This little book (100 pages) on the lives of five missionaries that changed the world just might change your life if you dare to read it! Daniel Akin provides key detail and insights into the lives of missionaries via textual exegesis of five different passages. Seeing how these true stories illustrate the truths of Scripture is compelling! Akin does a fine job in articulating facts in such a way as to grab the reader's attention. These are truly remarkable testimonies of faith, perseverance, and zeal for nations from a zeal for the glory of God. When you read the lives of heroes of the faith, you cannot help but strive to follow in their footsteps. That is why I say this little book just may change your life!

I would like to provide a brief caption from each chapter here to whet your appetite for this book and any other biographical work of the great missionaries in the rich history of Christianity.

Chapter One: William Carey (Matt 28:16-20). Carey is known as the Father of Modern Missions. He took the Gospel to India because he could not get over his burden for the thousands of people who lived under the sway of false gods. No matter the opposition he faced at home or on the field when he arrived, he stayed the course! In reference to the laxness for missions he said, "I question whether all are justified in staying here, while so many are perishing without means of grace in other lands" (p. 7). Carey FELT that multitudes were perishing. Do we?

Chapter Two: Adoniram and Ann Judson (Rom 8:28-39). This is the chapter that gripped me. I knew Adoniram and Ann Judson ministered in Burma. I knew they had accepted believer's baptism as the scriptural model and were baptized by William Carey. I did not know the torture that Judson endured being imprisoned on charges of being an English spy. Alongside the deplorable conditions of his cell and the pain inflicted by his shackles, Judson lost his translation and sit helplessly by watching his daughter and wife deteriorate physically. Not long after his release, Ann died. His daughter died six months later. It was too much to bear. Judson left his station to live in the jungle alone. He dug his own grave, set down beside it, and stared into it for days. He wrote, "God is to me the Great Unknown. I believe in Him, but I find Him not" (p. 30). God did not leave him though. Judson would return to his station and see around 7,000 people baptized before his death!

Chapter Three: Bill Wallace (Phil 1:21). Wallace was a medical missionary to China. When all other missionaries left their posts because of war, Wallace remained and continued to minister. He not only ministered in medicine, he witnessed to his patients and saw the Lord open many hearts. Wallace sacrificed everything, including his meals, to serve the people of China and to lead his staff at the hospital. He was falsely accused and imprisoned by the Communists. While captive, he endured countless hours of brainwashing, physical torture, and inhumane interrogation, all in an effort to get him to make a false confession. He would not break, and eventually his body could endure the pain no longer. Wallace's small monument simply reads, "For me to live is Christ" (p. 55).

Chapter Four: Lottie Moon (Rom 12:1). Lottie Moon was saved at age 18 and challenged with missions through her pastor, John Broadus. God placed a desire for China on her heart, and she held fast her commitment. Small in stature but large in heart, Moon had a dynamic impact in China and in missions that continues today. What made an impression on me the most is that Moon constantly appealed for the States to send more laborers to China, specifically men! And they would not come! She chided the coldness of America. The church in China needed men to lead it. Moon knew this was the biblical way. Yet, men would not arise to the occasion. So often, against her wishes, she would address men. She died at 72 weighing 50 pounds because she kept giving her food to others. She wrote, "O that I could give myself up to him, so as never more to attempt to be my own or to have any will or affection improper for those conformed to him" (p. 78).

Chapter Five: Jim Elliot (Psalm 96): At age 29, Jim Elliot was speared to death by Acua Indians in Ecuador along with his companions. Their martyrdom continues to inspire and call forth missionaries to lay down their lives for the Gospel. When asked if they would use their guns to protect themselves from an Acua attack, Jim replied, "We will not use our guns. We are ready for heaven, but they are not" (p. 93). God used the slaying of Jim and his friends to make inroads into the Acua tribe, and many have come to Christ! What an extraordinary example that the Cross advances the Gospel, not the sword!