Last week we attended, along with maybe two hundred others, my brother-in-law's 90th birthday party. About half of these were relatives, many, like me, relatives by marriage.

We use the word "relative" in two or three different ways (at least). In speaking of the divine relativity, I use it in two of these senses.

We all have relatives, people we are related to. This is one usage. Human's are, by nature, inescapably, relate-ive. We are related to people, we relate to non-family members also. We are relative. In this sense, God is relative.

The common understanding of things that are "relative" is that there is no definite truth or goodness. That these--and other matters--are just "relative to the individual. No universal true, no universal good. It is a matter of personal choice.

Relative, by its nature, means "related to something or someone." In the common usage, it seems to mean, "related strictly to each individual or individual group." This usage, I reject as nonsense.

Another common usage of the term is that things are relative to the situation, relative to a context. Specific instances of right and wrong, truth and falsity may in some real sense be dependent on the particular time and place. God seems to be relate-ive in this sense. When we read the Bible, God appears--and acts--in ways that, by common standards, are not consistent with each other. God changes, relative to the circumstance.

In the end, everything is relative to God; God is relative to everything. God and thus, all reality is relational. God relates, we relate. God cares and is involved.