To the Anonymous Missionaries
[Inspired by the letters of Lottie Moon, 1878 & 1879]
To the anonymous missionaries—
the many whose names are unknown,
who seek no monument, desire no remembrance but Christ alone.
To those we know only by initials and distant report,
whose stories are veiled by the briefest lines
yet whose faith we mention in prayer.
You are the faithful who go out into autumn’s dimming fields,
pressing onward through the chill of lostness,
plowing and planting in quiet resolve.
You scatter seed with open hands and steadfast hearts,
casting the Word of God wide and trustful into the furrows of the world.
In time, small green shoots emerge—fragile, hidden, and tender—
and soon winter’s snow conceals them,
the waiting stretching longer than you had strength to imagine.
Who can say when the harvest will come?
Yet spring arrives with its soft rains and its promised warmth,
the Spirit breathing life unseen,
until summer’s light reveals the golden harvest in fullness.
You are the humble laborers,
sowing as time and strength permit,
tending what you may never see to fruit.
We pray for you and for your people—
that the faith rooted in you might become seed for others.
Know this assurance:
God Himself will give the harvest—
Doubt it not.
In your steadfast presence
may His steadfast presence be your joy.
Yet still the laborers are few.
So may the Lord of the harvest call forth more.
May His Church awaken to her high privileges and weighty responsibilities—
to send, to pray, to sustain, to bear one another’s burdens.
And in our giving and praying, let us not forget our nearness—
to know, to listen, to care well for those we send,
sharing their griefs, rejoicing in their glad days,
ever strengthening the bond between sender and sent.
For the seed they sow abroad was first sown in them through the love and witness of the local church—
seed meant to grow and give life in every nation.
To the anonymous missionaries—
we will join you in the barren seasons
and sing with you in the abundant ones.
O Church, pray to the Lord of the harvest.
Be willing to raise, disciple, and send those He appoints.
Let these not be wild words,
but abiding responses within the Great Commission,
until from every nation, tribe, peoples, and tongue there rises a Great Multitude,
standing in the glory of the Lamb.