The Divine Center by Richard J. Foster

"Earlier I spoke of God on the periphery of my life. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that I was on the periphery of His life. It was I who needed to come into the Center, the Core. It is one thing for God to come into us (and a very necessary thing), but it is quite another for us to come into God. In the first instance we are still the center of attention: in the second God is the focal point. When God comes into us we still have a certain kind of autonomy: . . . when we come into God we have come IN. He is in all and through all and above all. This is no infantile pantheism, as if God could be captured in His creation: it is a marvelous majestic monotheism - one God from whom all life is sustained. It is life out of the Divine Center.


The focus of Christian simplicity becomes more clear when we change the image flow from God coming into us to our coming in to God. "Christ in you" was certainly an important theme in Paul's teaching, but his favorite and more frequent image was of us "in Christ". In the latter case, Christ has become the reference point and we are making the movement into Him. When we are in Christ, our deeds and words are of one piece because they both flow from a single Spring".

From: Freedom of Simplicity by Richard J. Foster