Monday, July 26, 2010

Dear me family and Friends in Idaho,

Hello!!!!!! i hope that is a long enough hello haha has to go half way across the world. haha. Its been a good week. I'm enjoying working with Elder Diphala and finding more people to teach. we found some good families this past week. so hopefully something spectacular will happen with them. :) I'm glad everyone is doing better now. what did you all get? the bugs or what? Well i'm doing well. we now have a car! hooray!! haha we didn't have a car because it had to in for repairs, it had been in a few accidents and needed the brakes fixed and the steering and the back bumper and lots of other things. so yeah! its now fixed and we have a car :) i and my comp are very happy about it too. haha

Well this past week was a good one. we had zone conference on Tuesday and it was on working with our stake and ward leaders. it was good council from Pres and sister Probst. They are awesome. We as missionaries are required to bring souls into the fold. The ward is responsible for befriending these souls and making sure they stay in the gospel. They also mentioned that we cannot do anything without the ward. it won't move forward. We are to "help" the ward not the ward help us. So yeah.

We have managed to visit with Sinazo and Abongile this past week a few times. they are doing so well. we hope to give them a baptism date this week for the 28 of August. Abongile already wants to be baptized. she is probably the only investigator that i have found and is progressing in the teaching. :) i feel really good about it. She came to church again yesterday and loved it so she definitely will strive to be there every Sunday. Sinazo is also doing very well. we met with her on Tuesday and taught her the first half of the plan of salvation, then met with her again yesterday after church and taught her the rest of the plan of salvation. a cool thing about that meeting was that she had a friend there who has been taught before and has a copy of the BofM so she sat in on the lesson and then we set up a return appointment with her for Wednesday so we are hoping that she will join us now on as we continue to teach Sinazo. good stuff.

So those are the really progressing investigators. We have a few others but they aren't very committed to the appointments. so there is Mbasa. yo i'm worried about this kid. he is supposed to be baptized in 2 weeks and hasn't been coming to church. so we went there yesterday after church to find out why and he always comes with a family issue that he had to take care of. so has of right now he won't be getting baptized on August 7 anymore. he will probably be baptized with the other 2 candidates on the 28th. So we talked to him and told him that we don't want to "push" you to being baptized and i think that helped him understand that he just needs some more time to get back into the groove of things.

We also did some tracting this past week and found some good potentials as i mentioned above. we found a guy by the name of Bulelani. he is a policeman and also has a problem of drinking. We first got there and i asked him how his day was and everything just to be friendly and get to know him a bit and he told us that he had a good day. So i asked well what did you do. then he told us hes been drinking. lots actually. I'm not quite sure if he was sober during the 15 min lesson we had with him or not. haha he was sober enough to understand and respond to the questions we asked him so it was good. I hope this guy can turn around his life. its sad to see people just drinking away there life. or smoking away their life. if you know what i mean. but yeah hes a good guy. we hope to see him next week, since he is working this week.

well that was basically the week for ya. haha it was a good one. we worked hard. walked then got the car saturday to it was nice. we attended ward council and established with the brethren that there is a problem with missionary work in the ward and we only have 2 baptisms for the year where there is a goal of 26 so we have lots of work to do. No i didn't have to give a talk yesterday thank goodness haha. i've lucked out again. wasn't threatened yesterday. So that was nice. i taught gospel principals though i think that takes the spot of giving a talk.

well i love you guys!! :) i'm grateful for the emails and letters. i got one from you mom. thanks for the report on Nationals :) WOW storm front won!! that is cool!! i want to hear the songs they did. I'm very surprised that the vocal majority took second. Some day i will go to nationals again! haha.

I would like Campbells soup!!!! haha i hope you haven't sent the package already. so Campbells and MissMall socks and sweets as usual please. M&Ms you know :) hehe well have a good week everyone!! LOVE YOU!

your missionary,
Elder Robert S. Rigby (CTM)

Good and the Bad

Dear the People in Idaho,

Howdy everybody!! hehe whats up back in the Idaho state?? well its warmed up finally here in the Eastern Cape. Its very nice. yesterday was a heat wave i think and today its looking like the same. :) i like warmish days not too hot and not too cold. nice and sunny :) Its been a good week in missionary work. Have found another family to teach, we did some tracting last week. So hopefully things will go well with them. I'm doing well. i'm getting along with my comp Elder Diphala (De-paul-a). Its Lusuitu. he's a hard working missionary, its nice working with him cause he always wants to teach. he's getting to know the area now so i'm starting to keep quiet and letting him have his stewardship as my District Leader. Well here is the week:

Monday- tragic day, i really don't want to talk about it but i need to let you know. Went and did the usual emailing and shopping and then came back to the boarding and found 2 inches of water on the floor! A water line under the kitchen sink broke while we were gone and so water was leaking out and basically flooded the flat. By back pack was on the Floor with my Scriptures and Camera in it. :(! So now my scriptures are really fat and my camera thank goodness still works. at first it wouldn't turn on but then it finally dried out and works now! :) so good news there. my scriptures on the other hand are quite water damaged. but still usable i'm not happy about it though i haven't even had those for a year yet! so is there warranty on them or anything? i want a new set. So we spent the entire pday cleaning the boarding and getting the water out and drying my scriptures with a blow dryer that i borrowed from the land lord. i flippin did every single page in that thing. took a long time went to bed at Midnight that evening. but yeah!

Tuesday- Walked all over kingdom come! saw Olwethu. (I) she is doing ok hasn't really been reading like she needs to but still won't come to church cause she claims she is too busy in her church JCF. We just read a chapter with her and committed her to read and pray she had questions about prophets so we discussed that too. shes concerned whether her minister is really called of god or not. which he isn't so we told her to pray about it. so we'll find out this week what her answer was. We then saw one of our RC Oviwe, She is a younger single mother. yeah it happens a lot in Mdantsane. Ladies want children but guys wont make the move to marry so they go out and break the law of Chasity so they can have a baby. yeah its pathetic but what can ya do.

Wednesday- Met with Mbasa finally! hes back from holiday. he is doing well hasn't read for a while so we recommitted him to read and gave him the BD for the 7th of August. don't know if it'll happen now cause he didn't come to church yesterday and he said he would. i think he is running from us now it seems like. he is never home and never answers his phone. But on a more happy thought we met with Abongile! She is doing very well. now that she's back in school shes been busy with her homework but still finds time to read! :) She came to church yesterday and enjoyed it very much and wants to come again next week. so good improvement there :) happy day! haha We taught her the plan of salvation this week and she was like oh wow haha thats cool. she now knows where she will go after this life. the spirit was strong in all of her meetings. She is a very good progressing investigator.

Thursday- had weekly planning. then was able to see a less active member Bro Gontsana. he is an older man in his 60s has some problems with the word of wisdom. so we are trying to just visit him and be friends to him at the moment. We are trying to the brethren to go and visit him instead of us cause we are missionaries not members and can't relate to him very well since we are young men. The rest of the day just fell through so we did some finding and checked up on some potentials.

Friday- had District Meeting. it was nice. haha just reviewed and shared success stories on the account-abilities. its been interesting looking back at them and seeing the success and the ones we need to improve on. There are 13 of them that president came up with last year so we are still using them. Zone conference is tomorrow so that'll be exciting. We met with Abongile again and taught her the other half of the plan of salvation. it was good. she is just excited about everything as i mentioned before. and then we met with Uviwe again. We just visited with her and discussed being obedient and following the prophet.

Saturday- Wow what a day! there was a reception for Spendulu Maklangabeza. Very well known family in Mdantsane. haha. they have been members every since the church started here. So we attended the reception. Since they are in our ward and we got invited. Yo there was lots of food that day! haha i got fed so much! haha I was so full by the end of the day. It started at noon and lasted till 4 we left just after we ate and went to our appointment with the Xanga family. the family i mentioned above that we have found. they are a good family haven't met the father yet but we will met him next week we hope. Had a good discussion on the first half of the restoration. and then we went to the Maklangabezas and had more food haha

Sunday- 2 people came to church. it was a good service. i almost had to give a talk. but lucked out cause my comp went longer than was expected so i'm lucky haha/ We met with Sinazo she is doing well. we watched the restoration dvd with her and before that we asked her about her prayers and the spirit just overcame her as she was sharing with us. the spirit is powerful! it was a good day.

Well that was the week and i'm about out of time. I love you guys! I hope everyone is getting better! dang sickness huh! I would like anything for my bday. good missionary mall socks would be nice. more music to listen to. as soon as i can find a cd player. i can't find one anywhere! so i'm told to just get a dvd player a mini one so i don't know well i love you guys!!!

Elder Rigby CTM

Monday, July 12, 2010

Out with the old and in with the not so new

Dear Family and Friends,

hey everybody! had transfers this past week so we found out on Wednesday morning and my dear companion Elder Mkhize left me to go to Uitenhage. So now i'm still here in 3rd ward Mdantsane with Elder Diphala now. He goes home in 3 months from Maficane. In the Northwest province. he is an ok elder so far. different with the new comp and same area so i'm in charge for the first couple weeks. its slow. none of our appointments have held since thursday evening. But here is a break down of the week:

Monday- played some sweet soccer for Pday. were all very tired when we got done haha. went to the FHE with the Cetyawayos. it was fun! we did the a activity on the BofM from PMG. asked them to come up with some questions that they have been asked about the church and then we had to find the answers to the questions using the BofM. It was fun. :) Sister Cetyawayos' baby is so cute haha she is 5 months old. haha smiles and is a happy baby all the time.

Tuesday- Well don't have the car anymore so we hitched a ride with the ZLs again. pain in the butt really. Emailed that morning since we couldn't monday. then we went to the area and had a pretty good day. met with Abongele Majavu. She is doing so well. reads and always has a few questions for us and is progressing so well. we watched the restoration dvd and taught her how to pray. Its wonderful having an investigator who is serious about investigating the church and wants to find out for herself. We then saw Sinazo, she has been coming to church for a while but didnt want to be taught at first but now she does so we taught her the restoration this week and she understands. we hope to give her a BD for Aug 7, 2010. then we went to Zukiswas. she is a recent convert. she loves the missionaries and always wants to feed us haha. we did the BofM activity that we did with the Cetyawayos with her as well. it was also fun haha. came up with the question of Joesph Smith and so we used to the BofM to answer so where can you find a verse talking about Joesph Smith?? good luck! hehe.

Wednesday- gotta call from the APs and Mkhize was leaving. so we basically said goodbye to everyone that day. bunch of members and a few investigators. then had a nice Brai at the Aprils. (aka-BBQ) nice food.

thursday- transfer day....yeah waited for missionaries at the bus stop and the airport. busy day. hectic day. i was very tired when i was done. we made it to the area about 5:00 so i took my new comp to meet some members and then we had to wait for the ZLs to come get us.

Friday- had district meeting. met with Abongele today. she wants to be baptized! YAY!!! haha hasn't been to church yet though. she was supposed to come yesterday but she over slept. yeah yeah sounds like someone i know.... ha... then met with sinazo again and taught the rest of the restoration. we used the CUPS analogy. it works really well. :) build them up and then Jesus Christ is taken away as well as the apostles and prophets and power and authority so it all falls down. then build it back up with Joesph Smith. :) works nice. Walked all over kingdom come too! asche bubba. i don't like that.

Sat- had a short weekly planning since we didn't get to on Thursday. then went to the area and had correlation. then all of the plans that we had that day fell through so it was a crappy day. we did some finding. found some good potentials, well maybe. find out someday.

Sunday-went to church and had 2 people come. Sinazo and Bomikazi. Both females. I got there and bro sonaba asked if i would be the backup plan B talk haha i said ok. so i was sitting up on the stand, trying to come up with something to talk about for a few min. luckily the other speaker came and i didn't have to speak. haha i was so happy. It was a good sacrament meeting. Kuview spoke about how there is no royal road to Gods Kingdom. it was good. Jesus Christ made it possible yes but its not easy. cause it wasn't easy for him. after church we went to find out why abongele didn't come and then we walked all over again cause appointments didn't hold. no one was home. :( sad day. so we visited members and did what we could. Oh did i tell you that our Bishop is released? if not yeah his job is far away in Queenstown so they have to move and they're not happy about it either. So at the moment we don't have a Bishop we have a presiding Elder. Kuview. Which was the 1st counselor. so yeah!

Well i love you all and hope everything is well. Love you guys!

Elder Rober S Rigby (CTM)

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Better late than never

Hey everyone! Sorry for the delay on word from me. the internet was down yesterday so we are emailing today! I'm glad you all had a good week as it was the 4th of july. nothing happened here haha obviously. Pretty boring. The world Cup ends this week so we shall see who takes it. I'm thinking its going to be Germany. They are after it big time. Transfers are this coming thursday. I'm probably staying but who knows what will happen. my comp has been here 6 months so he is probably leaving. find out tonight or in the morning. The car has been taken away again so we are back to walking. The Zone leaders offered bikes but my comp doesn't want them cause he says they will be a burden.

its been a hectic week. the ward went to the temple this past week so on sunday the ones who were able to go bore their testimonies and it was awesome. it was so cool to see how the temple can bless the lives of others. they only go twice a year or try to go, because its so far away. 13 hours drive. so like going to Greeley Colorado or something. I'm very grateful for a 10 min drive to the one back home. i miss the temple i'm going to go every week when i get home!

We have found some good new investigators to teach and the nice thing about it is that they have been keeping their commitments! :) we were very happy when they told us what they read and what they learned.Had a good experience when we were teaching this young man Sankele, he is 17 and read the intro to the book of Mormon. he asked us to sum it up for him and help him understand what it was talking about. So i started and it just flowed nicely. my comp afterward was a little disappointed that he didn't get to teach but then realized that i was being directed by the spirit and was doing what i needed to do. it was good to teach. i love the book of Mormon! the book of Mormon changes lives! haha we've gotten some good members present this past week too so thats another improvement haha our fellow shippers have been fulfilling their calling!

Well i don't know what else to say. its kinda been a slow week. people fall through and then you struggle to decide who to see next so then you mind is just done for the day and it goes kapoot. So i love you guys and miss you. love you!

love your missionary,
Elder Robert S Rigby (CTM)