As Christian professionals & parents, understanding resilience through the lens of both faith and science can equip us to better support the children we love and care for.
Resilience is often misunderstood as simply having the ability to “bounce back” from difficulty. But it’s much more than that. Resilience is the capacity to adapt positively in the face of adversity, trauma or tragedy. It’s not about avoiding hardship or pretending everything is okay when it’s not.
Instead, resilience is about overcoming life’s challenges and emerging stronger, wiser and more capable.
From a biblical perspective, we see resilience exemplified in countless stories.
Consider Joseph, who endured betrayal, false accusation, and imprisonment, yet remained faithful to God and eventually became a leader who saved many lives. Or think of Paul, who faced persecution, shipwrecks and imprisonment, yet wrote, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9)
Scientifically, resilience is understood as a dynamic process rather than a fixed trait. It involves behaviors, thoughts and actions that can be learned and developed over time. Resilience is not about eliminating stress or erasing life’s difficulties. Instead, it’s about developing the tools to deal with challenges effectively.
The importance of resilience
Resilience is crucial for several reasons:
- It leads to greater life satisfaction: Adversity is a part of life in this fallen world. Resilience equips us to face these challenges while still finding well-being.
- It promotes mental health: Resilient individuals are better able to manage stress, anxiety and depression. They’re more likely to maintain a positive outlook even in difficult circumstances.
- It is related to long-term success: Resilience involves adapting to challenges, which hones our ability to solve problems creatively and achieve goals.
- It aligns with our faith: Cultivating resilience is a way of living out our trust in God’s faithfulness and sovereignty, even in very difficult times – becoming active participants in His restorative work, first in us and eventually through us in others, too.
These benefits would be true for anyone and will benefit any child. However, resilience may be most important for those children who have experienced early adversity.
Early adversity can be associated with a variety of difficult outcomes. However, early adversity and even trauma do not need to define a child’s life; rather, with proper support and intervention, the impacts of adversity and trauma can be lessened as we build a child’s protective factors and resilience.
How resilience is made
Thanks to sound science, we actually have a good deal of information about what produces resilience.
Resilience starts with experiencing something difficult, such as stress, challenge or even adversity. Just as muscle can’t be built without bearing tension, resilience can’t be built without bearing challenge. However, difficult experiences alone aren’t enough to produce positive outcomes. In fact, we know that early adversity, apart from other factors, is typically correlated with negative outcomes.
What makes the difference in seeing better outcomes? What can be added to difficult experiences to make resilience? The answer is protective factors.
As noted in the book Overcoming: What Scripture & Science Say About Resilience:
Broadly understood, protective factors are the counterpoint to adverse experiences. They are internal assets or environmental supports that help a person flourish and cope with challenges,102 and foster a sense of being safe, secure, connected and having a stable environment.103 Protective factors are also sometimes called “Benevolent Childhood Experiences (BCEs) or “Counter-ACEs.”104 They have the potential to be the positive on the opposite side of the balance from adversity.
Resilience across a lifespan
Many adults who parent and/or work with children find themselves wondering about children and resilience. In some ways, the description provided above can seem abstract. If not properly understood, a basic understanding of resilience can seem like a Western, “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” sort of mentality. Thankfully, that’s not the case at all.
Resilience can be built at any age.
This is good news for those of us caring for children who have had a difficult start in life. We don’t need to wait until our 4-year-old is an adult to begin building his or her resilience. Further, this is very good news for those of us with older children or adults we love (and ourselves!) who have experienced severe difficulties.
It is never too early and never too late to build resilience.
Resilience is not magic
Clearly, resilience is an incredible asset and something we would all want for ourselves and those we love. At the same time, resilience is not magic.
Two critical aspects define resilience-building.
First, it’s a gradual process requiring dedicated time and consistent practice. While we can observe progress as new behaviors and thought patterns develop, it’s not an instant solution. The best outcomes occur when resilience-building practices become habitual, enabling children and families to handle increasingly difficult challenges.
Second, resilience shouldn’t be used to rationalize harmful situations. Experiencing severe adversity doesn’t give children an advantage in developing resilience, nor does the value of resilience excuse individual or systemic injustices. Basic safety is fundamental to building resilience. Like bailing water from a leaking boat in the rain, resilience practices generally can’t succeed while harm continues.
A Christian perspective of resilience
As Christians, the concept of resilience not only aligns well with the principles of our faith but is also woven throughout the Bible.
Of course, we see an abundance of examples of overcoming – from Esther to David and Ruth to Daniel. But we also see guidance on how resilience applies to our lives.
Jesus said that we will have trouble to overcome (John 16:33), but also that his presence and power are able to overcome all that we face. We see that the Lord our God is with us wherever we go (Joshua 1:9) , that we can do all things through Him who strengthens us (Phillippians 4:13) , and that we are more than conquerors (Romans 8:37) through Him who loved us. We have no promise that any of this will be easy, but we can trust that it is deeply true.
Christian parents and professionals will of course want to foster resilience in the children they love and serve. We know that life can be very difficult, and we want to prepare our children to overcome challenges. For those of us caring for children who have already experienced early adversity, this is especially important. And we may wonder, with a combination of hope and doubt, “Would overcoming be possible for my child?” We grieve the suffering they have experienced, and we cautiously hope for more for them.
Christian parents and resilience-building
While there is no simple “formula” for creating instant resilience, there are indeed solid principles for cultivating resilience over time. These include:
Thoughts and words have power.
Language is powerful in shaping children’s self-perception. Moving from a focus on challenges to a focus on assets and possibilities is a small yet significant change any parent can make. Using life-giving language, avoiding diagnostic labels, memorizing Scripture, and speaking blessings can help children see their God-given identity and potential beyond past trauma or challenges.
Relationships make a difference.
Healthy attachment acts as a powerful buffer against adversity, and serves as a key ingredient to resilience. To develop healthy attachment and resilience, caregivers should prioritize spending focused time connecting, engaging in back-and-forth serve-and-return interactions, and sharing joint attention on the child’s interests. These intentional ingredients build the stable, loving adult-child relationships that foster resilience.
Repetition over time leads to success.
Even very healthy children often need hundreds of practice repetitions to learn to say “please” or “thank you” on their own. How much more so for kids building the basic practices (“muscles”) of resilience? Hundreds, even thousands of repetitions may be necessary before a new practice becomes second nature, but it’s well worth the effort in the end!
Each child starts out with his or her own strengths and areas for growth, and these will inform his or her capacity. [For instance, I am 5’4”, and it is unlikely that our children will become basketball stars.] What we can be sure of is that God has good plans for our children, and He has given parents an irreplaceable role to play.
Facilitating resilience in our children will help them to travel much further down the road to achieving their full potential than if they lack it. Without resilience, they will struggle. With healthy resilience, they have the means to overcome.
Resilience as a journey
Resilience is a good gift we can give our children through small actions repeated over time. We can’t do the overcoming for them, but we can build the scaffolding to heal from early adversity, to conquer challenges, and to fulfill their potential.
Building resilience, especially in children who have experienced early adversity, is not a journey for the faint of heart. Thankfully, we don’t do it alone.
In the end, the outcomes for our children are out of our hands. We are called to love, care and pray for the children we love and serve with all the wisdom God will give us. But ultimately, we release them back to the One who gave them to us, trusting that He has a good plan, and holding fast to the hope we have through Him.
-Nicole Wilke, PhD, is a child welfare researcher, missionary, author, and marriage and family therapist dedicated to improving care for vulnerable children and families globally. She currently serves as Director of the Center on Applied Research for Vulnerable Children and Families at CAFO, bridging research and practice to improve faith-based care for vulnerable children and families around the globe.
Interested in learning more about building resilience in children to overcome adversity?
The CAFO Research Center has two new books on nurturing resilience in children to help them overcome trauma and adversity. Learn more about Overcoming and Caleb Koala’s Comeback Ride to find practical support for helping children build resilience and overcome adversity.
