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Brian Scott’s La Vida Experience

La Vida participant and sherpa from 1989–1993 

Deputy
El Paso County Sheriff’s Office

A couple of days into my La Vida trip, we got rained out of rock climbing, so we carried on and bushwacked up Porter Mountain from Owl’s Head and hiked down the other side to camp.

The next morning we were on our own for our first day of ‘‘finals’’. We hiked up the trail to Slant Rock that day in the rain and we passed hiking parties that told us things like “the bear kept us up all night” and “the bear got our food and we’re having to hike out.” Like just about every other group on their first day of finals, we had gotten out of camp late that morning and by the time we went to hang the bear rope, it was dark. We all went out to do this and we were making a bunch of fairly nervous noises to intimidate any lingering bear out of the temptation to take a stab at our grub. While this was going on, an audible-only-to-me Word of the Lord was given to me which said, “Brian, there will be no bear.” This word was unmistakably clear, self-evident in its origin and completely comforting. It was also the only time I’ve received a word in this way from the Lord.

There was no bear that night. Not only that, in my five subsequent summers of being on staff in the ADK’s and in the spring and fall teaching Discovery classes and weekends, I only ever saw a bear once. It was a yearling on the shore of one of the ADK ponds and I saw it briefly from several hundred yards away sitting in a canoe. I’d regularly go for re-supply during solo and get back and be told I had just missed a bear. I heard a bear one evening run across the trail ahead of us and splash through a nearby creek, but it was dark and I never saw it. I heard a bear walk around our campsite one morning before dawn but never saw it for the lack of light. The Lord was truly faithful to his word to me, not just that night at Slant Rock, but during my entire time with La Vida.