me away ….but since I first experienced the reality of God ‘walking with me’ I cannot be happy any other way.
I have found that how real ‘His presence’ is to me, is directly related to how much time I spend in His word. How can we say we love Him when we don’t read His e-mail. (E-ternity letters)
I think that is the secret to Enoch and Noah’s ‘silence’ – the more time we spend ‘listening’ to God, the less we speak!
And then when we do speak our words will “always be seasoned with salt, that ‘we’ may know how ‘we’ ought to answer each one.” ( Col. 4:6)

I know in my own life when I ‘walk with God’, I am aware of a deep sense of peace that nothing can disturb.
I find there is also a very clear perception of His voice and my own thoughts and feelings are quiet.
‘Walking with God’, makes it easy to bring God into smaller and smaller details of my life, and asking for His help, His direction, His thoughts becomes my automatic response.
Have you not found that to be true in your life??

Are you not thankful that we have a God , who is not afar off, but who is so near that we can walk together with Him? Trusting Him in and for everything?
And one day, our walk -according to I Cor. 5:7 - will be changed and we will 'walk no longer by faith, but by sight’, because we shall see Him face to face !!