Wednesday, May 28, 2025

Week 100: One in Three - Miami, Oklahoma

 Four Sundays left...


Hey all!

Well, first things first, I totally wrecked my ankle playing volleyball today haha. It's not broken and I'm not coming home early, but unfortunately I can't do normal missionary work on it right now. Prayers would be appreciated, thanks 🙏

Life's been pretty wild in general this week. Four of our most promising friends—our miracle family from the farmer's market and a cool guy who was on date for baptism next month—all decided they weren't quite ready to live the word of wisdom and decided to stop meeting with us. We're on good terms with all of them still, though, and the lady we first talked to at the market asked if they could keep their copies of the Book of Mormon because they would join as a family or not at all but she was still really interested in studying it! They'll come around all in due time. 

On the bright side, some super cool friends of ours who were taking a little to warm up started coming through this week! 

Please pray for:

- Matthew
- Zeke
- Brent and Shelby (especially Shelby, she's having a difficult recovery right now)
- Andy
- Cindy, Ray, and Tim


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One awesome sermon I heard this week that I couldn't wait to share with you is called "Choice and Commitment" by Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Twelve. He had some great insights on becoming better at making decisions and at choosing to follow the Savior, Jesus Christ. Here's a link:


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(Forgive my formatting these next few paragraphs, I ran out of time haha)

If you're between the ages of 13 and 35, please check out this article about the power of inviting friends to seminary and institute! I'm so pumped that the Lord inspired leaders in the Church with an initiative like this. Check out this excerpt from the article:

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/youth-young-adults-asked-to-invite-a-friend-to-seminary-institute

Right now, over 800,000 youth and young adults around the world are enrolled in seminary or institute. Even better—more than 60,000 of them are friends not of our faith! And here’s the amazing part: One in three of these friends chooses baptism—often because they feel a real sense of belonging, peace, and community as they grow closer to Jesus Christ.

Elder Ronald A. Rasband reminded us in the April 2025 general conference:

“They are a mighty battalion, gaining strength from each other as they learn of Jesus Christ, follow, and testify of Him as the Son of God.”

The Church just launched the Invite a Friend to seminary or institute initiative—and it's all about simple invitations that open big doors. Here’s how you can join in.

As you feel prompted by the Spirit:

  • Think about inviting your friends or contacts to join seminary or institute.
  • Encourage members in your area to do the same.
In seminary and institute, your friends will find a place to feel the Spirit, learn about Jesus Christ, and develop lasting relationships.

One of my good friends from Fayetteville joined the church because of the seminary program. This is for real. Imagine if out of all the people you ever invited to seminary or institute, only one of them came to know and accept the truths our loving Father in Heaven so desperately wanted them to know. 

So says the Lord in Doctrine and Covenants section 18:

13 And how great is his joy in the soul that repenteth!

14 Wherefore, you are called to cry repentance unto this people.

15 And if it so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy with him in the kingdom of my Father!

16 And now, if your joy will be great with one soul that you have brought unto me into the kingdom of my Father, how great will be your joy if you should bring many souls unto me!


Love y'all! See you at home soon.
Elder Rigby




Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Week 99: Victory Lap - Miami, Oklahoma

 🎵"I'm T16, going on 17"🎵


Hey all!

Greetings from my seventeenth transfer in the mission field! I was sooooooo close to not writing an email today, but I can't stop now when I'm this close to the end. The work has been going so well here in Miami lately, and Elder Eilander and I are best buds already, so this week has been an absolute blast. We have multiple families we're working with who are progressing on the path of discipleship amazingly and have seen miracle after miracle while working with them.

Whenever you're able, I'd appreciate it if you could please pray for:
- Cindy, Ray, and Tim
- Brent and his wife (haven't met her yet but she's having surgery tomorrow so she needs extra prayers 🙏)
- Nestor and Yoly
- Jason
- Robert

Here are some miracles from among the folks we've been teaching:

1) A lady we met at a farmer's market told us her adult son had just begun his journey with God and asked us to help teach and baptize him! He, his mother, and his stepfather all came to church last Sunday and absolutely loved it. They're familiar with the church and happened to be longtime family friends with a sister in the congregation we felt inspired to bring out with us to their first lesson! We'd never had her on a single lesson in the past, but the Lord told us to give her a call and that we did. Didn't take long for us to figure out why when we got to the lesson 😁

2) We were stuck in the rain with nothing to do after all our plans fell through, so we prayed to the Lord for guidance and He impressed us with this thought: "What would you do right now if it weren't raining?" I HATE getting wet in the rain, so in that kind of weather we almost always go visit friends who we're teaching or who have been taught before. In the sun, though, we knock them doors like there's no tomorrow. So, knock doors we did. Elder Eilander picked a street that felt good to him, and despite it having been one I'd knocked twice before in a massive area with plenty of neighbors to find people in, we decided to go there again. After some time knocking in the rain, we met a friend whose coworker is a member of the Church and has told him a little about the Gospel! 

 This is a big deal! Because an ordinary member of the Church decided to share his faith in Christ with a friend, that friend was prepared to receive us. You can give that same help to the missionaries in your home area by loving, sharing, and inviting others to come unto Christ. 

This is what the Savior has to say on the subject in 3 Nephi 18 of the Book of Mormon:

...For unto such shall ye continue to minister; for ye know not but what they will return and repent, and come unto me with full purpose of heart, and I shall heal them; and ye shall be the means of bringing salvation unto them.

3) Felt prompted to talk to a guy in Walmart while we were shopping and we've since taught him three lessons! He came to a study class last night and the members decided to switch the plan up and spend the whole time telling him their individual conversion stories of being led to the Lord's fold.

4) The bishop of our congregation just reached out to us about a member family with a young son who the family would like to have the missionaries teach! Luckily enough, we're the missionaries haha. 

5) My dear friend Michelle from Fort Smith, the first friend I was ever able to personally baptize, just reached out to me tonight after I hadn't heard any news from or about her in months! She's doing great :)

~

Alma 28:14 (BofM):

And thus we see the great call of diligence of men to labor in the vineyards of the Lord; and thus we see the great reason of sorrow, and also of rejoicing—sorrow because of death and destruction among men, and joy because of the light of Christ unto life.


Jesus is real and His Church is alive! He loves you so much—really and truly.


Love,
Elder Rigby


p.s. Don't try to get a cactus cutting bare-handed




Wednesday, May 14, 2025

Week 98: Sprint to the Finish - Miami, Oklahoma

 "If I find another tick on me tonight I'm gonna squeal"


~

Hey all!

I have so much I want to share from this week but I managed my time in true Rigby style and have all of six minutes to write today. Whoops 😅

Last transfer of my mission! I'll be staying in Miami, OK for my last six weeks, which I'm happy about. Elder Larson will be leaving to be a Zone leader down in Bentonville 🥳 and my new companion is Elder Eilender, one of my friends from way back in Fort Smith!

I want Bahama Buck's

Got a tick for the first time ever and freaked out. So close to a tickless mission 😔

Our friend named Kevin didn't realize we were "Mormons" during our first two visits and it blew him away when he realized but then we showed him how the Book of Mormon directly taught what he believed the Bible was trying to say and now he's cool with us lol

Made some burger bombs with Elder Larson 🍔💣 

Found a TON of new people to teach

Saved a hummingbird that got trapped in a screened-in porch and oh my gosh it was so tiny. Also held a lil prairie kingsnake (danger noodle) videos on Google Photos

Went to the temple with three of our recent converts! Marvin was able to personally baptize another of the recent converts who acted as proxy for his wife who passed away two years ago. If I had time, I would write a massive paragraph about our trip and how awesome it was, but for now suffice to say it was really, really special. If you're curious and want to hear more, just ask me about the temple and baptisms for the dead!

Remade my resume and applied for a bunch of college jobs in Provo. Making a new resume was actually way fun...but maybe I just miss school haha. Speaking of school, if you're going to BYU Provo in the fall then email me if you want my class schedule! It'd be fun to try and get in the same classes as some of my pals. 

Song of the week: "Let 'Em In" by Paul McCartney & Wings. Walmart radio has some gems sometimes. 


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Spiritual thought: Ruth 1:16-17

 And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: 

 Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me.

Say something like that to your mom sometime. She deserves it. 

Love, Elder Rigby



Wednesday, May 7, 2025

Week 97 - Miami, Oklahoma

 Elder Mason Steele, my cousin in the Sierra Leone Freetown Mission, says it best:


"This life...it no ezi" 

~

Spent lots of time finding new friends this week and met some real cool folks. Marvin's doing awesome and we had a nice surprise at dinner when our friend Galatia, who got baptized in the YSA congregation after we met her on campus a month or two ago, was there for the meal too! We get all kinds of surprises as missionaries, so I've come to really appreciate the good ones.  

I played all of the hymns for Sacrament Meeting for the first time last week! Achievement unlocked. Shoutout to my piano teacher Sister Vogelsberg who's serving a senior mission with her husband right now.

Got a sick biker bible for free from the Christian Motorcyclists Association booth at an event in Baxter Springs, Kansas, we went to called Cowtown Days. I never knew they were a thing until this week, but the CMA seems like it rocks. If I rode anything more advanced than a Bird scooter, I'd totally join.

My sister Hazel graduated early and moved to Moab to be a river guide at the same company my parents and a ton of my relatives have all worked at! You beat me to it, Haze. My little sisters and my cousins all got so old all of the sudden and it freaks me out 😅

AWESOME Speech - "Engaging Without Being Defensive" by M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth"  The Apostle Paul (KJV Romans 1:16)

This is what it's all about! The good news of the Gospel of Christ is that He lives and so does His Church. It's back - right now! Today! How cool is that? I hope that those of you who read my emails will come to know, as I have, that sharing the restored gospel of Jesus Christ is one of the very most exciting causes we can possibly be a part of. I've shared it here before, but I just can't get over this line from the Lord's living prophet, President Russell M. Nelson. :

"My dear brothers and sisters, do you see what is happening right before our eyes? I pray that we will not miss the majesty of this moment! The Lord is indeed hastening His work."

Life no ezi but it do be good good

Love, 
Elder Rigby

🐴: Boone (okay fine horses are cool I'll admit it)