Ralph wasn't worried when the Supreme Court handed down the ruling.  “A foot will no longer be 12 inches long. Such a hard standard is prejudicial against those from other cultural backgrounds,” the majority judges ruled.  “Individual communities are to determine what length a foot is in their own locale.”

        Ralph normally worked with the same set of subcontractors. They agreed to keep the current 12 inch standard. He wasn’t worried. Several months later, Raph bid on a plumbing job in a nearby community. He used the twelve inch standard. This community, however, used one meter to the foot. That's what the concrete slab contractor used. The framer, being from another town, used the royal cubit—18 inches to the foot.

        When the house was finished, they had a problem. Though beautifully framed, it was surrounded by huge slabs of exposed concrete. Plumbing came up in all the wrong rooms. Commodes were placed in the living room, den, and kitchen. The house was a large, expensive mess!

        In an age relativism, we’re encouraged to  “look inside ourselves” to determine what is right for us. If we don't violate our internal standard, then we're good. Problem is, we’re often selfish. We tilt our standards in our own favor. Actions are justified as necessary by our sense of need and desire. We live for ourselves, adjusting our morality on a sliding scale to fit our preferences. With no absolute right and wrong, good is what is good for me and God is a reflection is my self interest. Values are confused with opionions. Character is considered personality. To suggest absolute standards, makes you a narrowed minded extremist.

        One of the Bible's darkest times is the period of the Judges when  “everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” This period is characterized by a long period of moral decline and depravity. Everyone set his or her own standard. Culture decayed as morality declined—a large expensive mess!

        Today we face the challenges to live above our culture—to realize there are absolute standards of right and wrong. Those standards are not based upon human preference, but upon the unchangeable character and nature of God. They are not open to popular opinion, or even what we feel is right inside ourselves. They are built on faith in absolute truth and spiritual reality.

        The book of Proverbs put it this way:  “There is a way which seems right to a person, but the end of that way leads to death!” To change our standard of right and wrong to make it socially and personally more acceptable may be more comfortable, but a world built with such an approach leads only to confusion and ruin!