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THE EVEREST CHRONICLES #10

THE DOOR TO ANOTHER WORLD

He was a 29-year-old climber from Sweden, and his plan was to climb Everest all by himself. Göran Kropp had taken seven months to ride from Stockholm to Nepal on a custom-built bicycle loaded with 240 pounds of gear. And with something like 300 climbers on the mountain, waiting to go up, it was determined that young Mr. Kropp would go first, on May 3.

The other expeditions watched with binoculars or stayed glued to radios as he made his way to the South Summit at 26,000 feet. Then shortly after midnight, he began the lonely journey to the top. The Adventure Consultants expedition with Rob Hall and writer Jon Krakauer hung a sign on their mess tent: "Go, Göran, Go!"

There wasn't any wind that night, but the snow was thigh-deep, so it was slow going for the courageous Swede. At two o'clock the next afternoon, the standard turn-around time, he was just 300 feet from the top, just an hour away. However, this was a man who knew his limitations and how much strength it would take to get back down safely. To the incredulity of those listening below on the radio, he made a decision. With the summit clearly in his sights he turned around, and came back down the mountain. And seasoned climbers everywhere applauded his good judgment. He was one of those who lived through the terrible May of 1996. Actually, he got a second chance and made it to the top with the IMAX team three weeks later.

But there's a quiet story in the Bible that parallels this image of a man climbing alone. Others are down below looking on, but up near the summit a special person is uniquely close to the roof of the world, much higher than all the rest.

We know very little about this climber, but you can read the mountaineering log in Genesis chapter five. His name was Enoch, and the records really tell us very little about him. First of all, "He walked with God." That's very simply put. "He walked with God." And secondly, his lifespan is much shorter than his peers. In verse 23: "Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years" — while, of course, in those virgin days of our planet's history, most of these ruddy men lived to be eight or nine hundred. Read through the chapter and the numbers are incredible.

But then I get to verse 24, and I get the chills of Everest up and down my spine as I read about this solitary climber. Listen to this:

"And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him."

We don't know much about this mysterious little story, because that's the only information left behind. Just this one sentence. One day, Enoch simply wasn't there anymore, because God had taken him away. He had climbed high on the mountain with his God; day by day as they walked together, they were higher and higher on the peaks of companionship. And one day . . . Enoch was gone. He didn't come home for supper, because he'd gone to another country.

We've spent two weeks here on the mountains of Everest, and if you've been with us, I know full well that it hasn't been all fun and games. David told me about writing some of these scripts and having to wipe at his eyes; I've felt some of the same here in the studio. And yet there's something about the very peak of Everest, the top of that mountain, way up there at 29,028 feet that is very close to heaven. A man or woman standing on the peak of Everest is closer to the stars than any other human. We mentioned earlier that the winds up there aren't just ordinary breezes; they're actually caused by the rotation of this planet. Way up there in the stratosphere, as high as the jet planes fly, in the thin air of outer space, a person is very close — can I say it this way? — to heaven itself. I'm sure many of the people who who gotten to this place, the roof of the world, have had a sense of spiritual awe, of divine presence.

And then there was this man Enoch, who walked with God. And it's very clear that he had an experience with his Creator that was different from his neighbors. Already wickedness was spreading throughout the world; in fact, the story of Noah's ark and the destruction of sin is just one chapter over there in the Genesis story. But here was a man who walked with God. While others were down at Base Camp, so to speak, down in the plains of licentiousness, one lonely man was scaling the mountain. He was up there alone, heading for the top. Except that he wasn't really alone; "Enoch walked with God."

There's a great old book entitled Patriarchs and Prophets, and the writer shares what I honestly think are inspired insights about this man Enoch. He was kind of a missionary among his own people, she writes. He worked tirelessly to remind others about their Creator. Where others forgot, he remembered and he reminded. He preached, he prayed, he encouraged. But sometimes he would go off by himself and spend time alone with his Maker.

"After remaining for a time among the people," she writes, "laboring to benefit them by instruction and example, [Enoch] would withdraw, to spend a season in solitude, hungering and thirsting for that divine knowledge which God alone can impart. Communing thus with God, Enoch came more and more to reflect the divine image. His face was radiant with a holy light, even the light that shineth in the face of Jesus. As he came forth from these divine communications, even the ungodly beheld with awe the impress of heaven upon his countenance."

People everywhere could tell that there was something different about this spiritual mountain climber, who seemed often to be off by himself with his unseen Companion. For 300+ years they watched him, this unique man. Some heckled him, some admired him; but they all acknowledged that he was different.

And then one day . . . he was gone. Let me share just one more paragraph from this same book.

"For three centuries [Enoch] had walked with God. Day by day he had longed for a closer union; nearer and nearer had grown the communion, until God took him to Himself. He had stood at the threshold of the eternal world" — that sounds like the peak of Everest, doesn't it? — "only a step between him and the land of the blest; and now the portals opened, the walk with God, so long pursued on earth, continued, and he passed through the gates of the holy city — the first from among men to enter there."

You know, if anything we've said these past two weeks is chilling, it's this picture right here. Enoch walked so close to God, they were such good friends, that one day as they climbed higher and higher, they really were on the peak of the mountain. They simply couldn't get any closer to heaven. Spiritually speaking, they were at 29,028 feet and there wasn't any higher they could climb. And you know, I really believe God turned to this man He loved so much and said, "Enoch, look. We're really closer now to My home than to yours. Why don't you just come on home with Me?"

"And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him."

Friend, let me tell you something as we close. This world's population is endlessly fascinated with the thought of a portal opening up . . . and suddenly someone is gone, in a different world. But as far as I'm concerned, you can take Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Wars, Star Trek, Contact, Men in Black, X-Files, Millennium, and all of Hollywood's other attempts to show people walking through that door . . . and lump them all in last place compared to this quiet verse about one man named Enoch who climbed up this mountain with his God and then stepped through the door into heaven. There's no Twilight Zone story in this world like the story of Enoch.

And of course, in just this one verse we read exactly how this quiet, mysterious miracle took place. What exactly did Enoch do that stirred God's heart to give His friend such a rare privilege? What was the secret? Well, it's told to us very plainly. In the Living Bible: "Enoch lived . . . in fellowship with God . . . in constant touch with God." The Clear Word: "He knew God intimately." The Contemporary English Version: "Enoch truly loved God." Or, maybe the most poetic and potent of all, the King James: "And Enoch walked with God." Clear over in Hebrews, the New Testament, surely this hero's got to be mentioned in the great Hall of Faith chapter 11. Sure enough, in verse five:

"By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death; he could not be found, because God had taken him away."

Again, how, we ask? "By faith," the Bible tells us. Enoch had faith, he trusted in his God, his heavenly Friend. They walked together, talked together, spent time with each other. When Enoch walked alone up the mountain, he was never really alone because he was building that faith relationship; he was walking with his God.

Friend, don't you want that? I know I do. It's hard to climb up Everest; every story we've told these past two weeks has involved cold and tears and unremitting pain. It's always easier, more comfortable, down below with the masses who don't care. But consider the rewards of seeing that door, that entryway to a better world.

As we finish with Everest for now, I can't help but think of a great song which serves as my prayer on this Friday, August 6th, 1999:

"Just a closer walk with Thee. Grant it, Jesus, is my plea. Daily walking close to Thee. Let it be, dear Lord, let it be."