Need Clarity?

'Clarity' is something we want. Maybe we're just a product of our times, but there is a great desire to have clarity. The definitions of 'clarity' mainly relate to diamonds and wine - not understanding or enlightenment. In wine it means that there's no cloudiness. In diamonds clarity refers to the absence of flaws. With these definitions in mind, it would seem that when we want clarity, we're desiring complete comprehension - without cloud or flaw.

If that's what clarity means (and I think it is), I don't know if I've ever achieved it - or ever will until I get to heaven (and then it won't matter). So what's a person who wants to understand to do? Let me lay some Eugene Peterson on you. This is from his commentary on 1 and 2 Samuel published by Westminster John Knox:

"Story, and the longer the better (and the Bible is long), forces us to inhabit the community of sinners and saints, with no one exempt from the process. Story prevents us from assuming that we can get God coming down a rope ladder and pulling us out of history. Storytelling, and especially biblical storytelling, trains us in patient submission to the process of holy history. Von Hugel, one of the preeminent spiritual guides of this century, used to say that when we get to the heart of life, things are not 'clear but vivid'. Luminosity, not clarity is the distinctive mark" (p. 217).

Peterson's talking about the biblical story, the holy history. But he's also talking about us. We're not part of the biblical story, but we are part of the on-going holy history of God.

So how's luminosity different from clarity? I've been chewing on that for a few days now. I think that luminosity has to do with enlightenment. When the light bulb proverbially comes on for us, it doesn't necessarily mean that we understand without cloud or flaw, but it does mean that we 'get it'. God's plans for us are so interconnected with His plans for others, that there's simply no way to figure out exactly why or how or even when... The simply astounding thing is that God has plans for us - that in the really BIG thing He's doing, that He's bothered with us at all.

So, maybe clarity's not what you need or what I need. What we need is to be patient with the story, in awe that God's included us, and ready to 'get it' when it's revealed. Maybe we also need to understand that 'getting it' doesn't mean that we understand every detail with no clouds or mystery. Maybe luminosity is preferable after all.