Crash loop problem minetest

[Hobb3s]

I've had the world up and running smoothly for a few months until last week when we noticed that we couldn't connect anymore. The server appears to be stuck in a loop because it can't write to the map_meta.txt file.
I'm not sure what to do about it and my son has spent countless hours building in this world so I would like to save restore it.

So far I've tried:
1. setting the map_meta.txt file to 777 perms (no joy)
2. removing the file (no joy)
3. replacing with backed up older version (no joy)
4. rebooting, restarting, rebooting.
5. checking folder permissions.
6.checked system available memory and hd space

It's running on ubuntu 16.10 using the minetest 0.4.14 package and a variety of mods.

2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: .__ __ __
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: _____ |__| ____ _____/ |_ ____ _______/ |_
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: / \| |/ \_/ __ \ __\/ __ \ / ___/\ __\
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: | Y Y \ | | \ ___/| | \ ___/ \___ \ | |
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: |__|_| /__|___| /\___ >__| \___ >____ > |__|
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: \/ \/ \/ \/ \/
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: World at [/var/games/minetest-server/.minetest/worlds/leoanddad]
2016-12-23 17:24:55: ACTION[Main]: Server for gameid="minetest" listening on 172.16.1.10:30000.
2016-12-23 17:24:55: WARNING[Server]: Assignment to undeclared global "i" inside a function at .../share/games/minetest/mods/worldedit/worldedit/queue.lua:9.
2016-12-23 17:25:10: ERROR[Server]: ServerMap::saveMapMeta(): could not write /var/games/minetest-server/.minetest/worlds/leoanddad/map_meta.txt

Thanks for any help.

[TenPlus1]

Try disabling worldedit mods and then running world.

[sfan5]

Make sure the /var/games/minetest-server/.minetest folder is owned by the user you are trying to run Minetest from.