If you are feeling inspired to serve, the following steps can help you make the greatest impact for good.
1. Identify a Need: The best way to get started is to look around you and identify needs that exist in your community.
- Prioritize the greatest needs within your scope of influence.
- Look for and learn about local organizations and projects.
- While service always demonstrates God’s love for others, it shouldn’t be done with the intent to push personal beliefs on others. Let your good deeds do the talking.
2. Listen and Learn: Take some time to listen to the individuals who are most affected by the issue. Listening and seeking to understand the barriers faced by those around us teaches us how to provide meaningful help.
- Engage with individuals as a peer and equal. Look people in the eye, call them by their name, offer your hand.
- Question your assumptions, set aside prejudices, and seek to truly understand.
- Prioritize relationships over any difference in opinion.
3. Make a Plan: The most effective humanitarian assistance involves individuals and communities as you plan solutions that meet immediate needs and provide a path to build self-reliance.
- Respect the preferences, beliefs, and customs of those you seek to help.
- Invite those you are serving to help develop a plan by asking questions such as these:
- What have you already tried to address this need?
- What would you like to try?
- How, when, and where would you like to receive help?
4. Share Your Experiences: We share our experiences to invite and inspire others to action. Taking opportunities to recognize, share, and celebrate successful acts of service encourages those you help and inspires even more individuals to serve.
- Talk to friends and family about your humanitarian work. Invite them to join you.
- On your social media pages, share stories about the blessings of service you’ve seen—both in your life and the lives of those you’ve served.
- Connect with the social media pages of nonprofit organizations you’ve worked with in your community. Share your positive experiences with them.
“Many times, what we do is not seen or known by others. However, God knows, and He blesses us when we serve in quiet, unseen ways.”
Resources to Learn More:
To get more information about our humanitarian work worldwide and get involved in your community, follow us at:
Facebook: [@Caring.ChurchofJesusChrist] [@DeseretIndustriesThrift] [@JustServe.org]
Instagram: [@Caring.ChurchofJesusChrist][@DeseretIndustries] [@Just_Serve]