The life of Lottie Moon cannot be summed up in the matter of a few pages of history. Thankfully her legacy lives on alive and well in Southern Baptist life. Lottie set foot in the world during a unique time for women and for missions.  She was born into an age when the world was changing: the south was forced to let go of its slaves and look to them as brothers, women were fighting to have a voice in the public forum, and the missions movement was in a delicate infancy as the second generation of missionaries were taking their place on the field.

Lottie Moon forced the Southern Baptist Convention to think through its convictions about the role of single women in missions. On many occasions, because of the lack of men on the field Lottie not only was responsible to lead men to Christ, but to disciple them in some way as well.[1] Her exploits on the field and need for prayer and financial support from America helped women to organize and rally around the cause of missions.

Though the mission movement was underway in Southern Baptist Life, when the time that Lottie Moon came along, it was not well funded. The Cooperative Program would not come into existence until 1925.[2] Lottie found a way to rally women to fund missions and keep the movement alive for subsequent generations.

Lottie surrendered her life to the mission field upon hearing a plea that the workers were few. She then spent her entire life echoing the same cry. She called for men to be men on the mission field. She blazed a way for single women to answer the call. She made a plea to whoever would listen or read her words and rallied women to organize around praying, collecting money and sending workers into the harvest.

Given her work and her life it is fitting that the offing the Southern Baptist collect in Lottie Moon’s name takes place in December. She was born in December of 1840. She was born again in December of 1858. She entered into eternity in December of 1912. Every December since 1918 an offering has been taken in her name. Today though dead, she still echo’s the words of the Savior in Matthew 9:37, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” [3]