‘Grits and giving’: IMB thanks top Lottie Moon giving churches in 2005

Hot eggs, bacon, biscuits and grits greeted dozens of Southern Baptist messengers at the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering Celebration Breakfast in Greensboro.

Hosted by the International Mission Board, the breakfast is a way to thank churches for their faithful support of the Lottie Moon offering, every penny of which is used to support more than 5,000 IMB missionaries. Though 2005’s offering set a record, IMB president Jerry Rankin opened the event with a solemn reminder.

“Four years ago, we found ourselves in a crisis with a severe shortfall in giving to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering,” Rankin said. “For the first time since the Depression years of the ’30s, we actually had to defer the appointment of missionaries.

“As we sought the Lord, we were convicted of three things: that God did not want us to trust in our own resources and the affluence of Southern Baptists but to walk by faith. He taught us that we needed to be better stewards of the resources that we did have. He also convicted us that if this crisis could be used to awaken churches to the priority of giving to missions ... it would be worth it to go through a year or two of austerity.

“For the last three years, we have seen a sustained level of giving to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering that is absolutely phenomenal, reaching a new record this year of $137,939,677,” Rankin continued. “We just want to thank you.”

The $137.9 million marks a 3.03 percent increase over 2004’s $133.9 million Lottie Moon offering and a 1.28 percent gain over the old record set in 2003 — $136.2 million.

Rankin asked Bryant Wright to pray before the breakfast, noting that the church where he is pastor, Johnson Ferry Baptist in Marietta, Ga., gave more than $659,000 to the offering, earning the No. 1 spot on the list of top giving churches.

During the breakfast, Rankin recognized Kanoot Midkiff, minister of missions and senior adults at Mount Vernon Baptist Church in Boone, N.C. Midkiff’s church earned the honor of the highest Lottie Moon giving per capita: $243.73 for each of Mount Vernon’s 827 members — a total of more than $201,000.

He credited volunteer mission trips, relationships with overseas missionaries and the IMB’s multimedia resource materials for helping make Mount Vernon’s Lottie Moon offering so successful.

Rankin also praised the thousands of smaller churches in the Southern Baptist Convention who gave sacrificially.

“Of course, we’re always thrilled to get reports of phenomenally large gifts, often from the larger churches,” he said. “But I can assure you that what thrills our heart most are the testimonies from many of the smaller churches that give far beyond their reasonable means.”

Gustavo Vasquez, pastor of Iglesia Bautista El Calvario in Seymour, Ind., told how his 47-member congregation managed to give more than $10,000.

Vasquez explained that he had asked his church what their Lottie Moon goal should be. Someone shouted $500, he said, and then $1,000. More shouts came, and suddenly the goal had hit $6,000.

“That was a scary thing ... because the year before it was $1,500,” Vasquez said. “But then we said, ‘Let’s not set a goal; let’s let God set a goal in our hearts.’ We prayed about it, and let the Holy Spirit tell us how much God wanted us to give.”

One woman gave up two weeks of paychecks; another man took a second job so he could contribute his offering.

“Our motivation is God himself — he has passion for the lost souls, and he has placed in our heart the same passion for the unreached people,” Vasquez said.