"The Lord Wanted Trust, Above All Trust"

...He had wanted answers.  He had wanted solutions.  He had hoped for a plan, but none came.  This absence of practical direction would have renewe his anxiety were it not for a palpable stillness that enfolded him and filled him with peace.  The actions of grace were silent, he knew, and usually without sensible effect.  This mysterious dialogue of the soul had intrigued him all his life, but he had learned to recognize it as a real communication, or rather as a communion with the Lord.

The Lord wanted trust, above all trust. And this trusting was the foundation of the personal holiness from which right action flowed. By seeking solutions before the foundation was firm, he had been wanting to bypass faith and grasp at knowledge, as if knowledge alone could save. This was an old error, a subtle one, part of fallen human nature. It was like building a house on sand, and he now saw that in his anxiety to preserve the flock from trials, to build a shelter for them, any shelter, he might have fallen into the trap of operating solely from fear. What was the nature of this fear? That trials were so annihilating that they must be avoided at all costs? That God could not, or would not, save? That he was not with his people?--Michael O'Brien, Eclipse of the Sun, 732-733