Great post! There's much here, I'm fully on the same page.
I'll point out that in speaking to Nicodemas, Jesus told him not that no one had ever been to heaven, rather, that no one had gone there on their own. That distinction is in the grammar of the sentence, so there wouldn't have been any deception.
And before advancing from John remember also it is said in John 6:46 “Not that anyone has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He has seen the Father. So whether you feel he was taken to heaven and is standing beside Him on one side.... It could not have been before the crucifixion/resurrection happened......
AND NOT the thief on the cross either for Jesus said to him...Luke 23:43 And He said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.” (Upper Sheol has often been called Paradise)
Revelation 4:3-4 KJV
3) And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.
4) And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold.
1 Timothy 6:16 KJV
Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.
Here are 24 elders seated around God's throne. I'm thinking that they also cannot see God, who is a Spirit, and lives in light. Therefore I don't see a difficulty with this. There will also be the innumerable multitude before the throne, in chapter 7. I think that will be all those "in Christ", us. And we will only see light, but not God. We will see God, Jesus!
(A statement that of itself begs for a thread of its own for the simple reason that IF , as we all know, the punctuations were added by translators... and not in original text... had they moved the comma byu one word....it would read~ Truly I say to you today, you shall be with Me in Paradise. That carries an entirely different meaning)
We could talk about that if you like. Personally I think that would be poor translation. Some think it makes sense in English either way, to me it's stilted, and more so in the Greek.
However, I digress............................. and I need to explain the following and why I believe Enoch is now in heaven...
but did not get there until following Jesus' crucifixion.
The apostles creed states.... "He descended into hell"
In the Hebrew Scriptures, the word used to describe the realm of the dead is sheol. It simply means “the place of the dead” or “the place of departed souls/spirits.” Which would not necessarily mean the dead....
The New Testament Greek equivalent of sheol is hades, which also refers to “the place of the dead.”
Other passages in the New Testament indicate that sheol/hades is a temporary place, where souls are kept as they await the final resurrection and judgment.
Revelation 20:11-15 gives a clear distinction between hades and the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the permanent and final place of judgment for the lost.
Hades, then, is a temporary place.
Many people refer to both hades and the lake of fire as “hell,” and this causes confusion.
Jesus did not go to a place of torment after His death, but He did go to hades.
Further....
Sheol/hades is a realm with two divisions—a place of blessing and a place of judgment
Look at Acts 2:27 Because You will not abandon my soul to Hades, Nor allow Your Holy One to undergo decay.
The abodes of the saved and the lost are both generally called “hades” in the Bible.
In LUKE 16:22 ....The abode of the saved is also called “Abraham’s bosom” in king Jimmy's Bible or “Abraham’s side” in the NIV
BUT enter LUKE 23:43 and “paradise” in most translations.
Remember the story of the rich man and Lazarus????? The example of the abodes of the saved and the lost are separated by a “great chasm”. We read that in Luke 16:26 .
When Jesus died, He went to the blessed side of sheol, or paradise.
Some people believe that Eph 4:8-10 that Jesus took believers with Him from sheol to another place of bliss that we now call heaven.
Others say Eph. 4 more likely refers to the ascension of Christ... And all the unbelieving dead go to the cursed side of hades to await the final judgment, while all the believing dead go to the blessed side of hades to await the resurrection.
I come down on the side of Jesus taking believers out of Sheol to heaven. And that is in part because of Mathew 27:52 "The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised;" (If they saw their own resurrection , which I believe, and there is no where written that tehy went back into their tombs..... then I must believe Jesus took believers with Him from sheol to another place of bliss that we now call heaven.
Did Jesus go to sheol/hades? Yes, There can be no doubt.
I have the same understandings on these things.
Regarding Ephesians 4, I think that Jesus entered sheol into the side of comfort, and took those ones into heaven, having fulfilled His sacrifice that would remove, and not merely cover, their sin.
Regarding the dead raised at Jesus' crucifixion, I have to leave it silent, since the Bible doesn't tell us. I think there is a church tradition that when Jesus ascended into heaven, that these also visibly ascended with Him. I just can't say one way or the other.
Did God transfer Enoch to somewhere? Yes. But not to heaven... I firmly believe he was put into
Upper Sheol/Paradise.....
Some people think we all arrive into heaven at the same time, that time in heaven is different. And that translates into "soul sleep" to some people. For me it would more mean that we leave this time, and enter that time.
My thinking is more along the lines that the OT faithful were brought by Jesus into heaven, and that the OT martyrs are those "under the altar" in the 5th Seal of chapter 6 of the Revelation. I think that we who are "in Christ" are alive in the celestial realm (seated together in the heavenlies with Christ, hid with Christ in God), and that when we die in this world, we remain alive in the heavenly realm, only, without the senses of our flesh to experience this world through, we will be awake to that realm, able at last to actually experience being in God's presence, once by faith, and then by sight.
Only of course we won't actually see Him Who is a Spirit, Who lives in unapproachable light. But we will see Jesus.
Something else I think about is that Jesus forgave sins before the cross. Hebrews tells us that without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins. So how could Jesus forgive sins before He shed His blood? I have to think, His IS God, so, He can do that. And maybe it has something to do with His eternal nature that He is truly fully sovereign, to forgive a sinner, to bring a man to heaven, to seat 24 elders around His thone.
Might Enoch actually be one of those elders? I don't know.
Anyway, I really appreciated your explanation to me! And I'm not going to be dogmatic about it, I'm not fully settled on this.
Much love!