A history of the work of redemption. Containing the outlines of a body of…

So it is with respect to the great affair in general, as it relates to the universal subject of it, as it is carried on from the first beginning of it after the fall, till it is perfected at the end of the world, as will more fully appear by a particular view of this affair from beginning to end, in the prosecution of this subject, if God give opportunity to carry▪ it through as I propose.

VIII. The next remarkable thing towards carrying on this work, we have an account of in scripture, is the translation of Enoch into heaven. The account we have of it is in Gen. v.24. "And Enoch walked with God, and he was not; for God took him." Here Moses, in giving an account of the genealogy of those that were of the line of Noah, does not say concerning Enoch, he lived so long and he died, as he does of the rest; but, he was not, for God took him; i. e. he translated him; in body and soul carried him to heaven without dying, as it is explained in Heb. xi.5. "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death." By this wonderful work of God, the work of redemption was carried to a greater height in several respects, than it had been before.

You may remember▪ that when I was showing what were the great things that God aimed at in the work of redemption, or what the main things were that he intended to bring to pass; I among other things mentioned (p. 12.) the perfect restoring the ruins of the fall with respect to the elect, and restoring man from that destruction that he had brought on himself, both in soul and body. Now this translation of Enoch was the first instance that ever was of restoring the ruins of the fall with respect to the body. There had been many instances of restoring the soul of man by Christ's redemption, but none of redeeming and actually saving the body till now. All the bodies of the elect are to be saved as well as their souls. At the end of the world, all the bodies of the saints shall actually be redeemed; those that then shall have been dead, by a resurrection; and others, that then shall be living, by causing them to pass under a glorious change. There was a number of the bodies of saints […] and glorified at the resurrection and ascension of Christ; and before that there was an instance of a body glorified in Elijah. But the first instance of all was this of Enoch, that we are now speaking of.