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THE EVEREST CHRONICLES
#4
GETTING USED TO THIN AIR
If you want to climb Mount Everest these days — and
have something like $65,000 in spare cash lying around — there are certainly
some creature comforts available now that Sir Edmund Hillary didn't get
to take advantage of. In the May 26, 1997 issue of Newsweek, reporter
Rod Nordlund described how a Malaysian team of climbers had Coca-Cola
delivered up to Base Camp regularly by Sherpas. Another team enjoyed the
entertainment of video movies and propane heaters brought in by chopper.
Some climbers even enjoyed bagels, pizza, and sushi prepared daily by
their hired caterers.
In Jon Krakauer's recent bestseller, Into Thin Air, the Adventure Consultants
group headed by Rob Hall, of which Krakauer was a part, enjoyed the benefits
of a huge mess tent at Base Camp. There was a big stereo system, a library,
solar-powered electric lights. They had a satellite phone and fax so the
eight clients could call home to anywhere on the planet. There was even
a shower with water heated by the kitchen staff. And the menu wasn't bad
there either: fresh bread and vegetables arriving almost daily courtesy
of the Himalayan yaks. Every morning the Sherpas would come by each tent
and serve the wealthy clients hot tea in their sleeping bags.
There was really just one thing they didn't have very much of at 17,600
feet. And that was air.
Here's how Krakauer described how that one missing luxury affected him:
"Despite the many trappings of civilization
at Base Camp, there was no forgetting that we were more than three miles
above sea level. Walking to the mess tent at mealtime left me wheezing
for several minutes. If I sat up too quickly, my head reeled and vertigo
set in. The deep, rasping cough I'd developed in Lobuje worsened day by
day. Sleep became elusive, a common symptom of minor altitude illness.
Most nights I'd wake up three or four times gasping for breath, feeling
like I was suffocating."
If you've ever wondered why an Everest expedition is
a two-month process, this is the biggest reason right here. Base Camp,
up in the sky at 17,600 feet, is a climber's home for something like six
weeks while he or she gets used to that thin Himalayan air.
The Sherpas, of course, who live right there in the mountains, are in
a constant state of amusement about the plight of the foreign visitors.
In fact, when Rob Hall's team made their first foray up to Camp One, which
is over 19,000 feet up, one of the Sherpas laughed out loud over Krakauer's
almost immediate exhaustion. "Are you not feeling good, Jon?"
he mocked. "This is only Camp One. Six thousand meters. The air here
is still very thick."
Part of the strategy of Rob Hall was to take his team of climbers on short
little trips partway up Everest: up to Camp One and then back down. Then
an overnight trip to Camp One before going on up quickly to Camp Two,
which stood at 21,300 feet. Then after another recovery time down at Base
Camp, they'd go clear up to Three, and so on. And slowly as the team went
higher and higher, and then back down to rest, they'd get used to the
thinner air. It's a process called acclimatization.
It's actually more than just a case of "getting used to" the
higher altitudes. At Base Camp, which, again, was up in the sky at 17,600
feet, there was just half the oxygen you'd find at sea level. Up at the
top of Everest, only a third as much. So what happens? Krakauer tells
us:
"When confronted with an increase in altitude,
the human body adjusts in manifold ways, from increasing respiration,
to changing the pH of the blood, to radically boosting the number of oxygen-carrying
red blood cells."
Well, did this process work? Actually, it seemed to.
By May 1, still ten days away from the big try for the summit, the team
had made three tough climbs and spent an awful night up at Camp Three,
way up there at 24,000 feet. By contrast, he wrote later, the air down
at Base Camp now seemed "(quote) thick and rich and voluptuously
saturated with oxygen compared to the brutally thin atmosphere of the
camps above."
You've probably heard stories of small children who grow up and live in
the upper regions of South American mountain ranges. Visitors marvel at
the large, almost swollen upper bodies of these children, whose lung capacity
is almost superhuman. It really is incredible how a person can adapt or
become acclimatized to adverse conditions.
But you know, friend, we can look over toward the spiritual mountains
all around us and see that the same thing is happening there. For good
or for ill, we can become used to things that were almost poison before.
We did a radio series a couple of years ago entitled BATHSHEBA-GATE. A
king named David committed the political crime of all time: adultery,
a pregnancy, a conspired murder, and then a failed coverup. I'm sure you
remember the story.
And yet this is the same man who, years earlier, was a sweet wholesome
Jewish kid. As a youth he so caught the eye of the Lord and of Samuel
that the old prophet anointed him to be the future king. Things like adultery
and deception and assassinations were the furthest thing from this wonderful
teenager's pure heart.
What happened? How did a young man who found the atmosphere of sin so
poisonous that he couldn't stand to be anywhere near it get to the point
where he enthusiastically sucked it in? Friend, it's that thing called
acclimatization. One way or another, King David slowly got used to compromises.
He bent a little rule here, then a small half-truth there. Just a few
little things at first, but his soul was getting used to thinner and thinner
air all the time.
Maybe you remember one of our favorite quotes, coming from C. S. Lewis'
book, Mere Christianity. Maybe he climbed a hill or two there near Oxford,
because this is what he says:
"Good and evil both increase at compound
interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are
of such infinite importance. . . . An apparent trivial indulgence in lust
or anger today is the loss of a ridge or railway line or bridgehead from
which the enemy may launch an attack otherwise impossible."
You may recall another classic C. S. Lewis line, this
one coming from the devil's mouth in Screwtape Letters, where the enemy
observes: "Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick."
You see, God knows and Satan knows that if the drift is slow enough, we
can get used to sin. We can get used to a different kind of air.
Maybe you remember this poem by Alexander Pope, entitled Essay on Man:
"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien;
As to be hated needs but to be seen. Yet seen too oft, familiar with her
face; We first endure, then pity, then embrace."
It's no wonder that the Bible warns us, in First Peter
5:8, to "Be sober, be vigilant." I like the New International
Version's rendering:
"Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy
the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour."
And when we know that acclimatization is one
of his favorite tactics, when we read Lucifer's own slogan that the best
road to hell is the smooth one without many turns or sharp curves, then
we realize that we need to indeed "be sober, be vigilant."
However, before we close today, let's praise God together that there's
another kind of acclimatization, a good kind. Climbers and non-climbers
alike, people seeking to know God and build a friendship with Him, can
find themselves soaring higher than they might ever have realized possible.
I think of eleven men that today we call the disciples. Except for Judas,
these eleven stumbling, bumbling men hung around with Jesus Christ for
three-and-a-half years. And the Bible evidence is that they were lousy
climbers. Their appetite for spiritual things was minimal; they couldn't
breathe that kind of holy air for more than a minute or two before dozing
off. In fact — and we got into this just a few weeks ago — on the very
last night of Jesus' life, He asked Peter, James, and John to stay awake
with Him. "Watch and pray with Me," He begged His three closest
friends. Now, that was tough climbing; that was going high up on the mountain.
What did they do? They fell dead asleep there in the Garden of Gethsemane.
They couldn't survive, it seems, on the thin air of prayer and devotion.
They needed the thick, luxurious, decadent air of political intrigue,
of power, of grabbing for the throne.
And yet as we read on into the pages of Acts and the adventures of the
early Christian Church, here were men who had finally become acclimatized.
They now had a passion for spiritual things, not temporal ones. They loved
to pray; they couldn't stop preaching. Talking about Jesus wasn't boring
any more; it was the greatest Everest adventure they could consider. The
air of Calvary wasn't painfully thin — it was the very essence of their
survival. They thrived on the message of the Cross.
We get letters all the time from brand new Christians. Spiritual infants,
really. Maybe they've just given their heart to the Lord as a result of
this program. That's tremendously exciting to us . . . but is this person
ready for some Greek interpretation and heavy theological debate? No,
they're not. But they might do well with our Discover Bible Course; in
a way, that's a first excursion just up to Camp One. And after they finish
those 26 elementary lessons, they move on to something a bit more challenging.
Before you know it — let's say a couple of years later — we might get
a letter from that same person . . . and it blows us away. They're veterans
in the Word of God! In terms of relationship with God and maturity of
faith, they're way up there on the mountain, thriving on air that would
have suffocated them earlier. Praise God for the spiritual power of acclimatization!
How about you, friend? What kind of air are you getting used to each day
. . . right now?
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