Click here to watch the 2009 interview with Bear Grylls at Holy Trinity Brompton. 

 Speaking to more than 900 people attending a packed Alpha launch evening in London, TV adventurer Bear Grylls spoke of his ‘quite simple’ Christian faith.

Interviewed by Vicar Nicky Gumbel and interspersed with clips from his recent Born Survivor series on Channel Four, Bear Grylls spoke about the pressures of his increasing fame around the world and what he described as ‘this whole kind of madness of the last two years’.

This involved him drinking the juice from elephant dung in Africa, biting the head off a vine snake in Panama, sleeping inside the carcass of a camel in the Sahara and eating the testicles of a goat with a group of north African nomads.

He said, ‘Those sort of things are great TV moments, but they’re not necessarily kind of highlights for me.’

He also spoke about press reports that he had stayed in comfortable hotels while filming his Born Survivor series when the films suggested he was camping in tough places.

He said, ‘I had lots of bad press but the truth, like a lot of these things, is much less exciting than the headlines. Basically, we film these over about ten or 12 days, of which two days and two nights are spent out.

‘When I’m not spending the nights out on the live stuff, I stay with the crew in a base camp lodge wherever that is.
‘But I’m quite new to all this TV stuff and I think you learn to take the rough with the smooth a bit.’

Of his faith, he said, ‘Life is sometimes quite fluffy and when everything’s going well we don’t necessarily need our faith... but I’ve learned over the years that my Christian faith has been such a backbone through so many difficult times.

‘My faith is quite simple in the sense that for me Christianity is about being held; it’s about being forgiven; it’s about being loved; and it’s about being strengthened. I’m no longer afraid to say that in the way I was, maybe, however many years ago.’

He spoke about going on an Alpha course with his wife Shara at Holy Trinity Brompton. He said, ‘It was lovely to be able to come and do it in a very non-pressured and unjudgemental and very honest environment, which I think you know is what you guys do here.

‘I think the best thing was actually being able to do it together and talk about life stuff quite intimately together. But our faith is quite bumbling and it struggles.’
Shara Grylls, who was invited on to the stage later in the evening, said of their time on Alpha: ‘I wasn’t a huge churchgoer before I met Bear but he said, “Let’s do the Alpha course together”.

‘It was a brilliant introduction to the whole thing because I had never been anywhere like this before in my life. We had lovely suppers and we had a really nice group. We still keep in touch with the leaders. We’ve now done the Marriage Course and other courses.’

How does Bear cope with life as a celebrity?
He said, ‘I find it quite awkward actually. That wasn’t really the big incentive.
‘But it’s part of the privilege of having an amazing job. I have so much fun. And being recognised is fine.

‘The nice thing about the show is that it appeals so much to kids. I get so many dads coming up to me in America and saying, “I just want to say thank you. You are giving a younger generation a love of the outdoors.”
‘But I have wanted to do all this kind of stuff ever since I was a kid. I’d climb trees and I’d be rolling around in the mud and people say, “But that’s what you do now.”

‘So I feel really lucky. People have said I must be quite an adrenaline junkie, but adrenaline doesn’t last three and a half months on a big mountain. Something else needs to drive you.
‘I think a lot of life is a struggle to summon up the courage to really follow our hearts.’

He spoke of his love for his family. He said, ‘I got back from the Sahara last night and this morning Jesse, who is four, saw I was feeling a bit ugh, so he came up and just went, “Dear Lord, please strengthen Papa.”
‘Those are magic moments,’ he said.