Kansas Nebraska Convention of Southern Baptists (KNCSB)

Offering helps missionaries serve in disaster areas

IMB missionary Trent Tomlinson prays for Rodrigo Santibanez, his wife Rosa, his mother, his sister and friend during the construction of their new shelter. Rodrigo and Rosa’s home collapsed during the earthquake in Chile on Feb. 27, 2010. Tomlinson is a colleague of Kansas missionaries Ken and Linda Bowie. The Lottie Moon Christmas Offering provided funds for him to minister in the areas hit by the earthquake.(IMB photo ©2010)

Many Kansas-Nebraska Southern Baptist churches use the Christmas season to emphasis international missions.

The Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions is traditionally collected in December. This year’s national offering goal is $175 million.

Veteran missionaries Ken and Linda Bowie, who serve in Chile, are among the more than 5,400 missionaries supported by the offering.

Every penny of the Lottie Moon offering goes to missionary support. “That is how LMCO helps us—by paying expenses so we can live where God needs us to serve others throughout the world,” the Bowies wrote in an e-mail.

Trent Tomlinson, one of the Bowies’ fellow missionaries in Chile, lives near the epicenter of the Feb. 27, 2010, earthquake in that country.

Tomlinson has an SUV that was provided by Lottie Moon Christmas Offering funds. Lottie Moon offering funds also buy for fuel for Tomlinson to travel to the stricken areas as well as phone and Internet costs to send prayer updates.

Read more about Tomlinson’s work in “Open Doors in the Rubble” from Lottie Moon@work on the IMB Web site.

The offering is named after legendary missionary Lottie Moon. She was appointed as a missionary to China in 1873 and served there for 39 years. She wrote many letters home to the United States telling about the great physical and spiritual needs in China.

She also made passionate pleas for Southern Baptists to go to China or give money so others could go. By 1888, Southern Baptist women had organized and helped collect $3,315 to send workers to China.

During a time of war and famine in 1912, Lottie silently starved, knowing the Chinese people didn’t have enough food. Her fellow Christians saw the ultimate sign of love: giving her life for others. On Christmas Eve, Lottie died at age 72 on a ship bound for the United States.

In 1918, Woman’s Missionary Union named the annual Christmas offering for international missions after the woman who had urged them to start it.