You Must Have a Center

He is before all things, and in him all things hold together... so that in everything he might have the supremacy, For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him (Colossians 1:17-19).

Recently I found myself in conversation with a young man who was senior at a Christian university. He said to me, “I have come to believe that there is a unity to all knowledge, which is reflected in the fact that if you take any discipline—history, literature, science, math—and push it far enough, you will find yourself in philosophy.”

Then I said, “Yes, that is right. This is the reason that the terminal degree in every discipline has been the Ph.D. To be a master in any discipline, one needs to be a philosopher, knowing the theory behind one’s subject.”

“If you push philosophy far enough,” he asked, “you will find yourself in theology, won’t you?”

I grinned to myself and said, “Right! Philosophy raises questions that only theology can answer.”

“If you push theology far enough,” he continued, “you find you have to have a center, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I agreed.

“Well, that is where I would like to dedicate my life. I would like to locate that center, know it, and give myself totally to it.”

—Dennis Kinslaw, This Day with the Master