Sitting encircled in the shade at the bottom of the climb, the instructor asked the youth group, “Why was climbing and challenging ourselves so important to our faith?”  The students thought quietly until one man, a volunteer sponsor, raised his hand.

“It’s like the animals at the zoo,” he said. 
​
This got everyone’s attention.  Shane, a former teacher-turned-zookeeper-turned-farmer, had signed up to help chaperone the group on this rock-climbing adventure with Discovery Ministries and found that the lessons from the day dredged up past experiences with animal husbandry that snapped a connection to human faith and resilience.  He saw the truth of the experience not only applied to his students but also challenged him.  

I had asked Shane what made him switch from public school teacher to zookeeper.  Without hesitation, he replied, “The beasts at the zoo were easier to manage and tamer!”  Then he related a study done on zoo animals to increase their resilience.  Zookeepers had begun to suspect the animals were susceptible to illness and morbidity when faced with adversity because everything was provided for them, a life made easy by eliminating struggle.  Turns out the lack of challenge was not doing the wildlife any favors. 
​
In a 2025 review, “Why Measuring and Building Resilience Is Applicable to Zoo and Aquarium Animal Welfare,” Jessica C. Whitham and Lance J. Miller explained testing a theory they called “stress inoculation.”  They had presented appropriate, manageable challenges to the animals over time to build resilience.  In short, they used smaller, deliberate challenges to combat larger-scale, harmful stressors.  And guess what?  It worked.  The animals in the test bounced back quicker from traumatic veterinary visits.  They adapted better when transferred from one pen to another and even did better socially with other zoo animals and human visitors.

Pondering this with our climbing group, we discussed the unprecedented levels of suicide, depression, anxiety, and fear amid a modern culture that has attempted to rid our lives of challenge, replacing it with as much convenience and comfort as we can stomach.  It dawned on us that maybe we need what the zoo animals need—deliberate times of adversity.

One kid raised his hand, “I guess this climbing day is challenging on purpose to help us grow in our character.” 

I couldn’t communicate our intent at Discovery Ministries much better except to add James’ sentiment about challenge found in James 1:2-4:  
​
“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”
​

James would agree with those zookeepers, emphasizing that as humans, we should go a step farther and thank God for the trials He allows, joyfully seeing the purpose in developing steadfast faith so we won’t lack anything.  This lack isn't a material pursuit of having everything we need—God provides well for that, too.  Still, James is giving us the answer that combats the deeper challenges of life like anxiety, hopelessness, depression, and fear.  He’s giving us a prescription to “abide” in Jesus.  It starts with agreeing to let God bring challenges to us, trusting that He will not give us more than we can bear, and believing that He will be present with us as we walk through them. 
​
It’s a lot like a novice rock climber clambering up a granite slab attached to a rope and belayer, but faced with a fear of heights.  The belayer will catch the climber when he falls, but he also wants to see the climber reach the summit and achieve the victory.  It’s a measurable challenge worth pursuing because that victory contains a sealed treasure, reminding us that we can conquer fear and rely on something outside ourselves to catch us.  It’s the invisible, less tangible treasure of true bravery that no one can take away from us.  This happens in our inner being and is visible only with our spiritual eyes.  

By the end of our discussion with the climbing group about how the zoo animals can illustrate the importance of challenge, one junior high boy raised his hand: “Do you think bears can climb as well as people?” 
​
Maybe the zookeepers can study that next.

Jett sat without a helmet or harness the whole afternoon, clearly communicating that while it might be great for the students he led to face their fear of heights at the climb site, he was exempt.  After belaying the last of his youth group kids down the rappel, I made my way toward Jett.  I wanted him to take a turn, face the fear, and lead his students by example, but his body language and my intuition, built on two decades of inviting freaked-out people to face their greatest fears, told me he wasn’t budging. 
​
I knew there was a good chance that if he didn’t step over the edge, he was going to lose his voice of influence.  Pondering this dilemma, I suddenly heard the still small voice of the Lord remind me of something He had been communicating to me for weeks, “Watch Me work.”  He spoke to my heart like a fresh breeze blowing through my soul on a hot summer day.  Instantly, I knew that despite my misgivings about Jett’s courage, God was going to do something great.  The best part was that I no longer felt the pressure to use some facilitative verbal jiu-jitsu to coerce Jett into leading bravely.  

Beckoning Jett to join me next to a granite boulder out of earshot of the group, I began by telling him that I wanted him to know two things.  First, I wasn’t going to strong-arm him to rappel.  I wanted to honor him and let the decision be his.  Second, if he chose to take a safe, comfortable stance while pressing his students to face their fears, he would likely lose some of his spiritual influence with them.  It's difficult for people to follow you as you follow Christ when you aren’t going anywhere. 
​
His response surprised me.  “I have this problem,” he admitted.  “I feel like I only have enough courage to face a few fears, and what if I use too much courage here and don’t save enough for the future?”  I’d never thought of bravery having an expiration date, but his question was authentic.  I had always thought facing fears built more courage and enabled one to face even greater challenges in the future, but I couldn’t deny that Jett had a point worth considering.  So, I answered with a different tack.  

“You may need courage to face future fears, but the courage you could use today will undoubtedly bless others.” 

Jett pondered this point for a moment and then resolved to face his fear, saying, “I’ll do it now…for my students.” 

We walked back to the rappel and scrambled up the slope to the top.  His 15 middle schoolers watched and chanted his name, cheering him on.
​
With his trembling body hooked securely to the rappel rope, Jett leaned back over the cliff like a new convert being laid beneath the waters of baptism and descended into something he had never experienced before—true bravery.  His action was true and holy because it was not done to show off or to prove something or even to impress others.  Bravery is not the act of being fearless, but quite the opposite.  True courage is being afraid and facing it anyway, especially when it inspires and encourages others to face their own fears.  

​When Jett’s feet touched down, his group erupted in celebration.  He was elated; he had done it!  And I wiped a glistening tear forming at the corner of my eye because I had just experienced again the faithfulness of God, watching Him work to make a timid soul brave.  In the shadow of the fearful crag, God and Jett taught me that if you’ve only got enough courage to spend once, spend it on others and that the courage we need comes from an infinite source a little at a time.  That day, despite the odds, all I had to do was watch Him work. 

“Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God;
I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you
with my righteous right hand.”
Isaiah 41:10

Angie came as part of her grieving process over her husband’s recent, premature death.  She hoped to find some consolation in seeing what he had been doing at Discovery Ministries all those years, to connect to him in the silent absence and experience him again by walking where he had walked.  By the end of her stay, Angie found more than solace—she found revival. 

The first evening around the dinner table at the lodge, Angie indicated just how different her interests were from her late husband’s.  She declared in no uncertain terms that she would not be going rappelling!  She wasn’t even sure if she was willing to do anything outside her comfort zone.  Adventurous quests had been her husband Ron’s sort of thing.  
​
It was true.  Ron had been coming to DM for years with the church youth group as an adult sponsor.  He first came out of curiosity, but he kept coming out of conviction that what he was seeing and experiencing was truly life changing.  It was on his first canoeing trip with Discovery Ministries some 20 years earlier that he had made the decision to follow Jesus, being baptized under the Current River’s cool, flowing water.  Angie, on the other hand, had never come.  Now she faced a dilemma.  Would she follow her husband’s path by going adventuring with the students she chaperoned or play it safe and reserve her right to distance herself from the challenges?  Slated to go spelunking, hiking, swimming at the local falls, bluff jumping, rock climbing, canoeing, and, yes, rappelling, too, could she go through with it?  

Angie was experiencing the positive peer pressure of those who’ve gone before us.  Like Hebrews 12:1 describes: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us…”  The context in this passage of the cloud of witnesses depicts folks who had the faith to face challenges, fears, and trials and keep believing that God was going to use their efforts for good.  Today, we stand on the shoulders of faithful Christians who kept the faith and endured, handing the baton to us so we could run the great race of faith in Jesus.  Angie didn’t know it, but she was here with the opportunity to receive that handoff from the work her husband had been doing all those years.  

The last day of their stay, the group went on a float trip down the Current River.  They took the usual accoutrements—paddles, life jackets, sandwiches, and water, but Angie also stowed away something unique, a small canister that she clutched closely.  I drove them to the river and helped them shove off, so only later did I hear the story of what happened next.  The float fell on an arbitrary Thursday, but it marked the anniversary of Ron’s baptism to the day, so about halfway down river the group pulled over on a solitary gravel bar, held a prayer service, and watched with rapt fascination as a teary-eyed Angie produced her parcel, opened it, and sprinkled some of Ron’s ashes upon the water.
​
They were just ashes, but her action reached back in time and connected the group to the apostle Paul’s words he wrote in 2 Timothy that he was “poured out like a drink offering.”  It vividly portrayed the beautiful and terrifying words of Romans 12:1, “Therefore…present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”  Seeing the ashes of a life poured out connected to the group members with such impact that a cadre of teens waded into the waters that day, marking their own commitment to Christ through baptism.  

​Later that evening Angie pulled me aside and told me the story.  She proclaimed praise to God and revealed how she had surprised herself by facing her fears—even rappelling twice on climb day!  She got choked up when she shared how God had spoken to her as a fish jumped out of the water at the moment she sprinkled the ashes of her late fisherman husband.  With tears glistening her cheeks, she confessed “I came to see what this place was all about, and God has met me here, turning tears of grief into tears of joy.”  

“Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering
of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all.”
Philippians 2:17