Biography
Malla Moe was born in 1863, in Norway, in a rural family. She grew up in a small village and went to work at a young age as a servant. She was a woman of strong will and independence. In her late twenties, she emigrated to the United States, where she worked in domestic service. She joined a Scandinavian church in Chicago, and she was converted. She felt a call to missions and applied to the Scandinavian Alliance Mission, a society founded by Fredrik Franson in 1891. She was accepted, and she went to the mission's training school.
In 1892, she sailed for South Africa as one of the first missionaries of the Scandinavian Alliance Mission. She went with a small group of workers. She was assigned to the work in Swaziland, which is now Eswatini, a small kingdom in southern Africa, where there was little missionary work. She arrived in Swaziland in 1892 and was among the first Pentecostal missionaries there. She settled in the rural area of Bethany, near the border of Mozambique. She had to learn the Zulu and Swazi languages. She worked among the people as a teacher and a nurse.
She was known for her plain way of life. She lived in a hut and ate the food of the local people. She also worked as a farmer, growing her own food. She was a woman of enormous energy, who walked from village to village, carrying her bag and a Bible. She was said to cover great distances on foot. She did a great deal of work with children. She started schools, and she held Bible classes. She also visited the sick and gave them medicine. She formed congregations of believers, and she appointed local leaders.
In 1908, she heard about the outpouring of the Spirit in Los Angeles. She was drawn to the Pentecostal message and soon received the baptism in the Holy Spirit. She became a Pentecostal and was a leader in the movement in southern Africa. She worked with other Pentecostal missionaries, among them John G. Lake, who came to South Africa in 1908. She had a big part in the growth of the Pentecostal churches of Swaziland and Mozambique. She trained African evangelists and sent them out. Her work was one of the great successes of the early Pentecostal missions.
She was also known for her toughness and her gift of prayer. She was a woman who was not afraid to speak her mind and who held to her convictions. She had trouble with some of the white missionaries, who were less ready to work with the Africans. She had a strong belief in the ability of the Africans to lead their own churches. She also was a woman who suffered from fevers and other illnesses.
She worked in Africa for more than fifty years. She made only a few trips home. She died in 1953, at the age of about ninety, in Swaziland. She is remembered as a pioneer who spent her life in the service of the African church. Her life shows that a plain servant girl from Norway may become a mother to a whole region.