And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.

I think the argument of relativity and absolute truth all started the day we first heard the story of the elephant. (I admit my tongue is presently firmly pressed into my cheek.)

Once upon a time, so the story goes, there were five blind men who were given the task of identifying a large animal in their path. One blind man, catching the elephant by its trunk said that the animal was a large snake. Of that there could be no doubt. Another, who was swatted in the face by the elephant's large ear said with a certain triumph ringing in his voice, "This is a fan." The third man ran into one of it's hind legs and said with conviction, "You are all wrong. We have a large tree trunk here." Yet another one received a smack in the back of his head from the elephant's dirty tail, and pronounced, "It's definitely a wet rope hanging from the tree." By this time, the elephant was becoming a little agitated, and lowered his head as the last blind man came toward him. His tusks came into contact with the man, who promptly turned in the other direction and shouted as he ran, "It's a sharp spear.

This story has been told time and time again by teachers of philosophy, and even preachers and theologians. And the point of the story? "Truth is a matter of perspective," they say ' "Truth depends on the way you see it.”

I was a child, sitting in church when I first heard this parable. The preacher used the story to exhort us with the truth that no one man can claim to have the entire truth about God. I think I knew what he was trying to say, but even back then I reacted negatively to the story. Because the next step of course, is to say that each person has to find their own way or that we are all free to interpret what we believe God to be. Then we are all left with the God of our own perception or our own designer God.

The reality about the story of the elephant is that not one of the blind men got it right. An elephant is an elephant, no matter what your perception or your handicap. And someone who can see knows the truth about the elephant.

And God is God, regardless of your perception or handicap or hang-up. The Bible says that Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever. There is no such thing as a designer religion.

We cannot redefine Him. We must do our best to understand what He has revealed about Himself.
We must ask Him who He is. We need to look for Him. We need to have our blinders removed. Often those blinders come from a cultural grid through which we interpret everything. Perhaps a deep prejudice or a negative experience has blinded us in this direction.

We are obligated to live our lives in accordance with who He is. What gives great comfort and joy, is that the God of the Bible has revealed himself in Jesus Christ as a personal loving God. He wants nothing more than for us to enter into a dynamic relationship with Him. He is a God of grace; a God of second chances, who will always forgive and restore my life, whenever I truthfully come to him.