Clarity vs. Trust

Just after reading a few preview pages from Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning, one thing stuck out to me. This guy he talks about goes to Calcutta to serve and figure out what he is to do w/ the rest of his life, and he asks Mother Teresa to pray for him. What for?, she asks. For clarity. She responds: No, I will not do that. That's the last thing you're holding on to that you need to let go of. I have never had clarity, what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God.

This is intriguing, because I can't count the number of times I pray for clarity, and have prayed over friends for the same thing. But, what if trusting God means accepting a certain lack of clarity. I think we all want clarity, but, I wonder if part of trusting God is accepting that he wants us to give up some clarity so that we can rely on him more, so that we can trust him more.

And if you think about it, why do we want clarity? I know I want it because I want to know what the mess is going on in my life, or in the lives of those around me. I want to have the knowledge of how something is going to turn out. I kinda feel like Adam in that way, I guess.

But that leaves no room for God. I don't need God if I have full clarity; he's of no use to me then.

So, instead of praying for clarity, I'm going to pray for the ability and courage to trust God.