A singularly perturbed two-point boundary value problem with an exponential boundary layer is solved numerically by using an adaptive grid method. The mesh is constructed adaptively by equidistributing a monitor function based on the arc-length of the approximated solutions. A first-order rate of convergence, independent of the perturbation parameter, is established by using the theory of the discrete Green's function. Unlike some previous analysis for the fully discretized approach, the present problem does not require the conservative form of the underlying boundary value problem.