Church-service missionaries and long-term volunteers are an increasingly important part of the ICS Department. These hard-working men and women serve in various roles that save the Church valuable time and resources. The following stories present two good examples.

Elder Sorensen

Elder Joshua Sorensen, a Church-service missionary from South Jordan, UT, has been serving for six months. He is now considering extending another six months as he prepares to submit his mission papers to go full-time.

“I would love to go full-time after serving a Church-service mission,” Elder Sorensen said. “The experience of living the mission rules and getting the experience will benefit me as I prepare. Any way that I can serve in building up the Lord’s Kingdom is a privilege for me.”

Working specifically with the database for Church asset management, Elder Sorensen helps track and organize the machines and software in the Church’s possession. Thanks to his contribution, this provides a comprehensive list where someone can search for a specific machine or software.

“I feel closer to the Lord through my service and am grateful for the opportunity to save the Church valuable time and resources in assisting in Church resource management,” says Elder Sorensen. “I love to serve in any capacity that will move the Kingdom forward.”

Brother Downey

While Elder Sorensen is serving within the ICS Department in the Riverton Office Building, another one of the Church’s valuable long-term volunteers is across the ocean, in Wales, UK.

Brother James Downey, a young man of 17, felt impressed to search out volunteer technology opportunities the Church offered and found The Vineyard. From that point, he came to LDSTech and has been serving ever since.

“I prayed about it and sought the Lord’s guidance to understand whether it is something that I wanted to get involved in,” Brother Downey said. “Once I knew it was right, I have contributed in any way I can. I want to continue as a long-term volunteer until I have the opportunity to go out and serve as a missionary.”

Living far away from Church headquarters, he is proud to be able to serve and speak with his family and friends about how he remotely assists in the ICS Department, currently as the community manager for the LDS Music and LDS Art projects for the iOS system.

“When I speak with people here in the UK, they talk about how much they love the apps that I help with,” said Brother Downey. “This gives me a great sense of accomplishment to know that I doing my part to help make certain that those apps are giving people the best experience.”

Brother Downey says serving as a long-term volunteer will help him to find a job by building valuable experience, find eternal blessings through service, and educate him for future callings within the Church.

“I would suggest this opportunity to people around the world because no matter where you are in the world, you can contribute to the Lord’s Work through making the Church’s technology better. I also want to have a job in technology, regardless of what is involved, and I feel that with volunteering for the Church, I can accomplish my goals of learning more about it.”

About Church-service missions and long-term volunteer opportunities

Church-service missionaries and long-term volunteers come in all ages and with a variety of skill sets, with each one being screened by LDSTech for technical skills and experience before being given an ICS assignment. This ensures each one is assigned a project that he or she is qualified to work on.

Integrating LDSTech missionaries and long-term volunteers into ICS projects allows the ICS workforce to help meet growing human resource needs and to more effectively hasten the work. We have a lot of work to do and require many willing, qualified helpers from the community.

For more information about becoming a Church-service missionary in the ICS Department, see Church-service missionary opportunities with LDSTech.

You can also send an e-mail message to ldstech-mission@ldschurch.org or call +1-801-240-7373.