In Genesis 5, we find the genealogy of Adam through Seth. Three men in Seth’s line are notable: Enoch, Methuselah and Noah. Enoch is the only man in the Bible who was “raptured” alive and will never die. Methuselah lived longer than any other man in the Bible. Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord and was chosen to save his family by building the ark.

Enoch

Enoch is a picture of the New Testament saints raptured alive before the return of Christ. Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah. That’s because Methuselah’s name means, “after he is dead, it shall be sent.” In other words, Enoch knew that God would judge the men on the earth right after Methuselah’s death. As a result, he “walked with God,” and he “pleased God,” (Heb. 11:5). He is among the “heroes of faith” in Heb. 11. Often men will get right with God when they hear of His wrath. That’s why preachers need to preach regularly on hell.

In addition to having good, regular fellowship with God, Enoch also prophesied and preached. He prophesied the Second Coming of Jesus Christ in Jude 14. He warned the people of his day that they were “ungodly,” (Jude 15) and that they were “sinners.” He doesn’t sound like the nice, sweet modernist preacher of today. And yet, we are right on the verge of the fulfillment of the things he prophesied. Would to God that we had more men like Enoch preaching today who were more interested in pleasing God than they were in pleasing men!!

Methuselah

Methuselah lived 969 years. He was born in 3317 BC, when Adam was 687 years old. Adam and Methuselah were contemporaries for 243 years. Methuselah died in 2348 BC, the same year that God flooded the earth. Truly the judgment of God fell the year that Methuselah died, just like his name indicated.

Noah

Lamech named his son Noah, which means “rest” or “comfort”, because any advancement that had been made in his society had failed to remove the effects of the curse from Gen. 3. Truthfully, our day is no different. Scientists have improved travel and now we have traffic jams and traffic fatalities that number into the 10’s of thousands per year. They have improved communication and you can’t get one shred of truth out of any mainstream news service in the world. They have improved medicine at the cost of thousands of dollars per patient and men still die (Lk. 8:43). We need Jesus to return before we are going to get any real rest around here.