This week on Fresh Ground Theology’s The Weekend Cup, we begin the story of missionary pilot Nate Saint—not with his famous final flight, but with the boy who dreamed of flying long before he ever saw the Ecuadorian jungle. A childhood fascination with aviation, a serious battle with osteomyelitis, military service during World War II, and the loss of his hoped-for career as a conventional pilot gradually redirected Nate toward an emerging idea: perhaps an airplane could be more than a profession. Perhaps it could be a tool for the Gospel.

We follow Nate through his early missionary aviation experience, theological preparation at Wheaton College, marriage to Marjorie Farris, and finally his departure for Ecuador with Mission Aviation Fellowship in 1948. Before Nate Saint became one of the best-known missionary martyrs of the twentieth century, he first had to become a missionary—and a pilot.

Sources

• Russell T. Hitt, Jungle Pilot: The Story of Nate Saint, Martyred Missionary to Ecuador
• Wheaton College Archives & Special Collections, To Carry the Light Further: Nate Saint, 1923–1956
• Mission Aviation Fellowship, “Nate Saint”
• Mission Aviation Fellowship historical materials on the origins of missionary aviation

Wheaton’s archival biography contains Saint’s letters, prayer letters, testimony, and his own writing on jungle aviation. (Wheaton Digital Exhibits)

Music: Adventure Beyond by Alexander Nakarada (https://creatorchords.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0