1922 – 2020: MAF pioneer
It’s not often that the good-natured office comedian is the person who founded the organisation, but it says something about the humour and humility of Stuart King, pioneering founder of the world’s largest humanitarian airline, who ascended into glory on 29 August 2020.
Stuart, who died age 98 in the 75th year of Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF), combined a mischievous sense of humour which led him to make jokes at meetings and then ask the person leading to get on with it, with a deep desire to glorify God and serve the developing world through aviation and technology.
In 1945, Stuart, an RAF Engineer Officer who took part in the Normandy landings, felt God’s call to spread the gospel and transport humanitarian personnel, life-saving medicine and food to isolated areas.
‘Although [MAF founders] Jack Hemmings, Murray Kendon and I were professionals in aviation,’ he said, ‘we were amateurs when it came to mission! We just felt the call to go. We didn’t think ahead to what it might become, we just went.’
Three years later, Stuart and Jack left Croydon to conduct a six-month survey across Africa. Following that initial flight, which concluded with their aircraft striking a banana tree in Burundi, Sudan was identified as the African nation that needed MAF’s services most.
In 1951, while repairing an aircraft for MAF’s first operation in Sudan, Stuart met missionary Phyllis Bapple. They wed in Khartoum, with God eventually blessing them with three children, seven grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
The organisation Stuart helped found came to worldwide attention in 1956, when pilot Nate Saint and four other missionaries were speared to death in Ecuador – the tragic incident providentially increasing support for MAF.
In 1987, Stuart handed over the leadership of MAF UK after more than 40 years, attending meetings at the Folkestone office as President Emeritus.
In 2019, he received the Award of Honour from The Honourable Company of Air Pilots for his outstanding contribution to aviation – joining astronauts Neil Armstrong and Jim Lovell.
Today, the mission that began with one plane now has 138 aircraft – enabling 2,000 humanitarian organisations to reach 26 of the world’s most vulnerable countries.
Paying tribute to Stuart, the Right Honourable Baroness Cox said: ‘We could not have accomplished our work without MAF and we thank God for Stuart’s inspirational legacy of Love in Action.’
Though sad at our loss, we praise God that Stuart could celebrate that the charity he regarded as his own family had grown, matured, and truly taken flight.
