Why did God take Enoch and Elijah to heaven without them dying?

He was "translated" to God

The terse record of Genesis is that at the end of the 300 years "he was not; for God took him." This is amplified in the New Testament, "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him" (Heb. 11:5). Here we learn that faith was the energy in which Enoch walked with God, and in which finally, he was transported into God's presence. After three centuries of walking with God it must have seemed a simple and natural thing when one day "God took him," and Enoch exchanged his earthly dwelling for the very abode of God Himself. Every word here is worthy of note. He was translated "that he should not see death." Was he then threatened by death? In the ordinary way it would hardly seem so, since his father lived 962 years and his son 969, and the average life of the nine antediluvian patriarchs excepting himself was well over 900 years. Again, it says, "he was not found," which infers that he was sought. The language, however, is explicit. His translation took place "that he should not see death," which can hardly be the statement of the obvious truism that had it not been he would ultimately have died. No, it carries with it the glorious moral import that the power of God through faith could lift a man clean out of the domain of death. It could sustain him in spiritual life whilst walking through the sphere of death's operations, and ultimately forbid the touch of its blighting hand, and land his feet in the presence of God for ever beyond its power. It carries also, we judge, the inference that but for translation his death was imminent, that in fact he was translated just as the blow was impending. In other words, that Enoch was left by God in his path of faithful witness until the last possible moment, and then just as the lawless antediluvians, angered by his plain and fearless words, were about to silence the witness, and sought him in order to slay him, "he was not found, for God had translated him."

So, in reading that fifth verse of Hebrews 11, we cannot help feeling that we are to understand that Enoch's three hundred years of walk with God and his bold witness for God was just about to be ended by his violent death at the hand of the antediluvian sinners, when God intervened and translated him. They were after him, but just before the blow could be struck, "he was not; for God took him." God did not intervene in Abel's case: that man had testimony that he was righteous, and then died a martyr's death. He did intervene in Enoch's; this man profoundly displeased the men of his age, but he pleased God so much that He took him into His presence beyond the reach of his foes. We may sum up his story by saying that he walked with God, he witnessed for God, and he went to God.

"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." Here faith is connected with a godly walk in separation from an ungodly world, and therefore related to "translation" into the sphere of new creation. Genesis tells us that "Enoch walked with God." Jude further speaks of his faithful prophesying of the Lord's coming and the judgment of the ungodly (Jude 14, 15). He is a striking type of the church of God, which in her proper condition walks in devoted separation to God, bearing faithful witness to the coming of the Lord, and will be suddenly caught up to meet the Lord in the air, not actually seeing death. God confirms His approval of her moral separation by physically separating her from the world before judgment falls. No doubt the witness of Enoch was deeply resented, and it has been suggested that the expression, "was not found" implies that he was sought, possibly with the object of putting him to death. But God intervened: he did not see death at all! Wonderful indeed the testimony of Scripture as regards him: "he pleased God." Who can estimate the marvelous value of this? But let its remark that all of this is the fruit of simple, honest faith.

All was now finished, the path of service and sorrow was ended; and Elijah was at last to enter upon his eternal recompense. "And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven." "The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels" (Psalm 68:17), and we may therefore conclude that the chariot and the horses of fire are the expression of angelic power. And, as it is added in the psalm, "The Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place," we may also gather, that the Lord Himself was in the midst of this display of His power, and the more certainly in that the whirlwind is often used in scripture as a symbol of His presence, though in judgment. The fire also speaks of judgment, but we know that the holiness of God, which must ever assume the aspect of judgment to His people when not walking in His ways (Heb. 12:29), is nevertheless their eternal security and blessedness. In such a manner Jehovah rapt away His faithful and precious servant from the scene of his testimony to be for ever with Himself, thereby exhibiting in a most signal way His appreciation of his service, and bestowing upon him an abundant entrance into the heavenly kingdom.

Elisha saw Elijah ascending, and exclaimed, "My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horse-men thereof." Faith being in exercise he connected the chariot of God with Israel, and saw therein the promise of the display of God's delivering power for His people. Moreover, as he lost sight of Elijah, "he took hold of his own clothes, and rent them in two pieces. He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him." His past history was closed, so to speak, with the departure of his master, and, together with Elijah's mantle, he received, according to promise, a double portion of his spirit, as the endowment for his new service which he was to carry on, in the power. of resurrection and grace in the midst of Israel.

There had been two men singled out from all others for special mercy and glory. One was in the early antediluvian world, when it was fast coming to its close. "He walked with God, and was not, for God took him." And when the world had grown older in sin, and God's separated people had far departed from Him, God did interpose again, and would show that there are no times, however evil, when His servants may not walk with Him. Thus, when Israel was altogether debased in sin, and God had put His servant in the midst of that wicked and corrupt and apostate people Israel; then and there it was that Elijah gave his testimony, and he too, without dying, was chosen of God to be taken up to heaven.

This leads us to the following chapter in Genesis, where sentence, pronounced in Eden, is seen carried out on Adam and his descendants till the days of Noah. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned" (Rom. 5:12). Cain could shorten the life of his brother Abel, but sooner or later death must have overtaken him, for "it is appointed to men once to die." So this is the solemn record of Gen. 5 "He died" is the simple statement of the inspired historian, appended to the close of the lives of all but one therein named. "There is no man that has power over the spirit to retain the spirit; neither has he power in the day of death: and there is no discharge in that war," are the words of the Preacher (Eccles. 8:8). And the one exception mentioned to the common lot of man forms no exception to the rule, that none can deliver himself from death, for we read of Enoch, "He was not, for God took him." It was God's act, not Enoch's effort, which kept his body from the grave.

The city, the inventions of skill and beauty and convenience, the music, the refinements of the life that now is, were all elsewhere, perishing like their devotees in the use of them; but he that does the will of God abides for ever. It seemed far from this in him who was slain treacherously and unavenged, the first martyr of the faith as of righteousness. But it was indisputable to him who believes God's word about Enoch. "And he was not, for God took him"; or, as it is interpreted in Heb. 11, he "was translated that he should not see death, and was not found because God translated him; for before his translation he has witness borne to him that he had pleased God."

What a plain token God gave in that great but simple fact, so transcending ordinary experience of unquestionable saints, that heaven was to be the home of those He loves on earth, the heaven of His presence where time and change, to say nothing of sin and sorrow, are unknown! This needed Christ's coming and His going away to put in the clearest and surest light, as in John 14–17. Even here in these early antediluvian days was the first testimony to it given, not in word only, but in a striking fact meant to come home to every believer: a peculiar honour to Enoch, the pledge of what all saints of the heavenly calling shall enjoy, who shall remain living at the coming of the Lord. For then will be the presence of Him Who is the power of eternal life, not for the soul only which we have in Him now, but for the body also as we shall have then. For we shall not all sleep, but we shall be changed in an instant, in an eye's twinkle, at the last trumpet. This is what the apostle calls "a mystery," not exactly the resurrection of the just, but the change of the living believers when those dead are also raised and changed. Of translation to heaven Enoch, as he was the first sample, so he is the abiding type in its heavenly reality, and its noiseless accomplishment without a previous sign or any preparation in providence or prophecy. We may see all this confirmed by the wholly different destiny of another saint that follows.

But as faith does not always assume the same shape, although it be the same divine principle working in man by the Spirit of God, so in the next witness we see the power of life, not the sense of death. Both are true in Christ, in whom alone they appear in their fullest character, but believers enjoy according to the measure of their faith. "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death, and was not found, because God translated him; for before the translation he hath had witness borne to him, that he had pleased God; and without faith it is impossible to please [him], for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and is a rewarder of those that seek him out" (verses 5, 6). To the same Messiah Enoch looked. There is no ground to suppose that he did not see death written on all, and sacrificial death the only way of deliverance, as Abel did. He knew as his predecessor that the woman's Seed must be bruised; but he knew also and felt assured that He would bruise the serpent's head. He saw life triumphant over him that had the power of death; in that faith he walked, and was well-pleasing to God. And his close on earth was accordingly, not by death like Abel, but by a power of life peculiar to himself. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death, and was not found because God had translated him."

We may therefore say that to him it was according to his faith, the witness to that truth a little before the deluge, as was Elijah long after it. Both lived in times of great and growing wickedness; both were prophets of judgment that should not slumber; both were translated on high without death, in witness of the great translation which will be the portion of all the living saints that remain, when the Lord Himself shall descend for them from heaven, and they shall be caught up together with the dead saints, raised to meet the Lord in the air. Enoch testifies of the change that awaits Christ's coming, the mystery shown us in 1 Cor. 15:51-52. The Holy Ghost comments on this well-pleasing walk of faith as concerning every believer, and possible only to faith — faith day by day in our walk with God, faith receiving that He is and becomes a rewarder to those that search Him out.

Genesis 5 is one of the most solemn chapters in Holy Scripture. It is a chapter of death. Eight times over we read of one and another that "he died." The wreck of all things here as the fruit of sin is thus brought vividly before us. Remarkably, right in the middle of this dismal catalogue of dying men, we read of one who did not die. "He was not; for God took him."

Elijah, taken away by the power of God, quits the earth without passing through death. We find in the fact itself a marvellous testimony to the sovereign goodness of God, and to the approbation He bestowed upon His faithful servant.