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Re: Sonnet 510 Reflections on Ephesians 5: 1,20
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Tom Matkin
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Jul 29, 2009 13:03 PDT
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Bonnie,
Thanks for commenting. I was beginning to wonder if anyone was out there.
This sonnet was a pleasant surprise for me. I sort of started with
the idea that it is easy to be thankful for things that we like and
that it might be a tremendous challenge to be grateful for the less
pleasant things in our lives. But as I was writing it I came to the
understanding that much of what we do that's a challenge we are still
thankful for because we understand that it will help us in some way.
So the poem ends up addressing three categories of things to be
grateful for, the good, the tough but obviously helpful in the
longrun, and the miserable unfair things that we can't see any
possible use for. And it answers the question of why we should be
thankful for such things. Because they offer us the real true
opportunity to prove our faith. If we can be truly grateful in the
face of afflictions that seem to offer us nothing in learning or
strengthening, then your gratitude is an expression of our faith and
obedience. So, then it relegates all trouble to the second category,
things for which we may suffer in return for a later reward.
I was also reading yesterday in 3 Nephi 26: 9&11 about the trial of
our faith and I note that there are a lot of scriptures which explain
this concept. So I guess that's why the sonnet came to that
conclusion. It was on my mind. If we had no trials, if everything
that afflicted or troubled us was explainable, we would have no
opportunity to demonstrate or prove our faith.
One of the reasons I write sonnets is to learn because I seldom have a
fixed idea where the sonnet will take me when I begin it. And even
when I have a good idea of what I'm trying to say, it takes a lot of
imagination to find a way to get there using the structure of the
sonnet.
Tom
On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 10:57 AM, <BonBon35-@aol.com> wrote:
--
Thomas M. Matkin
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