MAF Stories
Water wells help plant churches in Mali PDF Print E-mail

A ministry that's known for its missionary aviation is seeing people turn to Christ because of water.

Mission Aviation Fellowship started working in Mali as a non-government organization in 1985. At that time, the government required all NGO's to dig water wells. Because MAF wanted to work there, they began digging wells throughout the African nation.

Speaking from Mali, MAF missionary Susan Weatherstone says, "It was not something MAF had ever done before. The first few wells were almost trial and error."

Now, Weatherstone says, MAF has trained national Christians to do the work. Their first well of the season was just completed. "This was in a completely non-Christian village. Several groups had tried to dig a well there but were thwarted because of the rock."

The MAF team wasn't told about this and were quite frustrated when they hit rock at eight meters. Weatherstone says this took double the amount of time and required dynamite to finish the well. "The Lord knew that this village needed the extra time to hear the Gospel and to see the perseverance of these four Christian men who had come to bring physical water and spiritual water."

Weatherstone says God worked in an incredible way. "Throughout the course of the dig, six people became Christians. And then toward the end they did a large evangelism program, and they showed the Jesus Film. They also have a film on AIDS, and another 40 people indicated that they wanted to follow Jesus."

That wasn't the end of God moving in the village, says Weatherstone. "There are some pastors in this area, and they set up a rotation so that they can visit this village and do follow up. So on a Sunday a pastor came and visited the village and preached, and another 17 individuals committed their lives to Jesus."

Since that time, the village chief donated land for a church to be built. Pray that these new believers will grow in their faith and share Christ with others.

 

 
Rugged missionary plane of the future PDF Print E-mail
      A new missionary plane may revolutionize ministry to the underdeveloped world.

 

Missionary pilot Dave Voetmann spent a quarter-century looking for places to touch down amid the jungles and deserts of Africa. Now, he has found a permanent airstrip in the open spaces of Sandpoint, Idaho. It's there that Voetmann landed his beloved Quest Aircraft Company and set out creating a plane to reach every tribe and tongue.

The Kodiak, a rugged, single-propeller bush plane, will hit the market this summer at $1.3 million. With pre-orders approaching 100, Voetmann is scrambling to double his manufacturing plant's current production capacity of one per week.

Such demand does not surprise the seasoned aviator, who designed the Kodiak specifically to solve the frustrations of missionary pilots. Voetmann, 72, understands the need to land on narrow and treacherous strips of terrain. He knows all too well the maddening inability to lift off from tight quarters with a full load. "I had to leave people and cargo behind repeatedly, because I just didn't have room," he recalls. "That was a daily occurrence."