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Sermon Notes

A Successful Life

Sunday 24 August 2025 Pastor Craig Ledbetter Genesis 5
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I. Background and Review (Genesis 5:24)

A. We are in Genesis chapter 5 – amazing study

B. In chapter 5 God focuses our attention on TEN good men in history, from Adam getting right with God, all the way to Noah

  1. Adam – yes, he was the reason that sin is now in the world, but he got right, forgiven
  2. Seth – of all the children born to Adam and Eve, Seth was chosen by God to be in the line of the Messiah
  3. Enos – it was during his lifetime that men began to repent
  4. Cainan
  5. Mahalaleel
  6. Jared
  7. Enoch – we are going to learn some more about him today
  8. Methuselah – longest living man ever, 969 years!
  9. Lamech
  10. Noah and his three sons

C. Things are on a downward spiral morally and spiritually

As we discover in Genesis 6, the entire world was headed for destruction.

D. God mentions a man named Enoch, describes his life and why it was special

  1. In the middle of this list of godly men who loved God was a man named Enoch

    “And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.” - Genesis 5:24

  2. When Enoch is born, 622 years had passed since creation

  3. It is still 1,000 years before the Flood comes

  4. Enoch was the seventh generation from Adam

  5. The great grandfather of Noah

E. Enoch Shows Us a Successful Life – at least as far as what GOD thinks about him!

  1. Everyone usually wants to be a success instead of a failure in life. But few discover what success really looks like!
  2. To the world, most Christians will look like failures
  3. And we probably are
  4. But we should NOT be failures in God’s eyes!

F. Two great truths about Enoch that we need to ponder and understand

  1. He walked with God
  2. And God took him! That means, God took him to heaven without him dying!

II. Message

A. What God Shows Us About Enoch (Genesis 5:21-24)

“And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methuselah: And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters: And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years: And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.” - Genesis 5:21-24

  1. He was a godly man

    • It was rare then, and it is rare now to be godly
    • Remember the two lines of cultures in the world back then? Cain’s line and Seth’s line
    • Enoch chose to be in Seth’s line of believers, instead of Cain’s angry, rebellious, independent line
    • Enoch chose to follow the example and the commandments of the Lord God of heaven and earth, the creator of everything, Jehovah God
    • Enoch was not perfect – he was just like you and me, living in a very dark time
    • But he was FORGIVEN by a substitute lamb in his own place – paid for in blood
    • And he lived forgiven by God under God’s grace and mercy
    • GRACE changes us – does not make us perfect, but changes us for the better!

  2. He was out of step with the world and its culture – you have got to get this!

    • Cain and his descendants set the pace – created the culture, wrote the popular music, were the wealthiest and the most powerful men of that day
    • But Enoch and his family were out of step – different, unusual, weird, peculiar
    • He walked a different path than most everyone else, and people knew it
    • I have to ask the question, are WE any different than OUR world?
    • Does anybody notice you and me as just the same as them, or as a bit ODD?
    • You may only want “religious experiences” and blessings and emotional highs from church… and that be all…
    • But a true born again, Bible believing Christian WANTS to be different, and actually lives different, and looks and talks and thinks differently than the world around them! And they don’t mind being a bit weird!

  3. He was a Family Man

    • A married man – a husband
      • Not single
      • And he was not like Lamech in Genesis 4 who had several wives!
      • Married one woman for a lot of years – over 300 years to the same woman!
    • He had many sons and daughters – that made him a Dad

III. Conclusion

A. True success is measured by God’s standards, not the world’s

B. Enoch walked with God in a dark and wicked generation

C. God honored Enoch by taking him to heaven without dying

D. Will you choose to walk with God and live a truly successful life?

For more information, contact Bible Baptist Church of Ballincollig at www.biblebc.com

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