International Missions - Lottie Moon Christmas Offering     

     Charlotte Diggs "Lottie" Moon was born in Virginia in 1840. During a sermon while living in Georgia in 1873, she heard her calling to share the gospel in China. Later that same year the Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention appointed her as a missionary to China, and she set sail for Tengchow. Lottie spent most of her missionary years in Tengchow and P'ingtu where she ministered to women and taught at mission schools. Over the years she adopted the Chinese culture, dress, and language. This enabled her to earn the respect of many Chinese people, and her work won many to Christ.

     Lottie made many personal sacrifices to meet the needs of the Chinese people. Suffering from malnutrition after giving her food away to others, she developed medical complications leading to her death at age 72.

     While in China, Lottie pleaded to the Foreign Mission Board for more missionaries and monetary support to continue and expand God's work among the Chinese people. A Christmas Offering was developed, and was renamed to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for China in 1919.

     Today, the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions supports over 5,000 missionaries in the field all over the world. All of the funds (100%) donated to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering go directly to missionaries to support basic needs such as food, shelter, church building, educational materials, etc. Through international missionaries assisted by the Lottie Moon Offering:
 

• Each day an average of almost 1000 people were baptized internationally, and 451,301 were baptized in 2000.
• The total number of churches affiliated with the Southern Baptist International Mission Board increased 10.5% to 52,186 in 1999.
• Total church membership overseas jumped to over 5.6 million in 2000.
• 6525 new churches were started in 2000.
• 1015 "people groups" were served in 153 countries in 2000.
• 300,805 volunteers helped in international mission projects from churches like Cool Spring in 2000.

     Today, over one hundred years since Lottie Moon began her work, there are still billions of people internationally who have never heard the gospel, according to missions researchers. This is greater than the entire population of the earth at the time when Lottie Moon lived. Thus, there is much more work to do, not only financially in support of foreign missions, but also through prayer, volunteer services, and short-term or career missionary service. The task is for all believers, as stated in the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19: "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations. . ."

For more information about international missions and the Lottie Moon Offering, see the International Mission Board Website.

Updated 12/5/05