The Great Circle

The circle began on September 9, 2019

It started with a shudder. A muffled bang. Then silence.

Three feet in front of me, the crankshaft had snapped in two. The propeller spun freely—no power. Oil pressure dropped to zero. A red light flashed. We were gliding.

To our left, volcanic ridges and valleys. To the right, a flat, sandy expanse—deceptively calm, but deadly. We banked right, toward what we hoped was salvation.

What we didn’t know then was that our Cessna was descending into a place sparsely inhabited, a place caught in a cycle of isolation, violence, and revenge. No churches for miles. But that was about to change.

Sarah, the other pilot flying N827DG, walks towards the helicopter that flew us out of the valley.

We touched down hard, swerving to avoid bushes and dunes. No fire. We were upright. We were alive.
Three hours later, we locked up the plane and climbed into a rescue helicopter. Two pilots, our patient on a stretcher, and two of her relatives—all squeezed in. As we lifted off, church leaders were already calling relatives in the valley below, asking, “Is the airplane okay?” “Yes,” they were told. “Let’s check.”

The next day, pastors arrived. The Cessna was intact. But the real discovery was the people. No longer just warriors and herders—there were families, children, entire villages. But no churches.

“We think the airplane came down to show us all the people who live here,” one pastor said. “They need a church!”

A pastor named John and two other pastors began the journey—riding down into the valley every Sunday to teach about Jesus. A year later, we returned. An elder greeted us:

“I remember when your airplane came down. We couldn’t believe what we saw. People had come out of the plane and was walking around. They were not injured. There’s no place here for a plane to land. We said, ‘They must have a big God.’”

In 2023, AIM AIR hosted a missions conference in our hangar. Thirty-five churches came. One elder from a large church asked us to hold a similar event in Eldoret. We didn’t know how to organize it easily—but they did it themselves and invited us.

That event brought together leaders from the same dangerous Suguta Valley. As we talked, my friend, Pastor David asked me, “Why can’t these church leaders come to Korr and see what’s happening here?”

The drive from the Pokot tribal area to Rendille tribal area takes two days—backtracking almost to Nairobi, then turning north again. But by air? Just 70 minutes.

On May 31, 2025, David’s ministry, Tirrim Trust, celebrated a milestone: 204 Rendille adults graduated from the adult literacy program. Many had spent years learning under the training trees. Some took weeks just to learn how to hold a pencil. Most were women—mothers and daughters who had missed school to care for family.

Now, they could read. They could help their children. They could read God’s Word.

“When I started to read Mark,” shared Nareyo, a Tirrim literacy alumnus, “I saw—this God is not like the Rendille god. This God is kind. This God loves His people.”

Usually, we fly representatives from Nairobi churches to Korr for the ceremony. This year, we changed it up. David invited a friend from the Kenyan government—Josphat, a cabinet member responsible for marginalized communities. He’s also from a nomadic tribe – the Turkana.

We sent a second airplane to pick up the bishop from Pokot and his wife. “Nomads helping nomads,” David said. “It’s nice when southern Kenyans help, but they don’t know what it’s like to be a nomad. If nomads can learn from each other, that’s best.”

Josphat agreed:
“Today, I’ve seen a model that works. We can replicate this in many areas.”

The Pokot bishop brought someone else: Pastor John—the same John who rode two and a half hours every Sunday to the site where we crash-landed. Now, for the first time, he saw nomadic churches transforming communities through literacy and faith.