With reference to this "walk with God", this that characterized Enoch, this to which you and I are
called now, what does it contemplate? This "walk with God" contemplates something as to the
present, and something as to the future.

What is it as to the present? Mark this_suffering, loss, shame, degradation, every step of the
way! That is what is contemplated in a person who walks with God in an evil day:because it is
not walking with God when the rule of everything is godliness, it is walking with God when
everything is in revolt from Him. This is the character of the time, such as it was in Enoch’s day.
Therefore it is suffering, and I will tell you more than that, it is self-abandonment.

Believe me, if there were a little more self-abandonment amongst us, many of our difficulties
would vanish. If it is a simple question of God; His claims, His pleasure, His interests, His
thoughts, why the difficulties are overcome at once! And if God’s will is sweetest to me, even
though it triumphs at my cost, look how well out of the difficulty I am!

I say it with all reverence, looking at the pathway of the Lord Jesus as a man here, was He
successful as a man? Was it not shame, scorn, contempt, reproach, loss, all the way from the holy
mount to Calvary? Was it not downward with Him every step? Was it not surrender with Him:
surrender, too, of what belonged to Him in right and title? He was very different from us. You
and I have no right to claim; everything is pure grace with us:but with Him it was the
abandonment and surrender of everything that belonged to Him, from the throne of God to the
cross. Is that the pathway that you and I are called into? You see how little we weigh these things.

If I set out to follow One who had not a place where to lay His head, I cannot go on with this
principle_ trying to make the best of everything around; on the contrary, I seek to have as little
as I possibly can in it; this I cannot help, if I am truly "walking with God". This, then, is what this
path entails now, and I feel it important for me to state it.

If I set out to "walk with God" in these days, according to the revelation of His mind as He has
given it to me in Christianity and in His book, I make up my mind for this_this is the one thing
that is before me_ "it is enough for the servant to be as his master". I would rather see people
shrink back; I would rather a person looked at it and said, "This involves certain things in it; this
brings certain claims with it; give me a little time, let me think of it, let me weigh it over before
God, do not let me run rashly". I would rather see people like that, I would rather see them
looking the thing, as it were, in the face, because I know when they do that, when they do bring
this thing before God, in quiet waiting upon Him, He will, to a genuine, true, and honest soul,
make known His mind; and further than this, He compensates such a one first. Do you mean to
tell me that the sense that I have pleased Him is not a compensation? If I have that, I am
compensated at once, even before I suffer, and God delights to do so when He sees the heart true
and exercised before Him.

Oh, I feel that the gravity of these things is not sufficiently before our hearts in these days. It is
not a small thing to step out of everything around me, that I may simply answer to the mind of

Him who is up there. It is not a small thing, or a trifling thing, be assured. May God keep any of
you from thinking it a light thing! May God keep your hearts from ever attempting to bring down
the immense solemnity of a divine position to the poor, miserable, wretched, contemptible level
of things down here, taking away all pith and reality out of it! It is the tendency of these times:
I believe we are not outside the danger of it. I know we are seriously in danger of overlooking
state of soul. There is the danger of working upon the mere outward intelligence, instead of God
working upon the soul through the conscience. May the Lord deliver us from this; it is most
dangerous!

Well, now, there is one other thing. What is to be the issue of this "walking with God"? I have
spoken a little about the present, what the present is connected with. It is, as I said, loss and
suffering. I might speak of the other side of it, of the blessed reality of Christ’s presence, of the
sustainment of His love_how He cheers us on, how He walks the road with us, of the joy of
being where He is:but I would rather leave the gravity of the thing on your heart. I do not think
it any loss that you should have a sense of the solemnity of it.

What, then, is the end of it? It is this_just the very opposite to everything contemplated by a Jew
in the Old, Testament times. A Jew looked for everything prosperous here, basket and store in
abundance; he looked for everything being made straight to his hand as to the present. It was with
him plenty, it) was the increase of everything, plenty of corn and wine, plenty of everything this
earth could afford_wealth, dignity, honor, ease. That was all perfectly well in its time; and was
what a Jew looked for; it was his birthright, his inheritance here, and there was never a thought
of being out of it_length of days, long life, was that which was before the Jew.

But when I, as a Christian, look at this "walk with God", what is the issue of it? Look at it in
Enoch. It is just this_to be taken out of the world_it may be today! Do you believe that? Do you
believe that the very next moment may be the cloud of glory? It is a subject that is common among
us, this blessed hope of the Lord’s coming, the blessed expectation of our returning Lord. Think
how little the reality of it is before us! I remember the time when I first of all "saw" the coming
of the Lord, as the expression is_when I first of all believed in the second advent_what a
wondrous brightness, and a freshness, and vividness, there was about it!

May I ask you, how is it now with you? What about today? Is the freshness with which it came
to your heart, twenty, thirty, forty, or any number of years ago, that which is welling up in your
soul now? Do you calculate just minute by minute with reference to that? Is that the next thing
before your soul? Is that the expectation of your heart, that you should be translated, that you
should not see death, like Enoch? "He was translated that he should not see death, and was not
found because God had translated him." There was a power of life in him that completely
overcame the power of death, such a power of life as set aside death completely, the common lot
of man since the fall.

The reason that these blessed facts of God have become stale with us is this_because we have
received them as doctrines, the doctrines of a well-framed creed. There is the solemn part of it_it
has become our creed. We are just as much in danger of having our creed as anybody else. Do
not be deceived about it; the instant that the divine freshness and living reality of these blessed
truths of God pass away from our souls, so that all we can say of them is, "That is my doctrine,
that is what I hold", instead of their having a practical, operative, power upon us, searching us
each moment_ I say the instant that is the case, we go down; we have really dropped from the
blessed, wonderful, divine power of these things, just to be, as somebody has expressed it, "as
clear as the moon, and as cold as the moon." What a mournful picture that is! The Lord keep us
from it.

I believe, if there is one thing we need in these times, it is "walking with God" individually. Let
me say this, and I say it humbly, I believe the difficulties we have collectively are created because
of our low state individually; that is, there is a lack of individual faithfulness, there is some want,
some feebleness, individually. A good assembly state is the result of a close individual walk with
God. You never have assembly power apart from individual faithfulness. And what I believe is
this_I often think it aver, and pray about it_the reason for our general weakness just now is, that
we have overlooked individual state before God.

If you and I were walking individually with God, understanding what is entailed upon us now, and
what we look for as the ultimate issue of it_to be caught up to meet the Lord in the air, and be
with Him_we should banish the idea of trying to get on in the world, trying to surround ourselves
with anything that would make us comfortable. How foreign the whole thing would be!

The Lord help us to look at ourselves in the light of His presence and His truth; that our hearts
may take these things right home, and in the secret of His presence, in the solitariness and
quietness of His company, go over the thing with Him, our hearts before Him, with this thought
upon them_"Lord, really is it I?"

May the Lord command His blessing; may He use His word to stir up our hearts to more personal,
individual walk and fellowship with Himself, in the blessed hope of being taken out of this world
at any moment, to see Him, and be with Him forever!

FRAGMENT
Be Thou the Object bright and fair
To fill and satisfy the heart;
My hope to meet Thee in the air,
And nevermore from Thee to part;
That I may undistracted be
To follow, serve, and wait for Thee.
G.W.F.