Called to Serve: You
Contributed By Heather Whittle Wrigley, Church News and Events
Many Church members have already answered the First Presidency’s call for all Church units to organize a day of service in 2011.
Article Highlights
- The First Presidency has called all members to participate in a day of service in 2011.
- Members are encouraged to include members of the community.
- A section of ChurchofJesusChrist.org has been dedicated to gathering reports of members' experiences with the day of service.
“As we serve without consideration for religion or denomination or race, our helping hands will become linking hands.” —Elder Walter F. González of the Presidency of the Seventy
Related Links
- Read other members’ service experiences during 2011 and share your own.
- April 9, 2011 – Read and watch a video about the Hopkinsville Kentucky Stake joining community members to spruce up the community ballpark.
- April 23, 2011 – Read about how members in southern Florida celebrated the 75th year of the Church welfare program by repainting three homes.
- April 30, 2011 - Read about Church members in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, sweeping across three schools and a local park.
- Visit the Welfare 75th Anniversary section of ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Church welfare department is gathering stories of members who are participating in a day of service during 2011, in response to the First Presidency’s call. Share your day of service 2011 experiences here.
The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has asked all Church units to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Church welfare plan by organizing their own day of service.
“The service may be undertaken at any time during the remainder of this year, and its length may be flexible depending on the service rendered,” the letter from the First Presidency read.
The call to serve comes on the heels of President Henry B. Eyring’s conference talk during the Saturday morning session.
“The feelings of unity will multiply the good effects of the service you give,” he said. “And those feelings of unity in families, in the Church, and in communities will grow and become a lasting legacy long after the project ends” (“Opportunities to Do Good,” Liahona and Ensign, May 2011, 25).
The First Presidency offered guidelines for members planning service projects, including inviting community members and full-time missionaries to become involved, and designing projects so that families and individuals can participate.
Publicizing the projects to raise awareness and interest was also encouraged.
Many wards, branches, districts, and stakes are already answering the call. Some service crews don yellow Mormon Helping Hands shirts, while others just roll up their sleeves, but from donating blood to sprucing up community buildings, the response by members has been overwhelming.
Elder Walter F. González of the Presidency of the Seventy presides over Church affairs in the North America Southeast Area. He first challenged every congregation in his area to give a day of service in 2009.
Every year since, members in the southern United States have organized annual days of service. Elder González said he is happy to see the challenge and opportunity extended to the entire Church.
“We serve because it’s a Christlike attribute, and it’s an opportunity to become a little like Him, to cultivate an attitude of service, a habit of serving by nature,” he said. “As we serve without consideration for religion or denomination or race, our helping hands will become linking hands, cultivating relationships with the community.”
In Jacksonville, Florida, 11 congregations answered the call by donating food and giving blood on April 16. Several LDS meetinghouses were used as drop-off locations for food donations, while others were staging places for blood donations.
Chainsaw-wielding members of the Jonesboro Ward in Georgia gathered at the Stately Oaks Plantation, legendary site where Gone with the Wind was filmed, on May 14 to haul broken branches.
The last week of April, Saints in California and Hawaii joined with community volunteers for the annual Mormon Helping Hands Day.
In San Diego, 150 volunteers helped clean 3,000 headstones at the Fort Rosecrans Memorial Park, a veterans' cemetery.
Latter-day Saints in Palos Verdes partnered with a nonprofit organization called Clean San Pedro to sweep and clean the streets and sidewalks in the central area of the city, collecting more than one ton of refuse and litter.
The head of Clean San Pedro, Steve Kleinjan, said, “We love to work with this church. They always have such a good turnout of volunteers.”
Members of the Charlotte South LDS Stake answered the First Presidency’s call for all Church members to participate in a day of service during 2011 by partnering with a local charity to put on a welcome basket item drive.
More than 2,000 paper bags with a list of much-needed items were placed throughout the community. A week later, nearly 130 volunteers spent 150 hours collecting the bags and donating the items to families transitioning from homelessness to housing.
Primary children from the ward made “Welcome Home” signs for the families in need.
In Georgia, the Griffin Ward came together on Saturday, May 21, to scour the inside and outside of a local homeless shelter, the House of Hope.
In Clinton, Mississippi, Latter-day Saints met to spruce up the Jackson Zoo, mulching flower beds, painting, and repairing equipment.
Elder González emphasized that members’ service will bless both those within the Church and those who are not members.
“There are so many different ways to serve and create links with the community,” he said. “And as we serve others, we will also see the hand of the Lord in the lives of our members.”
- April 9, 2011 — Read about the Hopkinsville Kentucky Stake joining community members to spruce up the community ballpark.
- April 23, 2011 – Watch a video about how along the southern Florida coast, members of the Jupiter ward in Stuart celebrated the 75th year of the Church welfare program by repainting three homes.
- April 30, 2011 - Read about Church members in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, who gathered for a service project and swept across three Baton Rouge schools and a local park during the last weekend in April.
