If you have read our latest newsletter, you’ll know that we are currently planning to leave Liberia in early November, 2024, to be based in Ashford in the UK for an initial twelve-month period. As there is not a lot of space within the newsletter, we wanted to add a bit more information here. You can click on any of the questions below to expand them and find out a bit more about our journey and what will be next for us.
We are also happy to answer any additional questions you may have – please do send an email to hello@dbwaterman.com, or alternatively if you have any questions specifically related to MAF and our support raising, you can also contact Adam at the office by sending an email to adam.pope@maf-uk.org.
If you could like a printable version of this document, please click here.
There are a number of reasons for the decision to move on from Liberia. Our initial purpose in moving to this part of Africa was to establish a regional maintenance facility, to support the work happening within Liberia, Guinea, and any future needs within West Africa. This involved transitioning the registration of the three aircraft in the region onto a new system, as they had previously been registered in Uganda. That system had become unsustainable, due to the lack of engineers with the relevant Ugandan licenses. An American registration was selected, and Dave was instrumental in enabling that transition to happen smoothly, and in a very quick timeframe.
Today, both Guinea and Liberia operate American (FAA) registered aircraft. This has opened the door to the possibility of more engineers being able to drop in and out of the programme as needed, to assist with the work. Due to the lack of maintenance personnel permanently based in country, that has been absolutely essential in order for us to continue operations here.
We now have a new engineer permanently based in Liberia, and another on the way later this year. This frees Dave to take up his specialist roles once more, namely his avionics expertise, and also his strategic thinking for developing sustainable maintenance solutions. Liberia is a country without good travel links, so relocating to the UK will increase the possibilities of Dave being able to deploy to another country to assist with avionics issues or installs far more easily.
It also gives us the opportunity for a good time of recovery. We feel God has repeatedly led us to the concept of a Sabbath Year, after a very exhausting season here in Liberia. The Sabbath Year was an Old Testament practice, whereby the land would receive a year of rest every seventh year:
But in the seventh year the land is to have a year of sabbath rest, a sabbath to the Lord. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest. Leviticus 25:4-5
We will still be working in this year (more details below), but we feel it is an important opportunity to catch our breath and enjoy a slightly less frantic and overwhelming pace of life for a year. The blessing associated with the Sabbath Year was that there would be an outpouring of provision, to see the people through that year and into the next:
You may ask, “What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not plant or harvest our crops?” I will send you such a blessing in the sixth year that the land will yield enough for three years. While you plant during the eighth year, you will eat from the old crop and will continue to eat from it until the harvest of the ninth year comes in. Leviticus 25:20-22
Though it’s going to feel like a bit of a strange year, not really knowing what will come next, we are confident that God will provide for our needs and clear guidance for our next steps. The prolonged busyness and stress have led to a few physical symptoms of stress within both of us, so we will have the chance to ensure we have some good checkups and rest time amidst settling into a new routine.
We are still incredibly excited by the work of MAF, in West Africa and across the globe. It is a huge privilege being involved in such an incredible ministry, reaching into the most remote places and to some of the most isolated people groups in the world with help, hope and healing. There is still nothing we would rather be doing than this! A part of taking this time to recover now is a plan to refresh ourselves so that we will be energised and re-equipped to continue serving in MAF into the future.
Yes, we do! For the last seven years, we have only been able to do this work with MAF thanks to the incredible generosity of individuals, churches and other groups who give so faithfully each and every month. Nothing will change during this year; we will be funded in the same way. Your gifts to MAF for our support will go toward paying for our expenses, and will also enable Dave to continue his incredible work, keeping our planes flying across the continent of Africa, and around the world.
It’s impossible to explain in words how much we value the sacrificial giving and prayer support from so many people and churches. It’s going to be a huge shock to the system, settling back into life in the UK, and your prayers will continue to carry us through this season, as they have carried us through so much in the past few years. Your partnership will ensure, even though we’ll be based in the UK for a while, that our work continues to reach those same people in isolated communities both in West Africa, and the wider world.
By the time we land back in the UK, we will have been living in Africa for seven years. We spent the first four years of our MAF career living in Uganda, and the last three in Liberia. It is going to be a big change, returning to the UK, and we will need to relearn some of what was once very normal life to us!
One of MAF International’s main support offices is located in Ashford in the UK, and so we are planning to be based there for one year. We plan to fly out of Liberia at some point in the first weekend of November, depending on flight availability and price.
Once we land, we hope to find somewhere to stay temporarily while we look at rental properties in Ashford, and hopefully find one to rent for the year. We hope to organise that as quickly as possible. There will be many other things to sort out too, such as getting hold of furniture and a car, and we look forward to some good time spent with family over the Christmas period.
Liberia is a country without a big export market, so it is quite expensive to ship anything from here back to the UK. As such, we will be selling or giving away almost everything we own here, aside from six suitcases which we hope to be able to travel with, and potentially one pallet with Dave’s toolbox. It will feel strange condensing everything we own into such a small space, and that means we will need to get hold of many household items once we land in the UK. We are hoping to live lightly there, especially as we are not sure if we will deploy to the field once again in a year, but there are certain things we will need, such as kitchen supplies, bedding, and some office equipment.
We would appreciate any help that you can offer. There are many items we will need to either buy or borrow for the duration of our time in the UK. If you can help with any of the following, please do send us an email:
- Accommodation. If you have, or know of anyone who has, an annex, holiday home or any other kind of standalone accommodation close to Ashford in Kent that we could use for the first couple of weeks in November while we look for somewhere to rent that would be amazing!
- Car. We hope to manage with one car, but that’s something we’ll need to buy as rental costs are incredibly high. If you know of anyone selling a vehicle or (long shot!) if you have a car that you don’t need that we could buy from you or borrow, let us know. This is something we’d really like to have sorted as soon as possible so we at least have transport immediately.
- Furniture. There don’t seem to be a lot of furnished lets around, so it’s more likely we will need to get some bits and pieces ourselves. If you have any old furniture that you don’t need anymore do let us know – it certainly doesn’t need to be new or to match at all!
- Household items. We won’t be bringing very much with us from Liberia, so we will need to get hold of things like plates, mugs, cutlery, bedding, towels, kitchen appliances, etc. We are planning to live lightly in the UK so don’t need a lot of anything, but if you happen to have anything going spare, we may be able to take it off your hands. We don’t want to end up with 100 teacups or plates though, so we’ll have to work that out if we get a lot of offers, but please do reach out if you can help at all.
We really appreciate your prayers at this time too. It’s going to be a huge change, and we’ll undoubtedly be faced with reverse culture shock, not to mention the emotional rollercoaster of leaving a programme relatively quickly. Your thoughts and prayers mean the world to us, so thank you very much for standing with us in this way.
Dave will be working out of the office in Ashford, fulfilling three roles within MAF:
- Maintenance controller for West Africa. This role involves specifying when maintenance is required, and how many resources are likely to be needed for those occasions. It is an essential position, and one Dave currently fulfils from Liberia. Continuing in this position for a year, or until a new maintenance manager is appointed, will ensure that maintenance continues in West Africa without disruption.
- Avionics support. There are a very limited number of avionics engineers within MAF, those able to look after the electrical equipment that keeps our pilots safe and pointing in the right direction. Dave will be providing remote support to the Africa programmes which are in much the same time zone as the UK, and will also be able to deploy to help with issues or installations as required.
- Support engineer. As well as helping with avionics specific jobs, Dave will be able to visit programmes to fill in gaps where we may be missing maintenance personnel, for example when staff are away.
We will be working out between us and MAF how much Dave will be able to travel and for how long at one time.
We’re not entirely sure right now! We are not overly familiar with the cost of living in the UK anymore, so we will need to work out a budget and see if Becky will need to pick up some work to enable us to live in the UK. She is hoping to be able to continue with her ministry; releasing weekly Bible encouragements on YouTube, preaching, and writing and marketing new books.
If you are interested in supporting Becky’s ministry please do get in touch. Alternatively, you can buy her latest book, No Mountain Immovable: How to Activate Your Faith, on Amazon. Leaving a review is also an enormous help, as new reviews almost always bring in fresh sales, and if you have read and enjoyed the book, please do consider sharing it with friends or family, or in your church.
We typically return to the UK every second year in order to visit various churches and groups. Instead of having that time squeezed into a six-to-eight-week window, we are planning to spread visits to different churches throughout 2025.
If you would like us to come and visit, please do send us an email. We would be very happy to come and talk about our work with MAF in West Africa, and the impact of MAF in this region and the wider world. Let us know when would be a good time of year for you – we are happy to speak in Sunday services or midweek events, whatever works best.
Becky would also be very happy to take bookings for preaching at any services. This could be as part of our visit to your church, or on a separate occasion.
We’re not really sure. All we know at the moment is that we’ll be based in Ashford for twelve months, starting from November this year. After that? We wait and see! We may end up redeploying to the field, we may discover that having an engineer based in the UK office is incredibly useful, or another option we haven’t yet considered may crop up too!
It does mean the year will feel a bit strange. We will start having discussions with MAF throughout the course of the year and will, of course, keep you posted with any updates as and when anything regarding the future is decided.
If you have any additional questions, please do get in touch. It is going to be a busy few months for us as we go about wrapping things up in Liberia, and getting rid of most of what we own, so we may not always reply instantly. That doesn’t mean we don’t want to hear from you though; it always makes our day to have contact from people who are a part of this great adventure from around the world.
We are also very happy to do any calls online (Zoom, Skype, whatever works!) if that would be useful. Do let us know.
Thank you ever so much again for walking with us on this journey. It feels a bit as if we’re stepping into the unknown right now, and that can be a scary place to be. Your prayers keep us going, so please do keep holding us up in this time of transition and change. We love and appreciate you greatly!