Born to Fly

While other four- and five-year-olds were watching Big Bird, The Flintstones, or Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, Bruce DeVries was watching the skies. He knew he wanted to be a pilot.

“I'm the son of an airline pilot,” Bruce says, “one of four kids in my family that the aviation bug hit really hard. I’ve loved airplanes ever since preschool.”

When he was a teenager, Bruce got some news that threatened to ground his future plans. He says, “When I was in high school, I found out I needed glasses. At that point in time, the idea of being a military pilot or an airline pilot was not very attainable with that situation.”

Navigated toward Moody Aviation

Active at his church, Bruce listened to the counsel of an associate pastor and a youth pastor. “The youth pastor—Chuck Dresser—was a Moody grad, and they both started talking to me and discipling me saying, ‘Hey, maybe God has something different in mind for you.’”

Chuck Dresser (who would later serve as Dean of Admissions and Dean of Undergraduate Admissions at Moody) took Bruce and a few other students on the long drive from their homes in Massachusetts to the Chicago campus for a survey visit. He was the first to tell Bruce about Moody’s aviation program and flight school.

Other factors began to navigate Bruce toward Moody too. “My dad had a copy of Jungle Pilot, the story of Nate Saint. My parents were very Godly people, and they had a number of friends from the New England area that were involved in mission aviation.

“It was really the Holy Spirit that worked in my heart with the idea of ministry. God started showing me where the gifts of service and of teaching were something that could be used together with aviation and—wow!—the idea of working with remote peoples just really clicked with me.”

Bruce came to Moody in the fall of 1985, followed later by his then-fiancé, Wendy (Goodwin). The two married in 1987 and would later add four children to their family. “We lived on the married floors in Smith Hall, and then we went down to Moody Aviation in Elizabethton, Tennessee, in 1989. Wendy worked as a home health aide, so she provided the funds while I did the schooling.”

When asked what he’s most thankful for when he reflects on his time as a Moody student in Chicago, Bruce—who never hesitates to interject a little humor into the conversation—shouts out, “Giordano’s pizza!” Then he quickly throttles back, noting some of the professors and subjects that influenced his life.

“I saw true compassion and involvement on the part of men like Dr. Bill Thrasher, Dr. Ray Badgero, Dr. Paul Benware, Dr. Edgar James…and I could list others. Seeing that passion in their lives for the Word, I think that impacted me quite a bit, that centrality of God's Word.”

Next stop: Mission Aviation Fellowship

Graduating in 1992 with a Bachelor of Science in Missionary Aviation Technology, Bruce found himself in a job market that, as he says, “wasn’t really favorable.” He and Wendy were familiar with Mission Aviation Fellowship, and both felt that God was calling them to consider the organization. “MAF was a mission that we liked, and the way they approached ministry was a good fit for us.” In early 1994, Bruce and Wendy were accepted as a career pilot/mechanic family.

Over the years, Bruce and Wendy have been stationed across the globe as part of MAF’s mission of bringing help, hope, and healing through aviation. “We spent 10 years in Venezuela, a little bit of time in Haiti, three years in Mexico, and more recently in 2021 and 2022, we were in East Central Asia where we were trying to get an operation going.”

“There are numerous mission organizations that, in some way or another, use aircraft. Mission Aviation Fellowship is one of the more unique ones in that we're not a department of a larger mission. Mission aviation is what we do,” Bruce says.

“One of the things we find is that with MAF’s longstanding reputation and ability, we can go into countries that other organizations can’t. For instance, for Wendy and me to be in former Soviet republic, we could not be outwardly Christian missionaries. We were there on a humanitarian basis.

“We're able to go into some of the more isolated areas after political turmoil or a natural disaster, like when there's a huge earthquake or something like the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean that wiped out entire islands. We were in there in that very anti-Christian environment  transporting people, materials, goods, and facilitating satellite communication setups.”

‘On loan’ to Moody

In between new assignments for Mission Aviation Fellowship, Bruce and Wendy have located and relocated to Spokane, Washington, multiple times so Bruce could teach at Moody Aviation. Still full time with MAF, they consider themselves “on loan” to Moody, and Bruce is currently serving as a flight instructor and associate professor of missionary aviation technology.

Jim Conrad, Dean of Moody Aviation, explains the long history that MAF and Moody Aviation share. “Moody Aviation’s connection with MAF traces back to the roots of our founder, Paul Robinson. After WWII Paul planned to join CAMF, Christian Airman’s Missionary Fellowship, which later became known as MAF, Mission Aviation Fellowship.

“Unfortunately, Paul was ‘too old’ in the eyes of MAF to join them, but the Lord used that diversion to redirect him to found a school dedicated to training missionary aviators through an alliance with Moody Bible Institute. MAF’s partnership with Moody Aviation has increased over the last 20+ years as they have consistently placed team members on loan to Moody Aviation to help us equip the next generation of missionary aviators.”

Jim says that a significant number of Moody Aviation graduates go on to fill the ranks at MAF. “In a recent conversation with David Holsten, President of MAF and 1998 Moody Aviation graduate, he estimated that nearly 40 percent of the MAF pilots and mechanics were trained at Moody Aviation. Many of these Moody grads now serve in various leadership positions with MAF.”

One of the unique challenges of a flight school is not just meeting education accreditation guidelines but something much more regulated. Bruce explains, “Moody Aviation is a Federal Aviation Administration approved flight and maintenance school, so anything that we do here needs to meet FAA approvals. Things like curriculums, syllabi, training course outlines—all of that has to be approved by the FAA.”

Technical, professional, and spiritual training

Moody Aviation students spend all five years of the program in Spokane. “One year is spent in general education and Bible classes, with two years dedicated to earning their aircraft maintenance certification,” Bruce says. “The final two years are split up between the flight emphasis and the maintenance specialist emphasis.”

Aviation safety is a foundational part of Moody Aviation’s syllabi, with specialized classes on everything from the fundamentals of electricity to fluid lines and fittings. Students gain an extensive knowledge of instruments, engines, and maintenance, as well as critical navigational skills including night flight, cross-country flight, and aviation meteorology.

Uniquely, time is also set aside for an emphasis on physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being. “We try to teach an understanding of fatigue and of taking care of yourself—things like that. We have chapel three times a week, and on Tuesdays we have small group chapel where the staff lead small groups,” Bruce says.

Moody Aviation’s Jim Conrad says of Bruce, “He brings a depth of wisdom, knowledge, and experience as a missionary pilot/mechanic who has served overseas for numerous years with MAF. His heart for the Lord and our students is evident in the way that he invests in the lives of those he instructs and works with.

“Bruce is very personable and also challenges students with realistic scenarios based on his real-life experience as he engages with them in training. He models a life of service as he and his wife invest in their family made of both biological and adopted children.”

Along with the satisfaction and deep joy of bringing the love and compassion of Christ to the world through aviation, Bruce teaches what he calls “the good, the bad, and the ugly” of mission aviation and of ministry in general. Part of that commitment comes from his own admission that, as a young missionary pilot, he didn’t realize the kinds of challenges that lay ahead.

“I’m very transparent with students. I'll relate the fact that—no—life is not all crystal seas and golden roads in missions. It's actually very difficult. Trusting God to take [those difficulties] and to use you even in the challenging times…I did not understand that early on. But I grew to learn from it and to appreciate it as well.”

Stories from the mission field

Over the years, Bruce has seen his share of challenging situations and heart-wrenching flights. “In Mexico, we averaged 160 medevacs (medical emergency flights) a year in the three years that we were there. That's almost one every other day.

“Flights might have been for a policeman that got in the way of a territory dispute and has seven bullets in him. One was for a young boy who had stepped out in front of a bus. One was for a young man that was painting the front of a Catholic church on the town square when the pole of his roller touched an electrical wire. Not only was he electrocuted, but he also fell about 30 feet.”

Among the flights that Bruce will never forget was the one for a 16-year-old girl in a remote Venezuelan village. Villagers had been trying to get help for days, but sunspots were interfering with their high frequency radio communications. Finally, the transmission was received, and Bruce flew out to the village.

“The girl was pregnant and had been in labor for four days,” he recalls. “The girl’s mother, aunt, and husband were in the back of the plane with her when delivery started. My shoelace was used to tie off the umbilical cord. When we landed, I carried the baby to the ambulance.”

But before he could hand the child over to medical professionals, the little life in his arms breathed its last. Bruce was distraught, and the trauma of the event still lingers. Even now, as he recounts what happened years ago, tears still flow. 

“A few days later, Wendy and I were pushing our stroller with our two youngest girls through town. This indigenous man comes running up to me and gives me a bear hug, which is a little out of ordinary.

“He called me ‘Capitán’ and said to me in Spanish, ‘Thank you so much for coming out to our village to help us!’ And I said to him, ‘I wasn't able to save the baby.’ And he said, ‘I understand that. There was only so much you could do. But you saved my daughter's life!’”

Bruce sees the truth of God’s Word and the strength of His promises constantly in the life that he and Wendy have been called to.

“We share our MAF stories in the churches that support us. But Wendy and I definitely consider our stories as the reason why God had us where He did, doing what we did, and experiencing what we experienced to be able to share with others, especially young people, to keep them motivated toward missions.

 “I see what God can do through some mediocre student like me. He puts me in the right place at the right time. Whether it's there in the jungles of Venezuela, or the mountains of Mexico, or a former Soviet official’s office in Central Asia, I can reflect and share the love of Christ that’s in my heart.”