Story by Jennifer Wolf
Unless otherwise noted: Photos by Lemuel Malabuyo

Sixto Quiñonez called out in his jovial, megaphone voice within the Amazon jungle, inviting the people of Panintza village in Ecuador to come to the evening service. Entire families started making their way to the small church.

In no time they had filed in and were seated on wooden planks with tree stumps for legs. Then they began shouting out the numbers of favorite worship songs, starting with a Spanish songbook and then transitioning to Shiwiar, their native language.

Their voices rose in praise to their Savior Jesus, accompanied by an acoustic guitar and a choir of jungle birds, cicadas, and other buzzing insects.

A call for help

Samuel Mayancha was born in Panintza and attended elementary school there. As an adult, he went away to the city to be trained as a teacher and gain experience. During that time he also gave his life to Christ.

When he returned to the village to teach the children, Samuel found the community divided over religious ideas. There was no spiritual work happening, and there was no one to teach them God’s Word. He desired to start a congregation but wasn’t sure how to do that.

Then he heard that the MAF team in Shell had a jungle ministry. MAF would adopt a village in which to plant a church and disciple the people. Samuel and the leaders in Panintza desperately wanted this for their community.

Samuel made a video stating their need for missionaries to come and teach them about God.

Sixto, the MAF chaplain, says they had just finished three years of ministry in a small jungle community and it was time to choose the next location. They had already received many requests.

Then Samuel’s video arrived, imploring MAF to come to Panintza.

“And I remembered in Acts, when the Macedonian cried out to Paul to come over to them and help them,” says Sixto.

MAF doesn’t force its ministry on villages. They wait until they’re asked to come. It was obvious that Panintza was desperate for God’s Word.

MAF accepted Samuel’s request and, two years ago, Sixto and Wilson Cuvi, the MAF base maintenance manager, started making monthly visits to Panintza. Other teammates joined them as schedules permitted. MAF staff also donated their own money toward the trips and provided gifts of food, medicine, and school supplies.

Doors opening

MAF first started doing these jungle outreaches back in 2010, when an expatriate water engineer—a believer—was working in the Quichua/Sapara area of the jungle. At that time, many communities rejected the gospel and were opposed to having missionaries come. But in this area, the people began to ask the engineer about Jesus. He tried to answer their questions, but eventually suggested they talk to MAF, which they did. They invited MAF to come to their community one weekend each month to help them study the Bible.

Wilson was the main teacher then, and the fact that he is Quichua and spoke the language opened doors to preach the gospel there. Trust was built between MAF and the neighboring communities, who later asked them to come and work with them as well.

To date MAF has done this type of discipleship ministry in 15 communities. People have chosen to follow Christ in each place, but in one village in particular—Suraka—the teaching had a profound impact. Out of 30 families, ten couples made the decision to unite in marriage before God, committing their partnerships to Christ. MAF never told them they needed to do this. They just felt convicted to do it. Along with this special celebration, many were baptized that day.

“It was a joyful and connected experience,” said one of the MAF pilots who attended. Three MAF airplanes flew in with civil authorities, and MAF staff raised money to buy rings for the couples.

Wilson stresses the importance of working in these smaller villages, which tend to be neglected. He says there are more than 400 small communities within the Amazon jungle of Ecuador that need someone to disciple them.

Challenges and rewards

When Sixto and Wilson began ministering in Panintza, people’s lives were a mess, home situations were not good, and there were complex sins.

“But the moment they knew and accepted Christ as their only personal Savior, it was different for them,” says Wilson. “Although there are struggles and there are still problems, they are feeling the love of God.”

At first Panintza’s new believers were meeting in the community gathering place, where there were all kinds of activities and parties. But Sixto challenged them to build a church because it would make a statement that they are Christians now. It would be their “light on the hill.”

Now, here they sat during the evening service, in the church they had built with their own hands. Bibles were open on their laps, as they followed along and took turns reading verses out loud for the group.

The post Faith Grows in the Jungle appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

I’m happy to say that Timmy the tarantula, my roommate in the Amazon jungle, did not disturb me one bit. Honestly, I don’t think he even moved from his spot by the door while I was in Panintza, Ecuador.

Now that we have the issue of the spider out of the way, I want to give you a glimpse of what it looks like when Lem Malabuyo (MAF’s video producer) and I do interviews in a foreign context. On day two of our stay, we interviewed MAF teammates Sixto and Wilson in between their teaching sessions. A translator conveyed my questions for them in Spanish and then paraphrased the answers back to me in English.

We also interviewed a few other people, including the schoolteacher, a former president of the village, and a young couple who walked for three hours through the jungle to be present for Sixto and Wilson’s teaching of God’s Word.

Some of the families lived on the other side of the river so, later in the afternoon, we crossed over in dugout canoes (another first for me). Then, it was a steep hike up the side of a hill on a makeshift staircase made of halved logs.

We were warmly greeted by one of the husbands, who treated us to some delicious fruit, which he knocked down from a tree with a stick. It looked sort of like a tangelo but, inside, the flesh was white and not pulpy (yay), just juicy. I had two and they were so refreshing, especially since it was quite warm and humid by then.

Next, we walked over to one of the homes and interviewed Olmedo and his wife, Nelly. We sat on the floor of a big front room. The entire home was covered by a beautiful and intricate thatched roof. Most of the houses were set up like this, with one closed-off room at the back, where I’m guessing they slept.

Olmeda said that before MAF came to teach them God’s Word, “they were dancing, drinking, and doing everything in the world. That’s the way we were.”  

“Now we have changed. We have left the things we were doing and now we want to continue in the new life,” Olmeda added.

I thought you might enjoy this short clip from the end of the interview, where Olmedo recited one of his favorite verses.

Last-minute visits

On Wednesday, we expected the MAF plane to arrive late morning, so we hurried off to visit another family. They had invited us to their home for breakfast. So around 8:00 we walked to the other end of the airstrip and then stepped carefully through a wet, muddy, and slippery forest.

Once we reached the home, we ventured to their kitchen and watched them prepare boiled bananas. When everything was ready, we ate together in their front room.

After breakfast, we interviewed the husband (the wife didn’t want to be in the video). Then, we thanked the couple, said our goodbyes, and started our hike back to the center of the village.

Walking through the rainforest here is like a symphony for the senses. First, you take in the beauty; it is something else. Then there are the sounds, from the sloshing of our shoes as we walked to the chorus of bugs and the accompanying bird calls. (Click on the photo below for audio.)

Lem, and brothers Levi and Daniel (translators), happened upon a fallen log in the path and noticed leafcutter ants streaming over it. Of course, Lem had to capture that on film before continuing down the path. As we were exiting the forest, I heard a commotion behind me and turned around to see Lem crouched down. An ant was tugging on his shoelace so he was using a leaf to remove it before it could bite him through his sock. But as he did so, the ant bit his finger through the leaf and drew blood!  

That is one bug bite he will probably never forget.

Rain delays and goodbyes

Back in the village, Lem and I and the translators started packing up our stuff. Then, the rain really started coming down. We moved from shelter to shelter as we waited for it to let up, and realized our flight was going to be delayed.

Morning turned into afternoon and things began to dry up. We had no idea if MAF was coming, because the village radio was broken. Since all our things were ready to go, we joined one last worship time at the church. The people knew we were leaving, so they asked the four of us to lead a few songs in English. They wanted to hear what it would sound like.

So we sang these two songs from their songbook.

Top: “I have decided to follow Jesus”

Bottom: “I have the joy, joy” (joy, joy down in my heart)

After the short service, we had some free time. Lem took off to get overhead shots with the drone, and I kicked the soccer ball around with some of the young women.

Finally, around 3:30 we heard a man shouting, “the plane is coming.” I couldn’t hear a thing, but somehow his ears picked it up from far away. We started grabbing our backpacks and the camera gear and headed down to the airstrip. Sixto and Wilson would have to wait until the next day to return, since only one airplane could make it in. We arrived back in Shell by 5:00.

Thursday and Friday we did interviews in the hangar, then Saturday was a sightseeing day. On Sunday, we made it to the Waorani church in the morning and then it was time to start our drive to the Quito airport. Sadly, our time in Ecuador was coming to an end.  

The post Saying goodbye to the Amazon appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

This is the third in a series of stories about my visit to MAF Ecuador’s program in early December. If you missed the earlier ones, start with the first story here, and then read the second one here.

“Where will we sleep in the jungle? I asked Cristina, MAF Ecuador’s administrative assistant and our main contact for the week.

It was Monday morning in Shell, Ecuador, and our group was at the MAF hangar. We would soon be boarding a Cessna 206 for our flight into the Amazon jungle to visit the small community of Panintza. 

“You’ll be tent camping,” Cristina answered.

I immediately wondered how our tents would hold up under the torrential downpours, and then a more pressing question came to mind. “Would we have to dig a hole for a toilet?”

She looked at me quizzically, as if it were a strange thing to ask. I can’t imagine why. I believe her answer was, “There’s a structure.”

Okay, good. I was sure whatever form of “toilet” was in said structure I had experienced by now in my travels with MAF, including the following: bucket-flush toilets; a long-drop toilet; squatty potties; and a thorn bush.

By mid-morning, it was time to board the airplane along with MAF chaplain Sixto and two local missionary teen brothers who would serve as our translators and help us conduct interviews in Spanish. Soon we were airborne with pilot Danny and flying over the Amazon jungle, which looked like a forest of broccoli from the air.

Forty-five minutes later we landed on the short grass airstrip at Panintza. As we taxied to the end of the strip, people were already coming out from the center of the village to help us carry our cargo, and the food gifts the MAF team had sent.

As we followed Sixto with our gear, two things became clear to me: 1) We were sleeping in tents but we’d be in a simple, raised wooden home, with two rooms and a large covered front porch. Four of the guys would be on the porch, Sixto had a room with all the food and supplies, and I had my own room. So we would not need to worry about the rain getting to our stuff, and the tents would keep the bugs out.

And (perhaps more importantly) 2) There was an outhouse nearby with a squatty potty.

Hospitality in the jungle

We dropped off our stuff and headed over to the large covered area where the community usually gathered—an open-sided structure with a tin roof. We sat on wooden benches at the front and Sixto introduced us and explained that we were there to gather stories for MAF’s supporters. Then some of the leaders came forward and made short speeches to welcome us.

There were maybe 30 or 40 people—adults and children—gathered under the shelter. One of the men shared how they live off the land. Everything they eat comes from the jungle, through hunting, fishing, or whatever is growing there.

Another man shared, “It was not Sixto’s will that we become Christians. It was God’s will.”

It was amazing to me that they were so new in their faith. MAF was in its second year of serving here. A team visits for three days each month to disciple the believers and train church leaders.

The women made lunch for the entire village and set up tables for us in another sheltered spot. There were bowls of hot broth with some sort of meat, small fish, and boiled plantains. When we asked what the meat was, someone told us it was a small horse. Come to find out, it was tapir.

After lunch, the guys started playing volleyball in the hot sun … with a soccer ball! Developed in Ecuador, “ecuavóley” is the national sport. It seemed to require even more energy than a regular volleyball game because of the heavier ball, and the rules were different.

I sat with the women in the shade of the main shelter. They were shy and sweet, and laughed a lot. They spoke Spanish, so I was able to communicate a tiny bit. I knew how to ask how many children and/or grandchildren they had, and to say how many I had. After those questions, all I could think to do was to show them pictures of my grandsons (almost 2 and almost 4 years old) on my phone. Some things are universal it seems, even in the jungle. 

Nighttime approaches, and so do the bugs

Just before 5:00, Sixto’s booming, jovial voice called the people to come to the church for the evening service. Soon, entire families arrived and began to find a seat.

They sang several worship songs in Spanish and Shiwiar (pronounced Shiviar), their native language. Then Sixto preached from Romans 6:1-8 and shared a list of “7 Reasons Why Not to Sin.”

It felt very much like Christianity 101—rich, basic truths that every believer should know but with culturally relevant examples for people who live in a jungle setting.

As it was getting dark, someone set up a projector and they began to play a short film about Jesus. Sixto and Wilson (the other MAF teammate who arrived on a later flight) left the church when the movie started. Lem and I and the translators went to find them and discovered they were heating water for hot chocolate or milk and had rolls with tuna for our MAF team.

We enjoyed our evening snack by candlelight, where the bugs came out in full force. Then it was time to get ready for bed, so I went to my room to grab my toothbrush and toothpaste by flashlight. As I was doing this, Lem says, “Hey Jenn, did you know you have a roommate?”

I turned around to see him by the door, his headlamp illuminating a spot next to the door frame.

There, hiding within its web, was a good-sized TARANTULA!

While I was mortified, the guys thought it was hilarious and promptly nicknamed it “Timmy.”

Of course I would get the room with the large spider! They assured me it would only come out at night to eat the bugs. It was a good thing, they said.

##

Would I be able to sleep knowing that Timmy was nearby? What would the next two days hold for me in Panintza? You’ll have to wait for my next installment to find out.

The post <strong>In the Amazon jungle</strong> appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

This is the second in a series of personal reflections from a field resourcing trip to Ecuador. If you missed my “Eyes on the Sparrow” story, read that one first, here.

Sunday morning at the Nate Saint house. We still didn’t have a plan in place for the day, and our connection to the local Waorani church we hoped to visit that morning fell through. I decided to enjoy an extended quiet time with the Lord, and continued to ponder what God had been teaching me the night before about how His eye is on the sparrow, and on me. I listened to the different versions of the hymn again and reflected on the verse (Matt. 10:29-31). Eventually, I made my way to the balcony that was just off my room and sat on the patio chair there.

I remembered that before the trip I had discovered an Elisabeth Elliot podcast. I opened up my phone and went to find it again. When I did, I scrolled through the episode titles, and guess what I found? An episode called “His Eye is on the Sparrow!”

So of course, I had to listen to it. I sensed that Jesus had something else to teach me. And as often happens when He is trying to make a point, it’s repeated two or three times in different ways—sometimes through a conversation with a friend, sometimes through a sermon. This felt incredibly personal, just me and His Word on a tiny balcony, and now an audio file.

If you’re not familiar with Elisabeth, she was one of the five wives I mentioned in Part 1 who were in the kitchen at the Nate Saint house when they received the news that their husbands had been martyred by a group of Waorani men. Elisabeth continued the ministry she had started with her husband and eventually was invited to live and work with the Waorani people in their village. She had the privilege of sharing the gospel with them, along with Rachel Saint, Nate’s older sister.

In this podcast episode, Elisabeth was talking about how to get rid of complaining. She shared about living in the jungle and how the Waorani never complained. She said they wouldn’t make a fuss about stepping on a thorn, a caterpillar, hot coals, etc. They would never think to grumble about the weather, for instance, including the torrential downpours that happened frequently. She said they didn’t even have a vocabulary for it. As if on cue, as I was listening, the rain started pouring down, making a glorious noise on the tin roof.

Elisabeth talked about how complaining is a learned behavior. I knew I had a tendency to be negative at times and grumble out loud or in my heart. Elisabeth herself said she was a born complainer. Well, I was in good company it seemed.

“Endurance is a learned behavior,” she continued, giving me hope.

She went on to say that the Waorani men viewed the women as physically stronger when it came to bearing burdens. Turns out when a man killed a large animal in the jungle, he would run and tell his wife where the animal was. Then she would go and find it somehow and carry it home on her back. Elisabeth says the women did so without a word of complaint and describes them as having “sheer dogged endurance.”

Throughout the episode, Elisabeth mentioned several verses or entire passages. So when it ended, I went and looked them up and camped out on one in particular that resonated with me.

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure,
children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation. Then you will shine among them
like the stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the Word of life. —Philippians 2:14-16a (NIV)

Around noon, Lem, my co-worker (MAF video producer) texted me. He said his missionary friend was inviting us out to lunch. Turns out the Waorani church had been right down the street the whole time! We had no idea it was close by. We could easily have walked there.

We got ready to go and walked over to the couple’s complex. Then they drove us to a nearby restaurant. After a lovely lunch, we called Christina, our main MAF contact, and arranged to go grocery shopping that afternoon. Then she asked if we wanted to go out for dinner with the MAF singles that evening.

Why, yes. Yes, we would! This would give us a chance to meet quite a few of the staff before we walked into the hangar the next morning.

I treasured the lessons I had already learned in my short time in Shell, Ecuador, and tucked them in my heart—God has His eye on me, and I could learn how not to complain. I was about to put these lessons to the test as I could be spending the next three days/two nights in the Amazon jungle.

The post <strong>No Grumbling Here</strong> appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

By Jennifer Wolf

At the Nate Saint House in Shell, Ecuador, I was trying not to panic as I texted my co-worker, Lem: “I can’t find that cloth purse that has my wallet and passport in it!”

I knew I had it with me when we stopped for lunch on the drive from Quito. Did I leave it in the restroom at the restaurant? Maybe I had hung it on the door.

“What if I left it at the restaurant?” I texted again. The restaurant was two hours away.

“That could be a problem,” he messaged back from the other guest house—the original MAF hangar that had been converted into a family home.

We would only be in Ecuador for a week, to do interviews with key partners and staff so we could share about the impact the MAF team is having here. Would it even be possible to replace a passport in that amount of time?

It was stressful enough traveling internationally, not being able to communicate in the local language, relying on others for help, and now, losing my passport!

I looked everywhere in my apartment. Where could it be? I sent a message to the gal whose father had driven us to Shell, thinking maybe I left it in his car.

But I must have had it when we arrived at the MAF property around 5 p.m., because I had my phone with me now, and I had been keeping that in the purse too.

What am I doing, thinking I can travel across the world like this? I’m not cut out for this, my panicked thoughts swirled.

The enemy was wielding an ugly sword trying to cut me down.

I was already feeling muddleheaded after a full day of travel the day before, arriving in Quito just past midnight. Then, a four-plus hour car ride to Shell, starting at 10 that morning. I was running on five hours of sleep.

Even my excitement over discovering that I would be staying at the Nate Saint house had started to wane just a bit. The constant traffic on the main two-lane road through town droned on just outside my windows. I realized my idea of a small, quaint base with a quiet street running through it was a bit outdated—like 75 years outdated! The MAF team had recently celebrated that milestone anniversary.

I blame all the vintage MAF photos I’ve seen, and the current snapshots that can’t show the whole picture.

But I was here and excited, for the most part. Surely, I would feel better after a good night’s rest. But what about this passport issue? It was 9 o’clock in the evening at this point. I felt the panic rising, so I did the most logical thing …

“Father God, this is really bad. I cannot find my passport! I’ve looked everywhere and I just don’t know where it is. Please help me! In Jesus’ name.”

Nothing fancy, just desperate.

A split second later, He put this thought in my head—front porch.

I raced down the stairs with the old, frayed carpet, past the radio room and the original kitchen—where five wives had received the worst news—unlocked and threw open the front door.

There, resting on an emerald-green bench on the front porch, was my colorful purse with my wallet and passport inside.

It made sense now. Lem and I had sat there while he connected my phone to the MAF internet before we had each gone to our lodgings. I had pulled my phone out of the purse and set it next to me.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Jesus! You’re so good to me, my quieted heart sang.

Bugs danced around the streetlights and cars and trucks buzzed by the chain-link fence out front as I turned and ran back inside, bolting the front door behind me.

Lighter now, I jogged back up the steps to the apartment.

An old window with stick-on words and an image of a bird hung on the wall across from the kitchen. It held new meaning to me now in this place that holds so much history. It read:

His eye is on the sparrow
and I know He loves me.

I knew there was a Bible verse related to this but couldn’t remember where it was. So I Googled and found it:

“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? 
And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. 
But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.
Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows” (Matt. 10:29-31, ESV).

At the same time, some videos popped up, and I learned there was a hymn. I played different versions until I found one or two favorites, and then I listened to them over and over again.

God has His eye on me. He had His eye on my passport. He cares about the minute details that matter to me—and you.

He’s always with me, always sees me, always loves me … even when I’m far from home.

The post <strong>Of Sparrows and Lost Things</strong> appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

Something that we really struggled with when we first moved to Ecuador was feeling like we didn’t belong. We were the new people and the only foreigners on our team here at ADSE, and we didn’t connect immediately with a local church.

But as the years have gone by we’ve realized, especially during our times of deepest need, the depth of community that God has blessed us with here. When we experienced a family trauma, our ADSE teammates showed up at our house and sat with us for hours. When Marcos traveled out-of-country and I stayed here with the kids, friends brought meals, checked on me via text, and came to hang out and give us something to do. When we just needed to see another living person during the lockdown of 2020, our neighbors became like family.

This didn’t happen overnight. It was the result of several years of praying and intentionally working towards building relationships with people. And it goes both ways, with us being on both ends of the giving and receiving that happens when you live life together with other people.

Finding community in a new place can be hard. It takes work; it takes hanging on through the awkward beginning when you aren’t quite friends but you are something more than acquaintances.

There are days when the effort doesn’t seem worth it, or you don’t want to make any effort at all. Friendships, especially ones worth having, don’t usually just fall into your lap. It takes a commitment to be the one to invite, to go out of your way to make time for people, to be available to help, serve, and give.

But the results? Oh, the results are beautiful. They are beautiful because they reflect what being the church is all about. We are the church and the beauty of the gospel is lived out in our actual lives. Invest in creating a gospel-centered community where you are, and you will be amazed at the results.

The post Finding Community appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

By Natalie Holsten

“I just grew up with MAF.”

Debbie Lowrance is the daughter of pioneering MAF missionaries, Hobey and Olivia Lowrance, who served in several Latin American countries, southeast and central Asia, and MAF’s headquarters.

Debbie is not only an MAF “missionary kid” but she’s also a longtime supporter. Recently she chose to name MAF as a charitable beneficiary in her living trust, a decision born out of her love for the organization, and a continuation of the legacy established by her parents.

Hobey and Olivia met in Ecuador in 1949, set up by fellow missionaries. They married then began a life of service together. Debbie’s three older brothers were born in Latin America. By the time Debbie came along, her family had just moved to MAF’s headquarters, then located in California.

“When I was little, I knew everybody in MAF, who worked at the office, and the history of people,” Debbie recalled recently. “I knew of lot of missionaries around the world. I was just part of a big extended family.”

When Debbie was 12, her parents took an assignment in southeast Asia. While her parents were based in Indonesia, she attended boarding school in Malaysia. On school breaks she was able to join her parents and occasionally fly with her dad into the remote jungles of Papua, then called Irian Jaya.

“He would let me tag along with him when there was room,” Debbie said.

On one memorable flight, they landed at an airstrip that had tight margins. The aircraft’s load was limited for takeoff, so Debbie had to wait at the airstrip. “I was 14 or 15 and weighed 100 pounds,” Debbie remembered with a laugh. “It made the difference, so I had to wait while he flew this man out and came back for me.”

When Debbie was 15 and her family transitioned back to the U.S., she remembers having her world rocked, going from a small mission school to a large public school with thousands of students. “I had a bigger shock going to the United States,” she said, contrasting that to her move to Asia.

At the age of 18, Debbie went to Ecuador with her parents, a dream come true for her, and her parents, who were returning to serve for three months. They stayed in the original house where her parents had lived in the 1950s. She was able to work in the hospital during her time in Ecuador, go on trips into villages, and fly with her dad occasionally.

“That was a highlight with both Irian and Ecuador, getting to do flights with my dad,” she said.

Her family’s involvement with MAF from the early days, and her own travels as a child and as an adult to different MAF programs have given her a deep appreciation for MAF’s ministry.

“I know MAF,” she said. “I believe in what they’re doing.”

A bout with cancer and a brother’s urging led her to pursue setting up a living trust. “I knew at some point I needed to get my affairs in order.”

With a living trust, Debbie will continue to support the ministry that has been so important to her family through the years and is helping to share the love of Christ with people in isolated places. “MAF is near and dear to my heart,” Debbie said.

To learn more about how you can be a part of MAF’s mission and leave a lasting legacy like Debbie’s, including resources to help you get started, visit maf.org/estateplan.

The post A legacy of service and giving appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

By Gene Jordan

My parents went to Ecuador as missionaries in 1951. As a kid I heard about the “MAF airplane, flown by Uncle Nate, in the jungle.” When I was three years old, I got to fly in his little yellow plane, which would one day be the most famous missionary airplane. His story, and that of the other four missionaries martyred in the jungle in 1956, was very familiar to me; it helped shape my life.

Throughout my high school years, I jumped at every opportunity to catch a bus from the Ecuadorian highlands down to the jungle where MAF operated. At the hangar, I weighed loads and fueled the airplanes. I washed mud off the planes at the end of the day and helped prepare for the next day’s flights, all with the hope of getting a ride in an MAF Cessna.

That hope was fulfilled! I flew with MAF pilots Dave, Glen, and Olie. I watched how they used their aviation skills to help people deep in the Amazon rainforest. I observed their tender care for the wounded and sick as they transported them to the mission hospital. I witnessed the pivotal role MAF played in knitting together different mission organizations, each with its unique ministries, working with different language groups in dozens of small, isolated, jungle communities. The common aim of each of these ministries was to introduce precious jungle people to their loving Creator. I decided to pursue a vocation with eternal significance: missionary aviation.

I joined MAF in 1977, after flight and maintenance training, and was assigned to . . . Ecuador! For the next 22 years I flew the jungle skies as pilot-in-command, where previously I had been a passenger.  Those early MAF pilots were my models as I learned to appreciate what it meant to serve God through aviation.

I flew hundreds of flights for missionaries. Fresh vegetables, diesel fuel, medicine, and mail from home were all delivered by MAF planes to jungle stations. With a missionary hospital near the MAF hangar, I flew more medical emergency flights than I can remember. Community development flights meant clean water and rustic elementary schools. Baby chicks, the occasional live calf or a kerosene refrigerator were not unusual cargo. Jungle school kids who memorized Scripture verses were rewarded with a flight out to a week of camp, where they learned more about God and how He loved them. I flew the “JESUS” film to dozens of villages where, for the first time in their own language, people saw the gospel story.  Passengers who previously worshipped evil spirits were now indigenous community church leaders.   MAF would pick them up from their villages and fly them to a more central community to experience Bible training with other leaders. The MAF airplane was the linchpin of jungle ministry!

On a recent trip to Shell, Ecuador, a young woman approached me. “I used to fly with you when I was in the sixth grade. You made the airplane go down very quickly. I remember screaming with excitement! I watched you fly the sick people from my village to the hospital, and I decided that I, too, wanted to help them through medicine. Now I run the first aid clinic in my community. Do you want to see it?”

Her pride was obvious, but my gratitude was greater, because I knew that her story has been replicated in other remote villages, not only in Ecuador, but in many other countries where MAF serves.

Today the MAF hangar in Shell includes members of the Shuar and Achuar tribes. The director is a young man who attended my wife, Lynn’s, Good News Club as a kid. MAF continues to serve in the eastern jungles of Ecuador, where there are established church communities among the Shuar, Quichua, Achuar, and Waodani people. Those who once lived in spiritual darkness now have the Bible in their own language. Young people who flew with MAF as children are now Kingdom leaders in their churches, schools, and health clinics, and as an MAF pilot, I had the privilege of being a part of this transformation.

Even in our digital-fast world, MAF planes continue to be tools that facilitate and accelerate the care of physical and spiritual needs of people isolated by jungles or mountains throughout the world. While I’m most proud of my little corner of the Ecuadorian Amazon, I recognize that none of this would have been possible without the many of you who stand behind MAF with your gifts and prayers.

One day “a crowd from every tribe, tongue and nation” will sing together that “salvation comes from God, and the Lamb.” That’s why MAF does what it does!

Story appeared in the May 2020 FlightWatch, a special 75th anniversary issue:

The post Eternal Significance appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

I saw nothing. But the whiny song grew louder. And closer. Suddenly the tail end of a large tanker truck appeared at our corner. The driver never halted, but deftly backed around the restricted turn, then maneuvered through the twisted gambit of parked cars and motor scooters that lined our narrow street. He passed below me and stopped in front of the apartment building next door.

The mad melody stopped and left an enormous silence. The driver hopped down from the cab, went to the side of his vehicle and removed a long, green, flexible tube. He connected one end to a valve at the rear of his tank and the other end to a waiting receptacle near the apartment’s entrance. Then he returned to the tank and opened a valve. And waited.

Water! On the edge of a 10 million-person city, these residents depended upon a man to deliver their water. By truck.

Big truck? Tiny, crowded, crumbling streets? High need? Multiple deliveries every day? What could go wrong? I marveled at his ability, determination, and persistence. They needed him. Desperately. And for the five weeks we lived there, he never failed.

He was just like those MAF folks I know who sharpen their skill, work until the job’s done, and serve others day after day, month after month, year after year.

There are differences, of course. One rolls, the other flies. One plays a raucous tune, the other roars. And, while the truck delivers exhaustible, life-saving water, the MAF airplane delivers eternal, life-giving water. We need both.

The post The Water Truck appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.

The first flight raced against desolation. A teenage girl, struggling to deliver her first child, lay beneath a tree. Her young husband paced the mud alongside. His eyes darted down to her. Up to the sky. Back to her. The village airstrip, their one connection to the outside world, remained empty, broiling in Amazon sun. Her moans offered the only counterpoint to the silence as every village ear strained. The dogs caught it first, heads suddenly up. The tiny buzz grew until kids heard too. Then adults. All stirred, looked northwest. The husband’s eyes widened. He inhaled sharply. Hope?

Little sound morphed into big noise and then to sight. The village crowd watched the red and white Cessna 206 circle overhead, descend, land, and taxi to a roaring halt before them. I jumped out. The village health promoter reported details—30 hours fruitless labor, mother exhausted, hardly able to breath let alone push. Her husband watched others lay her prone on the airplane floor. I fastened her straps, then buckled him into the seat next to her. All quiet while I prayed. Then I closed doors, strapped on harness and helmet, completed checklists and roared back into the sky.

A week later the second flight proclaimed God’s mercy. I circled again. Same descent and landing. Same roaring stop before the crowd. I hopped out. The husband followed, red and yellow toucan feathers atop his head framing a wide grin—despite stoic attempts. He turned and accepted a small, wrapped bundle. His wife stepped down next and reclaimed her prize. They gazed out, amazed at what they held, awed by what it meant. Then she smiled and opened the blanket to reveal the gift only God can give—new life.

The post Life Begets Life appeared first on Mission Aviation Fellowship.