It seems
somewhat strange to attempt fundraising during the holiday season. Surely
between all the family gatherings, office parties, gift purchasing, travel
expenses, and extra meals at home, people are already stretched pretty thin.
Yet December is the month that we focus our attention on raising money to
directly support foreign missionaries. We do this through the
International Mission Board’s Lottie Moon Christmas Offering.
Why
many have questioned, “Why Christmas?”
Lottie Moon is famous for having asked, “Why
not?!” She was convinced that it was the best time of year to ask.
“Is not the festive season when families and friends
exchange gifts in memory of The Gift laid on the altar of the world for the
redemption of the human race, the most appropriate time to consecrate a portion
from abounding riches and scant poverty to send forth the good tidings of great
joy into all the earth?”
Throughout
her many years of ministry in China, Lottie frequently wrote back home. In her
letters she helped educate people of the climate and conditions she was
experiencing in the mission field. She also challenged her fellow sisters of
the faith to do their part in accomplishing the task. She believed they could
best do that by making people aware of the dire need that she and many other
missionaries faced – their need for prayer, for fellow workers, and for
generous financial gifts.
Ironically
(or perhaps providentially), Lottie passed away on Christmas Eve of 1912,
having faithfully given her all, indeed, her very life, for the cause of Christ
in China. 6 years after her death, the Southern Baptist’s Woman’s Missionary
Union decided to name the international missions Christmas offering after her –
the very woman who had pleaded with them to take up such an offering in the
first place.
So then,
why Christmas? Great question. What is it exactly that we celebrate this season?
Is it not our Savior, Immanuel? Additionally, is there honestly any better time
for us to evaluate the things we are most wholeheartedly devoted to? Is the end
of the year not a sobering time of self-inventory? We begin to look ahead, but we
are also forced to reflect on what has been. I mean, before we can embrace what
this next year might behold, don’t we have to consider what we did with the one
that’s about to expire? We’re reminded of how we spent time and energy and
money on this and that, and that we’re hoping for many more things to work out
in our favor. But how many of these past expenditures and yet-to-be-experienced
desires are kingdom-minded? Of our plethora of resources, how many will go
toward fulfilling Christ’s Commission to make disciples of all nations?
This
might be a good place for us to dwell for a bit, for Jesus said that once we
locate our treasure, we’ll discover our heart in its midst (Matthew 6:21).
 |
| Matt Fowler Associate Pastor of Missions & Students matt@nbchurch.info @fattmowler |
No comments:
Post a Comment