Meet Bear Grylls: Mud, Sweat and Tears

How’s your backbone?

For the past few years, watching Bear Grylls on Man vs. Wild has been a regular event in the Tyson household (even if I still refuse to watch Bear drink his own urine or eat raw goat’s testicles—the latter of which he apparently prefers to Brussels sprouts). And so I was hugely excited to hear that Bear’s autobiography just hit New Zealand bookstores.

I’ve had a quick skim read through the review copy that arrived in our office (Hayden was first to read it) and it looks fascinating. As well as his inspiring life story that’s briefly retold in this week’s feature, Bear gives an insight into the importance of the Christian faith, which he calls ‘the backbone in our being’.

As a young child, Bear says his faith in God was natural; a simple comfort that he didn’t question. However, attending endless, dry school chapel services eventually gave him the impression that Christianity was boring. He writes, ‘The precious, natural, instinctive faith I had known when I was younger was tossed out with this newly-found delusion that because I was growing up, it was time to “believe” like a grown-up.’

At a low point in his life, the teenaged Bear reached out to God. And God was there. Since then, he says his Christian journey has been about ‘trying to make sure that I don’t let life or vicars or church over-complicate that simple faith I had found. … To me, my Christian faith is all about being held, comforted, forgiven, strengthened and loved—yet somehow that message gets lost on most of us, and we tend only to remember the religious nutters or the God of endless school assemblies.’

Perhaps surprisingly for a man of obvious physical and mental strength, Bear testifies that faith in Christ is the great empowering presence in his life, ‘helping me walk strong when so often I feel so weak’. This goes to prove that even if we can scale the highest mountain or cross the most dangerous river, we still haven’t found what we need most of all if we haven’t met Jesus.

Major Christina Tyson

Bible Verse

Hebrews 13:15–16 - Contemporary English Version
‘Our sacrifice is to keep offering praise to God in the name of Jesus. But don’t forget to help others and to share your possessions with them. This too is like offering a sacrifice that pleases God.’

Hiperu 13:16
‘Kei wareware hoki ki te mahi pai, ki te atawhai: e manakohia ana hoki e te Atua nga patunga tapu pera.’