“Thank you for bringing me the Bible today,” 11-year-old Joy says, holding her new Good News Bible close. Soon she is turning the pages, eagerly searching for her favourite verse. “For God loved the world so much …” she begins, reciting John 3:16. For Joy, this is more than a book. It is now her very own

precious Bible. “I’m so happy to have my own Bible,” she says. “I’m looking forward to reading it. I will share with my family.” Joy lives with her parents, brother, sister and grandmother. Her smile is impossible to forget.

True to her name, she overflows with joy,“ Because you came and brought me the Bible, I’m happy. I’m so happy.”Joy is one of hundreds of students visited by Bible Society of Kenya (BSK) during a three-day Bible distribution trip to remote

communities held in May 2026. Joining the team was Elise, Bible Society Australia’s Chief People and Missions Officer, who saw firsthand what receiving a Bible meant to children living in some of Kenya’s most disadvantaged regions.

The Journey to Reach Remote Schools One day, the team arrived at a school after classes had ended and the students had already set off for home. Often, they walk along rough dirt roads, sometimes taking up to an hour to get home. But when they saw the vehicle approaching and heard that the team

from BSK had come to bring them Bibles, they stopped at their tracks. Curiosity turned to excitement, and the students ran behind the car back to the school, eager to receive this precious gift. “We’re sorry we’re so late,” Elise apologized to students. Getting there had not been easy. The journey from BSK’s headquarters in Nairobi took several hours, with sections

of rough road slowing travel to less than 10 kilometres an hour. Reaching children in these remote communities often requires navigating difficult terrain, conservation areas, mountain regions and unpredictable weather. These communities are often so remote, road maps aren’t available, and BSK has to work with parachurch organisations and the Kenyan government to locate the schools and map out their navigation as they go. Once the team spent four hours stranded in a riverbed after a vehicle became stuck. In some locations, schools are so difficult to access that teacherstravel to nearby towns to collect the Bibles for their students.

Yet these are precisely the communities BSK is committed to reaching with God’s Word, yet these are precisely the communities BSK is committed to reaching with God’s Word.

“People have been saying to the Kenyan Bible Society, ‘Why are you going there? It’s too far. It’s too hard,’” Elise says. “That’s exactly what we’re trying to do … reach the less reached and less resourced.”

When a Bible Feels Like a Luxury “Most of the children that are reached through this program, they come from poor backgrounds where a parent is not able to put a meal on the table,” explains Susan,Project Officer for BSK’s Bible Distribution for Marginalized Children and Youth project. “For such a parent to think about purchasing a Bible… it doesn’t even hit their mind. It’s a luxury for them. The Bible is a luxury for them.”

Although Christian Religious Education (CRE) is taught in most Kenyan schools, Bibles are scarce, particularly in public schools and rural communities where both schools and families have limited resources. In some schools, only one Bible is shared among more than two hundred students. That is why receiving a personal Bible not only equips them spiritually but also assists their learning in the CRE subject. “I am glad to receive this Bible,” says Atieno*, a Grade 10 student who received her Bible earlier this year. “I will use it to know the Word and teach others the importance of knowing it as well. I hope to pass my Christian Religious Education now that I have a Bible.”

School leaders have seen the difference access to Scripture can make. “The Bibles we have received will go a long way in helping our students,” says Madam Christy*, a School Deputy Principal. “Because it is a personal copy, they can read it themselves and share the Word of God wherever they go.”