Journal: Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood
Volume: JBMW 13:2 (Winter 2008)
Article: The Power of a Consecrated Life Lived Out in The Ministry of Miss Lottie Moon (Romans 12:1)
Author: Daniel L. Akin

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JBMW 13:2 (Winter 2008) p. 69

The Power of a Consecrated Life
Lived Out in The Ministry of Miss Lottie Moon
(Romans 12:1)

Daniel L. Akin*

*President, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary
Wake Forest, North Carolina

Introduction

Lottie Moon was born Charlotte (Lottie) Diggs Moon on December 12, 1840, in Albemarie County, Virginia. She entered the world as a part of Southern aristocracy prior to the Civil War, a war that would devastate her family’s fortunes. Her family’s wealth was 1/40 of its pre-war value after the war ended. She would die on December 24, 1912, aboard a ship in the Japanese harbor of Köbe. She was frail, weak, and nearly starved having just passed her seventy-second birthday. She weighed no more than fifty pounds.1

Lottie served our Lord for thirty-nine years on the mission field, mostly in China. “Best estimates” say that this mighty, little woman towered all of four feet, three inches. It was never said that she was beautiful, but this little lady had a certain attractiveness about her and a powerful personality that would be essential in her service on the mission field. She taught in schools for girls and made many evangelist trips into China’s interior to share the gospel with women and girls. She would even preach, against her wishes, to men, because then as now there were not enough men on the mission field.

I have no doubt, having spent many months in her biography and letters, that Miss Lottie would be both amazed and embarrassed at all the fuss that is made about her each year by Southern Baptists. She knew that in 1888 Southern Baptists, at her request, raised $3,315.00, enough to send three new women missionaries to China. She, however, could never have imagined, that:

• In 2007, $150,409,653.86 was raised in her name.
• In 2008, a goal of $170 million is set in her name.
• Since the offering’s inception, $2.8 billion has been raised for missions in her name.
• 52% of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) International Mission Board’s 2008 budget comes from the offering that honors her name.

Here is the power of a consecrated life, a life sold out to the lordship of Christ, a life our Lord sovereignly chose to multiply many times over. This is the life we see outlined by the apostle Paul in Rom 12:1. Having spent eleven chapters explaining sin and salvation, sanctification and sovereignty, he now moves on that basis to address service and what I call the consecrated life. Such a life is seen in Lottie Moon. Hers was not a perfect life no doubt. It was, however, a powerful life; a life lived for King Jesus, and a life worthy of our careful...

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