Jury Duty
Picture it. There I am standing by the mailbox flipping through the stack of junk mail when it surfaces -- my jury duty summons. I can hear you groaning now. Jury duty is one of those things that I know we should be glad to do, yet I wasn't jumping for joy at the end of my driveway. I know our justice system is far from perfect, but compared to the other options around the world, we have the best thing going. All things considered, jury duty is a small personal price to pay for relative justice.
So I went. I ended up serving for a week during the summer. I was never actually on a jury; I just had to be available.
That's not what I want to tell you about. I want to tell you about the morning I went to court to get my jury duty postponed to the summer. As a teacher, being on a jury for an indefinite period of time is pretty much impossible, so my principal wrote a letter, which I took down to the courthouse at the appointed time for "jury duty excuses."
It was raining, I had to park really far away, and a huge crowd of questionable looking people were huddled around the door to the courthouse smoking cigarettes. I started to feel a little bit nervous. I pushed my way through the smokers, many of them having raucous conversations full of profanity, as politely as I could. Inside the door the smoke cleared, literally. I had to get in line to pass through a metal detector. That gave me a chance to look around while I waited in line. I don't know if you've ever been in a situation like the one I'm describing. A quick visual scan made it apparent to me that I stuck out like a duck in the chicken coop. Rough looking men with long hair and tattoos passed. Women walked by wearing attire I've rarely seen on women in my 'real' life, and there I was with my umbrella and ballerina bedecked purse, garbed in teacher clothes.
I had to surrender my purse to a security guard. He immediately proceeded to paw through the contents, dumping half of them on the counter and roughing up my favorite copy of Pride and Prejudice. He found the hundred calorie pack of Lorna Doones I had stashed as an emergency snack. "You aren't allowed to have these, " he barked.
"Okay," I responded meekly, wide-eyed and bewildered.
He narrowed his eyes. "Well, since it's sealed I guess I'll let you keep them," he said. "But you can't eat in there. Hear?"
"Yes Sir."
He plucked my umbrella out of my hand. "I have to keep this. You can't take it in there." His tone was still curt and very gruff. I realize now that he was actually being comparatively nice to me, but at the time I felt bruised and a little sensitive about things. In any case, I pushed everything on the counter back into my bag, left my umbrella behind, and proceeded into the courtroom proper.
Ah, yet more trauma awaits. Past the swinging door all the people I'd noticed in the outer chamber were now sitting tightly packed into benches that vaguely reminded me of church pews. I saw a sign on the back wall that said everyone must be seated, but where? There wasn't any room. I timidly stood near the back wall intending to wait for a seat to open up.
The bailiff was having none of this. He stalked in my direction. We had a short exchange about sitting down. I won't record it word for word, but essentially it resulted in him making a row of men, not the best sort based on my short appraisal, move down and make room for me. It was too much. I peeked down the row at my bench mates. Now I was scared. I clutched my purse to my chest and tried very hard not to offend the man to my left. At least there was no one on my right.
You're not going to believe this. I heard my name uttered in a stage whisper from across the room. Of course I looked. Wouldn't you? Just across the isle a young man, one of my former students, was waving madly in my direction. "What're you here for, Miss?" He asked. "Jury duty," I mouthed back. He seemed satisfied with this. When I made a more through investigation of the faces in the room, I saw other former students.
I sat up a little bit straighter. All around the room were police officers with guns. Heck! I had managed to actually teach some of these people without any defense but my mouth. That moment gave me a greater appreciation for the difficulty of my job as a teacher.
Meanwhile an extremely elderly lady hobbled in. There still wasn't anywhere for her to sit, and I didn't want her to receive any rough treatment. So I called her over then turned to the fellows on my bench. "Scoot down for this lady, please." I said this in my best teacher voice, and they were happy to oblige. Once I had my lady settled, the mother hen in me was happy.
At that point I started paying attention to what was actually happening in the courtroom. The judge was asking people to plea, and one by one they did, even my former students. Most of the people said, "guilty." I'm serious. I was gobsmacked. These people were being charged with things like assault, theft, and DUI, and they, for the most part, were admitting in a nonchalant tone that they'd done these things. I was used to courtroom dramas on TV where people always claimed innocence, even when they were actually guilty. These people were shameless!
In due time I was called to the bench and offered the judge my letter. He was very kind. I was also able to help the elderly lady make her way forward; she was asking to be excused from jury duty because of her health. I went back to school and jokingly told my colleagues about my experience and about how I saw some of our students there. They were all thoroughly entertained.
Even though I joked about it, that moment, when those people stood up and confessed their guilt, stayed with me.
A little nagging thought kept coming back to me -- I had gone to a place where people with problems and hard lives were gathered. How had I reacted? Honestly? I had judged them. I walked in, looked around, and thought that I was better than they were.
I was dead wrong.
In fact in many ways those people in that courtroom were light years ahead of me, at least they were able to admit their guilt. Odds are they probably knew they weren't in the best circumstances, that they had made mistakes. Me? Nope. I was sitting there thinking about how glad I was not to be them.
Here's the thing I've realized since then -- I am them. Romans 3:23 says that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God."
In college I did a lot of studying about God, especially about the case for and against God. During that time I heard people saying over and over again that we need to "defend God" and "defend the Gospel." Let me say that I understand what those people were communicating: figure things out for yourself so you can answer other people when they have questions. That idea is a biblical one. (1 Peter 3:15) However, I think I got the wrong idea.
The truth is not that God needs us to defend him or his message. He asks us to, even expects us to, but the real truth is that we need to be defended to God.
God is holy; we are not.
When Jesus lived a human life and died on the cross for us, he saved us from our sin and certain death. A lot of the time I forget about how he actually did that. He stood in for us and took on all of God's wrath -- justifiable anger and disgust at our sin and sinful nature. He defended us and continues to defend us against God's fair judgement against our rebellion. I say rebellion because that's what it is. Anything called sin can be boiled down to this essence -- claiming independence for ourselves by living as if we know what's good, right, and best for us instead of living by what God says is good, right, and best for us, which always distances us from him.
Although my stint with jury duty is absurd and pretty funny when I think about it now, it taught me a serious lesson about myself. It taught me a lesson about how I view myself, and just as importantly, other people. Next time I find myself in an uncomfortable situation, I hope instead of reacting badly I ask, "Okay God, what are you trying to teach me here?"
So I went. I ended up serving for a week during the summer. I was never actually on a jury; I just had to be available.
That's not what I want to tell you about. I want to tell you about the morning I went to court to get my jury duty postponed to the summer. As a teacher, being on a jury for an indefinite period of time is pretty much impossible, so my principal wrote a letter, which I took down to the courthouse at the appointed time for "jury duty excuses."
It was raining, I had to park really far away, and a huge crowd of questionable looking people were huddled around the door to the courthouse smoking cigarettes. I started to feel a little bit nervous. I pushed my way through the smokers, many of them having raucous conversations full of profanity, as politely as I could. Inside the door the smoke cleared, literally. I had to get in line to pass through a metal detector. That gave me a chance to look around while I waited in line. I don't know if you've ever been in a situation like the one I'm describing. A quick visual scan made it apparent to me that I stuck out like a duck in the chicken coop. Rough looking men with long hair and tattoos passed. Women walked by wearing attire I've rarely seen on women in my 'real' life, and there I was with my umbrella and ballerina bedecked purse, garbed in teacher clothes.
I had to surrender my purse to a security guard. He immediately proceeded to paw through the contents, dumping half of them on the counter and roughing up my favorite copy of Pride and Prejudice. He found the hundred calorie pack of Lorna Doones I had stashed as an emergency snack. "You aren't allowed to have these, " he barked.
"Okay," I responded meekly, wide-eyed and bewildered.
He narrowed his eyes. "Well, since it's sealed I guess I'll let you keep them," he said. "But you can't eat in there. Hear?"
"Yes Sir."
He plucked my umbrella out of my hand. "I have to keep this. You can't take it in there." His tone was still curt and very gruff. I realize now that he was actually being comparatively nice to me, but at the time I felt bruised and a little sensitive about things. In any case, I pushed everything on the counter back into my bag, left my umbrella behind, and proceeded into the courtroom proper.
Ah, yet more trauma awaits. Past the swinging door all the people I'd noticed in the outer chamber were now sitting tightly packed into benches that vaguely reminded me of church pews. I saw a sign on the back wall that said everyone must be seated, but where? There wasn't any room. I timidly stood near the back wall intending to wait for a seat to open up.
The bailiff was having none of this. He stalked in my direction. We had a short exchange about sitting down. I won't record it word for word, but essentially it resulted in him making a row of men, not the best sort based on my short appraisal, move down and make room for me. It was too much. I peeked down the row at my bench mates. Now I was scared. I clutched my purse to my chest and tried very hard not to offend the man to my left. At least there was no one on my right.
You're not going to believe this. I heard my name uttered in a stage whisper from across the room. Of course I looked. Wouldn't you? Just across the isle a young man, one of my former students, was waving madly in my direction. "What're you here for, Miss?" He asked. "Jury duty," I mouthed back. He seemed satisfied with this. When I made a more through investigation of the faces in the room, I saw other former students.
I sat up a little bit straighter. All around the room were police officers with guns. Heck! I had managed to actually teach some of these people without any defense but my mouth. That moment gave me a greater appreciation for the difficulty of my job as a teacher.
Meanwhile an extremely elderly lady hobbled in. There still wasn't anywhere for her to sit, and I didn't want her to receive any rough treatment. So I called her over then turned to the fellows on my bench. "Scoot down for this lady, please." I said this in my best teacher voice, and they were happy to oblige. Once I had my lady settled, the mother hen in me was happy.
At that point I started paying attention to what was actually happening in the courtroom. The judge was asking people to plea, and one by one they did, even my former students. Most of the people said, "guilty." I'm serious. I was gobsmacked. These people were being charged with things like assault, theft, and DUI, and they, for the most part, were admitting in a nonchalant tone that they'd done these things. I was used to courtroom dramas on TV where people always claimed innocence, even when they were actually guilty. These people were shameless!
In due time I was called to the bench and offered the judge my letter. He was very kind. I was also able to help the elderly lady make her way forward; she was asking to be excused from jury duty because of her health. I went back to school and jokingly told my colleagues about my experience and about how I saw some of our students there. They were all thoroughly entertained.
Even though I joked about it, that moment, when those people stood up and confessed their guilt, stayed with me.
A little nagging thought kept coming back to me -- I had gone to a place where people with problems and hard lives were gathered. How had I reacted? Honestly? I had judged them. I walked in, looked around, and thought that I was better than they were.
I was dead wrong.
In fact in many ways those people in that courtroom were light years ahead of me, at least they were able to admit their guilt. Odds are they probably knew they weren't in the best circumstances, that they had made mistakes. Me? Nope. I was sitting there thinking about how glad I was not to be them.
Here's the thing I've realized since then -- I am them. Romans 3:23 says that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God."
In college I did a lot of studying about God, especially about the case for and against God. During that time I heard people saying over and over again that we need to "defend God" and "defend the Gospel." Let me say that I understand what those people were communicating: figure things out for yourself so you can answer other people when they have questions. That idea is a biblical one. (1 Peter 3:15) However, I think I got the wrong idea.
The truth is not that God needs us to defend him or his message. He asks us to, even expects us to, but the real truth is that we need to be defended to God.
God is holy; we are not.
When Jesus lived a human life and died on the cross for us, he saved us from our sin and certain death. A lot of the time I forget about how he actually did that. He stood in for us and took on all of God's wrath -- justifiable anger and disgust at our sin and sinful nature. He defended us and continues to defend us against God's fair judgement against our rebellion. I say rebellion because that's what it is. Anything called sin can be boiled down to this essence -- claiming independence for ourselves by living as if we know what's good, right, and best for us instead of living by what God says is good, right, and best for us, which always distances us from him.
Although my stint with jury duty is absurd and pretty funny when I think about it now, it taught me a serious lesson about myself. It taught me a lesson about how I view myself, and just as importantly, other people. Next time I find myself in an uncomfortable situation, I hope instead of reacting badly I ask, "Okay God, what are you trying to teach me here?"
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