Week Six: Camp Green Lake - Bentonville, Arkansas

"It builds character." - Mr. Sir

First off, happy birthday to my comp Elder Ceb! Second, happy birthday to Harry Potter! Turns out Ceb likes basketball more than quidditch though so he didn't really care. Oh well. Still made my day. 

I haven't really talked about him too much but our friend Luis is getting baptized this Sunday! By a guy who looks like Matt Damon no less. Lots of celebrity lookalikes around here for some reason. Aaaanyways yeah! I basically just hopped in for the last couple of lessons with him but it's been so cool to see him draw closer to Christ and overcome some trials that he'd been really struggling with. He's a good dude and I admire his humility and his love for his family. Keep Luis in your prayers this week, yeah?

Update on life as a missionary:

Missionary work is hard; I've said it before. But if there's one thing knocking doors in the southern heat for six hours a day has taught me, it's to value everything else. I love sharing the Gospel with new friends. I love being in members' homes. I love personal study and playing music whenever I can and calling my family every single week. I can't stand knocking doors sometimes.  But because it's such a big part of my life now I'm grateful for things that I completely took for granted in the past. 

People of the week:

- Jason: a super nice guy we got to have a lesson with this week. Grew up a Christian in Saint Louis so needless to say his life story is legit. Talked about his kids, his shoe collection, his childhood church, and the time someone shot a shotgun at his car point-blank for not running a yellow light. Yup.

- Steve: a retired schoolteacher who let us into his home, got us some water, and talked about God with us for a full hour just because he likes learning. Gave us free pencils on the way out. Thanks, Steve. 

- Jeep dude: a guy with a tricked out Jeep who works a part time job taking out people's trash. Probably pretty wealthy based off of his fresh ride so I honestly think he just works as a trash collector because he likes it. I wish I remembered his name but I don't so I guess he's Jeep dude now. Way humble and way cool. 

- Donovan: likes Arby's Dreamsicle milkshakes. "The elites don't want you to know this but the Old Testament is actually a record of an ancient alien space battle where a third of the hosts of the aliens crashed to the earth and combined their genes with apes to create the human race." People are fun. 

A couple nights ago Ceb walked up and shared a message with this group of like seven girls while we were talking to folks in downtown Bentonville. They weren't interested so I laughed, applauded his confidence, and we moved on. Three minutes later they came back, introduced themselves, said they'd gone on mission trips as Baptists, and then prayed over us Baptist-style for like five minutes right in the middle of town. Kinda surreal but a fun turn of events for sure. 

"This episode, Elder Rigby..."

- ate at Slim Chickens.

- built half of a bed.

- got a sweet haircut in a duplex garage. Turns out a sister missionary with a cosmetology license just happened to be cutting Elder Schimbeck's hair next door the exact moment I asked another Elder where I should go for a haircut. The Lord provides.

Thought(s:)

1) Doctrine and Covenants section 4. 

The Gospel can seem so complex but at it's core it's so simple. Verse 3: "if ye have desires to serve God ye are called to the work." Verse 5: "faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God, qualify him for the work." My dad noted the distinction between the two and I thought it was really interesting because I could relate. As a disciple of Christ and a full-time missionary I feel called to the work, but do I feel qualified? Nope. Not at all. Not yet and maybe not ever haha. But the Lord has given specific instructions through revelation exactly how we can be, so I wanna do my best to follow them.

2) Check out Elder Neal A. Maxwell's last talk called "Remember How Merciful the Lord Hath Been" sometime. He just talks about things he's grateful for the whole thing and it's awesome. One of my new favorites for sure. 

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2004/04/remember-how-merciful-the-lord-hath-been?lang=eng

Hope you're all doing well! God loves you. Go reconnect with someone you haven't talked to in a bit. Catching up with old friends is nice. 

Elder Rigby

Muppet dog

World Champion Squirrel Cookoff. What can I say more?

getting a fresh cut from Sister Allen

Text from Bentonville Friends

 

Week Five: Papaya Man - Bentonville, Arkansas

Quick correction from last week's email:  We're totally allowed to listen to church music! When I said "no music" I meant that meant nothing besides official church publications unlike some missions that allow anything that "invites the Holy Spirit." Sorry for the miscommunication folks. 

Alright, email time! 

Life marches on! I'm happy to report that this week's been better than the last. I know I've got a long way to go but I'm seeing improvement already. Counting down the days (689, 688, 687...) is just maddening but when I just take it one day at a time then missionary life's really not too bad. I've been learning a lot lately about consecrating "go time" to the Lord completely and taking time to recover during mornings, nights, and meals with members. Speaking of member meals, they've seriously been some of the best parts of my day every day this week. Us missionaries don't always get to do our work in places conducive to the Spirit so any time we get to be in a member's home is just so refreshing. It's thanks to their support that I feel like I'm able to finish strong every night. 

Some fun personalities from this week:

- Ken: a kind Christian man who waved us over, got us some water, complimented us for sharing the Word of the Lord, and encouraged us vehemently to buy as much land as possible as soon we possibly could. Will do, Ken. 

- Elder Esera: a Samoan Elder with a big smile and bigger muscles who insists he's "from Chinese and speaks China." His accent is fun and his volleyball skills are terrifying. Apparently he was one of the best boxers in American Samoa for his age before he came here. 

- Elder Bradford: an Elder from Southern Arkansas called to Northern Arkansas. Familiar with the lay of the land and blends in with the natives so we use him for reconnaissance and various espionage. Has an extensive knowledge of Pokémon cards and made big bucks buying and selling them back home. 

- Brother Hogge: a cool dude in the ward who lives here with his equally cool wife. Runs IronMans regularly, bakes delicious homemade bread, maintains bodaciously curly surfer hair, and grows an absolute ton of tropical plants out of fruit he bought at the store—all while going to med school. Sent Elder Ceb and I home with little papaya saplings after teaching how to chemically induce a pineapple plant to produce fruit. 

Okay I'm running out of time yet again so I'll jump into the news. This week we:

- "cleaned out" our apartment for a few minutes today and found a treasure trove of dubious missionary paraphernalia. Highlights include a full tech deck skate park, a cookbook made for newlyweds, a set of well-used throwing knives, and a souvenir sword from Turkey. 

- got our groceries paid for by a nice lady named Michelle whose son is serving in Houston. Much obliged, ma'am.

- doxxed a family residence to find my Amazon order that got delivered to the wrong address,

and

- marveled at a mailbox shaped like a fish. 

Thought:

I have lots of thoughts! Like all the time. It's neat. But *the* thoughts I wanted to share are these:

1) Elder Waite (the one who looks like Jim Carey) actually has a crazy cool story. His entire family and extended family were members of the Church but they all left when he was a kid and became anti besides his older brothers who served missions against all odds. He went to other denominations and was a Baptist for a while but he never felt like they really answered his questions so eventually he decided to just take an honest, unbiased look at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. He went at it alone, emailing questions to his brother on a mission and sneaking out to church when he could. He didn't meet with the missionaries until later but when he did he found truth, felt the Spirit confirm it, and became a member. Now he's a devoted missionary and a powerful example. Boom. 

To all you discouraged missionaries reading this out there, take heart; these kind of people actually exist. They may not be ready yet when you meet them but someday they will be and they'll rock your socks. Elder Waite is so cool. 

2) Scripture of the week is Psalm 147 verses 3-5:

3 He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds. 

4 He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names. 

5 Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite.

Shoutout to Hermana Dobbs for the cool scripture. The Old Testament can be kind or intimidating sometimes but man, it holds so much truth. 

God knows us by name like He knows the number of the stars. He loves us perfectly and individually. When we give Him the time He will shape us into our best selves in a way that is just fascinating. If you're thinking of serving a mission, go do it. There's no better place to work than the Lord's vineyard. 

Love you guys! Stay safe Arizona folks, it's hot out there. 

Papaya's a nice word. Papaya papaya papaya.

Turkey sword from Turkey. Somehow it's here now. 

The fish box. Simply beautiful

District hike woo

Week Four: Paratrooper - Bentonville, Arkansas

Hey everyone! Hope you're all good. A ton of stuff happened this week and I can't get to it all but the biggest thing is that I finally got to go to Arkansas! I'm assigned to the Bentonville 1st Ward with my trainer Elder Cebellero and we're right in the middle of town. Like smack in the middle. The Bentonville temple is literally in the same parking lot as our church haha. 

Saying goodbye to my district and the MTC was sad but it had been a fire two weeks and we were ready to get going. The trip to Arkansas was actually super fun because my travel group turned out to be like 20 missionaries on the plane to Minneapolis and like 12 on the plane to Arkansas. The others in Minnesota went to Milwaukee so prepare for some greenies Elder Thompson. Also, a pilot named Captain Brett bought like seven of us Chick-fil-A. Thanks Captain Brett. 

I couldn't help but feel like I was getting shipped off to war in the last few days in the MTC. Everything was geared around suiting us up, handing us a plane ticket, and giving us a nice pat on the back before we parachuted into a battlefield. Arkansas is legit and the Bentonville mission is strong and no-nonsense. It's so foreign in so many ways and as missionaries we're out there in the thick of it almost 24/7. 

My mission president, President Collins, is equally legit. He's a super nice guy but he's waaaay tough on the "high love, high expectations" thing. No music, no member service, even no Pokémon cards. Just knocking doors every second we've got. It's way intense and honestly a lot tougher than I expected. But hey, the stats don't lie. Since he's taken the wheel the average baptisms per month has literally quadrupled in our mission. That's four times as many children of God accepting the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ every month. So while some of the guidelines we have to follow are frankly unpleasant I know that our mission president knows what he's doing. I came out here to do the Lord's work so if it's four times as effective with strict rules then heck yeah. 

My trainer, Elder Cebellero, is great guy too. He's a District Leader who's been out for nine months now and he's a great example of both an obedient missionary and a good hard worker in general. Elder Ceb's responsible, diligent, and competent and I've been learning so much from him these past few days.

In other news, this week I:

- Met one Elder that looks a lot like like Michael Cera and another that looks EXACTLY like Jim Carey. Like frighteningly close. I'll send a picture of him sometime cause he lives next door. 

- Learned missionary slang. We're discouraged from using slang so we sound more professional so a few substitutes include "treacherous," "powerful," and "hairy." I still don't know half of what the other Elders are saying but whatever, I'll pick up on the dialect soon enough. 

- Lit the duolingo owl on fire. 

Thought:

(PHILOSOPHY ALERT. Skip to the bottom and I won't be offended. Plus I can't see how much of this you read anyway.)

I got to spend part of my first day in the trenches as a trio with the Elder I was replacing on Friday. His name was Elder Sam Andersen (the exact same name as my MTC comp but he's a different guy haha) and it was his very last day before he went back home. I was exhausted and discouraged from knocking doors without success and at some point I made a joke about wishing I could switch places with him and be on my very last day too. He got super serious as soon as I said that and told me dead serious that he would do almost anything to switch places with me. It caught me completely off guard—I thought he'd be so done by that point that he couldn't wait to get home but he found something here in Bentonville that made him want to stay for as long as he possibly could. I kept thinking about it and it reminded me of an idea we learned about in my philosophy class last year. I'll quote it roughly: "you know what you're doing is meaningful if you would be okay with doing it an immeasurable amount of times over and over again." This dude was cool with serving a mission over and over again and he was devastated that he was going home while here I was doing mental math of how many months, weeks, and days I had until I got to fly back to Arizona. What made him love this so much that he never wanted to leave? I had and have literally no idea, but the longer I wear the tag the more I start to see what he was getting at so bear with me for a bit and maybe I'll answer my own question soon enough. 

Anyways, enough with the philosophy stuff for now. Here's a scripture:

Doctrine and Covenants 84:88:

And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.

Missionary work is hard. It just is. But I know God will support His servants and j know that the one thing better than going home to Heaven is going home to Heaven with as much of your family as you can possibly bring with you. Nuff said. 

Love you guys!

Elder Rigby

airport Chili's in Minneapolis

gorilla head

good ol' Bentonville temple

Elder Ceb

rain is nice

various doodads

Arrival in Arkansas - Bentonville, Arkansas

President and Sister Collins

Week Three: I wanna watch Top Gear - Provo UT MTC

*voiced by Clarkson*

"Tonight: Elder Andersen sees a cat, a New Zealander talks about Toyotas, I schmooze with the locals, and the district flies dangerously close to Canada."

"Welcome to Top Gear!"

So a nice part about going to BYU for a year is that I've met an absolute ton of school friends and other homies here at the MTC. So far the list includes Elders Harris, Irish, Calder, Evans, Jones, Pinoli, Stubbs, Thompson, Garrett, Scow, Leonard, Bryan, Munson, Crenshaw, and the one and only Liam the RA (Elder Henretty now) and Sisters Dobbs, Everton, McGarvin, Chapple, Calder, Allen, Pulsipher, Elgan, and Hamilton as well as Sister Masters, Brother Jones, and Shurtleff兄弟 plus Sister Roskelley from my BYU ward leadership! I also see Elder Williams from my flight from Gilbert to Provo and meet other random Gilbertites on a daily basis.

A lot of missionaries have been having trouble getting their passports lately for whatever reason and some Elders in my hall fell victim to the curse too and got reassigned for now from South America to New York City. In response to this news, six of them immediately banded together to perform the single most elaborate improv of a gritty New York crime drama I've ever seen. Fake blood and real tears were shed that night. 10/10. 

Okay back to the title. For those of you who don't know, Top Gear is a show where old British guys do dumb stuff in fast cars. It's fantastic. I wish I could describe it better but anything more wouldn't do it justice. If this show sounds even slightly interesting and you want a glimpse inside the head of a teenage car nerd then go check it out. Just make sure you watch the one with Jeremy Clarkson, James May, and Richard Hammond cause that's the OG.

Onto the news:

1. We saw a cat. It's now my phone wallpaper. Nuff said.

2. My district got assigned to welcome in new missionaries last Wednesday and it was super fun. I got to meet a ton of new missionaries including yet another homie, Elder Mitchell Jones, but for a bit my job was just to wave cars in to the parking lot in with an Elder from New Zealand/Tonga named Elder Hala. He was cool and I liked his accent. We talked about rugby, Samoa and Tonga's beef with each other, and how trucks in America are way bigger than in New Zealand for whatever reason.

3. My companion and I got our flight itineraries! We'll be leaving for the airport this Thursday at 4:30am for...Minnesota? That's right folks. Our trip to Bentonville is a 14-hour quest by bus, train, and plane from Provo to Minneapolis to Fayetteville. Wish us luck. 

Okay, now the spiritual thought: 

 One thing I learned this week that I particularly liked is from a lesson we had on prayer. Heavenly Father wants us to strive to really connect with Him, not to just talk at him or give Him a spiritual grocery list. "Think about how much it hurts when you know someone you care about says they're 'fine' when you both know they aren't. He already knows exactly what we need but He wants us to open up to Him, not to just tell him we're 'fine.' What makes prayer special is that it's a chance to let ourselves be vulnerable with our Father."

 I'm constantly getting humbled here at the MTC. I'm glad I am, though, because as I've started to see myself grow I've also started to forget Who helped me to get to where I am now. Every trial I go through helps me to turn away from pride and back to God again and again and I'm so grateful for how He always gives me another chance.

Stay cool mi compadres

Elder Rigby

aforementioned gato

box of wonders

Most of my district.  We don't smile 'cause we're cool

lies

Week Two: Beefing Up - Provo Utah MTC

Note: this email is late because Samsung does not have an undo feature like IPhone does when you accidentally delete the three-page email you spent the entire day writing. Sorry for the delay :P

Hi everyone!

It's been a looooong week but I love it here. A lot of it was fun, some of it painful, most of it difficult but all of it good for me.

Anyways let's get into the meat of it. MTC (missionary training center) life is super busy but it's definitely manageable. Daily life basically consists of swimming through two three-hour classes plus an hour and a half of study time and coming up for air during meals, exercise, and the hour of free time we have in the evening. Let me tell ya, the dorms are a jungle at night. Missionaries or not, cram 100+ 18-21 year old guys into one building and its gonna sound like Rainforest Café. So it's a high-protein day for sure but like I said, physical drains for spiritual gains. Plus, every Monday I have a prep day (P-day) where I have time set aside to call my family, respond to emails, do laundry, and hang out with the other missionaries in my class. 

Besides my companion Elder Andersen and I my district includes three sets of sisters and three other sets of elders for a total of 14 missionaries. I've loved finally getting to know them in person and they're all cool people that I like being around. Homies of the week include Elder Checketts for having the same favorite movies as me (Castle in the Sky and Nausicaä) and Elder Stone for quoting Bible verses as he did 50 pushups in like a minute (see Philippians 4:13.)

Elder Andersen got called as District Leader! As his senior companion I'm basically now secretary/voice of reason for my adorably ADHD new roommate. He's fresh out of high school and a little hyper but he's a really nice guy and I think being called as role models for the district is gonna be good for us both. 

So much happened this week and I'd love to get to all of it but I wanna at least try to keep this shorter so I'll make another list. This week I:

- Played volleyball at the gym almost every day and kept running into into Aldstë Calder and Élder Stubbs

- Watched Stadium of Fire from a five-story building and a 日本人(Japanese) sister from McGarvin姉妹's district gave us all cinnamon rolls

- Got lost when we went to the Provo Temple (sort of)

- Sang next to a 6'5 Canadian dude at missionary choir practice

Thought:

1) God loves me. 

2) He sees the complexities of my trials perfectly. 

3) He knows exactly what He's asking me to do.

Knowing these three things has seriously gotten me through this week. The Lord knows perfectly how much I love learning Japanese. He knows how badly I wish I could be with the missionaries heading to serve in Japan and how badly it hurts to not be. But putting this dream of mine on the altar has only strengthened my faith in my Savior Jesus Christ. Ladies and gentlemen, The Lord is good at His job. He wants me in Bentonville, Arkansas so I can't wait to get there and get to work. 

Mosiah 23: 21-22

21 Nevertheless the Lord seeth fit to chasten his people; yea, he trieth their patience and their faith. 

22 Nevertheless—whosoever putteth his trust in him the same shall be lifted up at the last day.

If anyone has any questions about Jesus Christ, His Gospel, missionary life, or just life in general then send me an email or message and I'd love to talk sometime! I can only really respond on Mondays but seriously ask me whatever whenever. 

Peace 

Elder Rigby

P.S. thank you so much to everyone who's sent me emails so far!! I had a super busy day yesterday but I'll try to write you back as soon as I can!