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The following message for the moment is delivered by the Reverend Dr. Bruce Wheeler-Thielman. Today's sermon is entitled, "You and God are a Majority." The scripture reading of the morning is portions of 1 Samuel chapters 11, 13, and 15. I begin at chapter 11, verse 1. "Then Nahash the Ammonite went up and

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besieged Jabash-Gilead. And all the men of Jabash said to Nahash, 'Make a treaty with us and we will serve you.' But Nahash the Ammonite said to them, 'On this condition I will make a treaty with you, that I gouge out all your right eyes and thus put disgrace upon all Israel.' The elders of Jabash said to him, 'Give us

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seven days respite that we may send messengers through all the territory of Israel. Then, if there is no one to save us, we will give ourselves up to you.' When the messengers came to Gibeah of Saul, they reported the matter in the ears of the people, and all the people wept aloud. Now Saul was coming from the field behind

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the oxen, and Saul said, 'What ails the people that they are weeping?' So they told him the tidings of the men of Jabash. And the Spirit of God came mightily upon Saul when he heard these words, and his anger was greatly kindled. He took a yoke of oxen and cut them in pieces and sent them throughout all the

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territory of Israel by the hand of messengers, saying, 'Whoever does not come out after Saul and Samuel, so shall it be done to his oxen.' Then the dread of the Lord fell upon the people, and they came out as one man. And on the morrow Saul put the people in three companies, and they came into the midst of the camp in

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the morning watch and cut down the Ammonites until the heat of the day. And those who survived were scattered, so that no two of them were left together." We move now to the 13th chapter, and I begin there with the verse numbered 5. "And the Philistines mustered to fight with Israel thirty thousand chariots and

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six thousand horsemen and troops like the sand on the seashore in multitude. They came up and encamped in Michmash to the east of Beth-Avon. When the men of Israel saw that they were in straits, for the people were hard-pressed, the people hid themselves in caves and in holes and in rocks and in tombs and in cisterns, or

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crossed the fords of the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead. Saul was still at Gilgal, and all the people followed him trembling. He waited seven days, the time appointed by Samuel, but Samuel did not come to Gilgal, and the people were scattering from him. So Saul said, 'Bring the burnt offerings here to me and the

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peace offerings.' And he offered the burnt offering. As soon as he had finished offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came. And Saul went out to meet him and salute him. Samuel said, 'What have you done?' And Saul said, 'When I saw that the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come within the

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days appointed, and that the Philistines had mustered at Michmash, I said, 'Now the Philistines will come down upon me at Gilgal, and I have not entreated the favor of the Lord.' So I forced myself and offered the burnt offering.' And Samuel said to Saul, 'You have done foolishly. You have not kept the commandment of the

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Lord your God which he commanded you. For now the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever, but now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought out a man after his own heart, and the Lord has appointed him to be prince over his people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you.'" And

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then we move to chapter 15 where I begin the reading at the verse numbered 1. "And Samuel said to Saul, 'The Lord sent me to anoint you king over his people Israel. Now therefore hearken to the words of the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts, 'I will oppose what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when

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they came up out of Egypt. Now go and smite Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.' And Saul defeated the Amalekites from Havalah as far as Shur, which is east of Egypt. And he took Agag, the king of the

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Amalekites, alive and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen and of the fatlings and the lambs and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them. All that was despised and worthless they utterly

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destroyed. And Samuel came to Saul and Saul said to him, 'Blessed be you to the Lord. I have performed the commandment of the Lord.' And Samuel said, 'What then is this bleeding of the sheep in my ears and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?' And Saul said, 'They have brought them from the Amalekites, for the people

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spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen to sacrifice to the Lord your God, and the rest we have utterly destroyed.' Then Samuel said to Saul, 'Stop! I will tell you what the Lord said to me this night.' And he said to him, 'Say on.' And Samuel said, 'Though you are little in your own eyes, are you not the head of

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the tribes of Israel? The Lord anointed you king over Israel, and the Lord sent you on a mission and said, "Go, utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed." Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you swoop on the spoil and do what was evil in the

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sight of the Lord?' And Saul said to Samuel, 'I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. I have gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me. I have brought Agag, the king of Amalek, and I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took of the spoil, sheep, and oxen, the best of the things devoted to

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destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.' And Samuel said, 'Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.' And Samuel said to Saul, 'I will not return with you, for you

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have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you from being king over Israel.'" And may God bless to us and to our understanding these readings from his word. Pray with me. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

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The majority rules. How often have you said that, or how often have you heard someone else say it? But to that phrase, I would this morning address a question. Who or what is the majority? I think we will be helped in finding our answer by looking at the life of Saul, and specifically at the three battles that

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Saul and his armies fought, the history of which I have just read in your hearing. We might begin by asking ourselves the question, "Is the majority the voice of the crowd?" In the 13th chapter of 1 Samuel, the Philistines come up against Saul. Saul awaits them at a place called Gilgal. He has been

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told by Samuel to tarry there until Samuel comes to lead the forces in worship before they go up against the Philistines. But Samuel is late. He does not arrive at the time when he said he would arrive, and so some of the people become disquieted, and they begin to wander away, to murmur, and to complain,

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and to depart. So what does Saul do? Because he is losing the support of the people, he risks losing the support of God. Because the people are departing from him, he departs from the specific command of God, and he does it at great cost. You see, he himself leads the worship service which Samuel said he

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would conduct, Samuel the spokesman of the Lord. And when Samuel comes and discovers what Saul has done, he says, "Your kingship will not continue," which is an obvious amplification of what has happened. Because whenever an individual begins to choose primarily the security of inclusion, you can be sure that that

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person will soon be making moral compromises and entering into spiritual retreats. He listened to the crowd instead of to God. Have you ever noticed how at the center of the little word "belief" is the smaller word "lie"? L-I-E. It's amazing how many lies people believe. Many people believe, for example,

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that Betsy Ross sewed our first national emblem. But that's a lie. It was begun by her grandson fully 50 years after the dear lady was dead. Some people believe that it was Paul Revere who rode to warn every middle-sex village and farm. But the fact of the matter is it was a man named Israel Bissell. Longfellow, when he

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wrote his poem, "Listen, My Children, and You Shall Hear," of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, when he wrote that poem he knew that Revere was better known than Bissell. So he made Revere the lead character in the poem. How many times have you heard people say, "I had some coffee for dinner so I didn't sleep all

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night." The fact of the matter is there's only enough caffeine in a cup of coffee to keep you awake for 30 minutes at the very most. Or have you ever heard someone say, "I can remember faces but I can't remember names." Actually, the process of remembering faces and names is exactly the same. If you can do one, you can do

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the other just as effectively. Now why is it that so many people believe these common untruths? It is because we have heard them repeated so often. They're the testimony of the crowd and we buy it. I've always liked the story of the man who went into the barber shop. There were three barbers there and he announced

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that he was going to be taking a long planned trip to Europe. And one of the barbers said, "Where are you going?" He said, "I'm going to France, I'm going to Germany, and I'm going to Italy." And the first barber said, "Well, the French are the rudest, most obtuse people on the face of the earth. You won't enjoy France."

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The second barber said, "German food is awful. It's very heavy and without flavor." And the third barber said, "And I don't think there's an Italian in all of Italy who speaks English, so you won't be able to understand anything that is said." Well, he heard the testimony of this crowd of three and he went off on his journey. When

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he came back, he needed a haircut, so he went to the barber shop. "Well, how was your trip?" they asked. And he replied, "Well, I found the French people to be very warm and hospitable. I really enjoyed my time with them. And I found that German cooking is amongst my favorite cooking in all the world. I like meat and

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potatoes, well cooked, and that's the way they prepare their food." Now, it is true that most of the Italians did not speak English. As a matter of fact, when we went to have an audience with the Pope, he spoke Italian to us. And at the end of the audience, we all knelt down and he came along and was blessing each one of

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us. And the blessings were all in Italian until he came to me. And when he put his hand on my head, he said something in English. And the barber said, "What did he say?" And he said, "Well, the Pope said, 'My word, where did you ever get such a rotten haircut?'"

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By so doing, the customer made clear to the barbers what he felt about the testimony of the crowd. The Bible says, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind." The world does not transform the mind. Only the Spirit of God can do that. And when we stand for nothing and begin to

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float with everything, we become what the German philosopher Martin Heidegger called an inauthentic existence. That is, we lose our own identity as it becomes lost in the judgments of the multitudes. That's the mistake that Saul made and the mistake which a lot of people make today. Vox populi, non-vox dei. So then,

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let us ask ourselves a second question. Is the majority the voice of the self? In the 15th chapter of 1 Samuel, Saul leads his forces against the Amalekites. Now, he receives very specific orders from God through Samuel as to how he is to conduct the battle and what is to be done with all of the booty and all of

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the prisoners. But Saul directly contradicts these orders. In the 15th verse of that chapter, when he's confronted with what he has done by Samuel, he tries to shift the blame to others. In the 20th verse, he out and out lies about it, and in the 21st verse, he tries to justify his behavior by saying,

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"I did it so that I could make a sacrifice to the Lord." And then it is that Samuel says in response, "It is better to obey than to sacrifice. I shall never return to you to speak God's Word to you again." Saul, you see, was self-motivated. The word "motivated" comes from two Latin words,

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"motum," which means "move," and "movere," which means "self." A motivated person is a self-moved person. Saul was moving in response to his own desires and his own wish. The person who is stimulated, on the other hand, is the one who is moved by the Spirit of God. Saul slipped into that group that the Apostle Paul

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described by saying, "They themselves, judging themselves by themselves, are without understanding." All of you are familiar, I am sure, with the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 when 1,516 people lost their lives in a watery grave. But I wonder how many of you are aware of how many warnings the Titanic received not

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to make that voyage. Three days before the ship set sail, a wireless message was received telling them that the sea was choked with icebergs and that they should delay their departure. They did not delay it. Several hours before they pulled up anchor and began the journey, they received a second wireless message

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saying that the situation had gotten even worse, but they still departed at precisely the time they planned to depart. A few hours later, another wireless message was received. This one was delivered to the captain of the ship who read it and then passed it on to one of the directors of the company who

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owned the ship. He read it and threw it in the wastebasket. It wasn't too long after that, as the voyage continued, when a fourth wireless message was received with the same warning. And the captain's only response was, "Tell the crew to keep their eyes peeled." And then on the very night of the accident, a fifth and a

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sixth wireless message came to the Titanic. "The area into which you are sailing is perilous with icebergs. Do not come this way." And the radio operator on board the Titanic sent out the message, "Shut up, you're jamming my air waves." Two minutes later, the Titanic hit the iceberg, a block of ice which cut a

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300-foot hole in its side. But no one was overly concerned because everyone knew the Titanic was unsinkable and there were 16 watertight compartments down below the surface and they would be able to stop the flow of the incoming water and so they were all locked. But one after another, those 16 bulwarks

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collapsed. So they said to the people, "Get near your lifeboats." But you see, the people didn't know which was their lifeboat and didn't know how to board the lifeboats. You see, they'd had no training in how to use the lifeboats because everyone knew the Titanic was unsinkable. And then the word came,

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"Abandon ship." And many of those who were on board the Titanic refused to abandon the ship. They said, "This ship is unsinkable. We'll stay on it. We're not going to risk ourselves in one of those rowboats." That's the reason when they picked up those lifeboats, more than 500 seats were empty. Now just as that

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iceberg was frozen solid, so the mentality of the people on board that boat were frozen solid. And that's what we see in Saul. We see his mind so set on doing what he wants to do, so locked into it, that he can tolerate no alternatives. You've met that kind of person. They quit the church when it doesn't do what they

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wanted to do. They stop their giving when they don't approve of the way the budget has been established. They condemn so-and-so because he speaks with tongues, or they condemn so-and-so because she doesn't speak with tongues. Or, for one reason or another, always something that they have settled once forever in their

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mind. They disagree, become disputatious, and a disturbance within the body of Christ. Bill Russell, who was for many years one of the outstanding players on the Celtics basketball team, the greatest professional basketball team in history, having won the NBA championship 15 times, was asked on one occasion, "What is the

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secret of the Celtics?" And Russell replied, "We laugh at ourselves. We never take ourselves too seriously." Well, Saul heard God, but he took himself too seriously, and so he denied God, and as a result, he never heard the voice of God again in his life. We know as believers that the majority that rules is the

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voice of God, and that's illustrated in the 11th chapter of 1st Samuel, where Saul is up against the Ammonites. Now, this battle comes earlier than his fight with the Philistines, where he surrendered to the crowd, and it's earlier than his fight with the Amalekites, where he insisted on

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following his own will. It's in the early days of his reign that he goes up against the Ammonites, inspired by God with specific instruction by God, and this time he obeys and he wins, and he gives God the glory. "The Lord has brought deliverance to Israel," he says. To Saul at that time, God was the voice of

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authority. God was the voice of the majority. You obeyed him with everything you had. You know, I've become more and more convinced across the more than 30 years of my ministry that the single reason why most people miss the joy and the enthusiasm and the excitement which are to be a part of the Christian life,

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the single reason that most of them miss that is either that they allow other people to stand on their wings -- that's the crowd -- or else they reject the counsel of God and insist on going their own way. The individual who yields to God, on the other hand, discovers what the adventure of faith can really be. Two

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weeks ago, I received a little package through the mail. It came from one of my former students. His name was Brian. Now, Brian was born into a Jewish home, but he was called of Christ and he became a Christian, and when he became a Christian, responding to God's call, his family disowned him. Brian went on to college.

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His parents, of course, were contributing nothing whatever to his education because as far as they were concerned, he was dead. And so he prayed to God that God would enable him to make it through school, and he earned every nickel that he used to pay for his college education. He was a brilliant student, the brightest

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student that I ever had, and while he was carrying a heavy academic load brilliantly and working at the same time to pay his bills, he was invited to become the editor of the school paper. He really didn't want to do that, but in the previous semesters, those who had taken on that job had done it in a

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lackadaisical way, had not held up Christian standards as they should have been held up. And so Brian, responding to what he understood to be God's call, took on the task. And during the course of his editorship, he was led to write several editorials which were critical of the school. He didn't want to write those

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editorials. He was afraid that some of the members of the school's administration and faculty would not like him because of what he had written, even though the articles were exceedingly well written and very accurate in what they stated. But Brian, obedient to God, wrote what he understood

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to be the truth. When it came to his senior year, it was customary in that school to nominate outstanding students for Rhodes scholarships or Fulbright fellowships or for Woodrow Wilson scholarships or the like. And Brian was at the top of his class, but he did not receive a single recommendation. I ask

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why. It was because of those editorials which he had dared to write. Brian felt led to go to Yale University. Terribly expensive, didn't have the money, but he went off to Yale and God provided for him a series of scholarships which took him all the way through his PhD degree. And he completed it in such an

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outstanding manner that Yale had him teaching philosophy even before he had received his degree. He met a beautiful young girl named Denise, every bit as bright as he is, and they were married. And their marriage was beautiful with the things of God. They truly married one another within the bonds of the love of

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God. But shortly thereafter, Denise suffered some mysterious illness which has recurred at various times across the last years. But never in all those times did Brian show anything but love and compassion for his wife, not only because he loved her, but because in God he had made promises to her to which he would

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always be faithful. And then he developed some kind of ailment in his hands which made it so painful for him to use his fingers that when he typed, he had to wear gloves. He typed out his entire doctor's thesis wearing gloves. The thesis was an outstanding piece of work. He was hired by Fordham University in

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New York City where he is an associate professor in the Department of Philosophy today. Now this package which I received two weeks ago from him and from Denise was a copy of Brian's first book which is entitled "Time and Eternity." Inside the book were clippings of reviews written by some of America's

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outstanding philosophers. And they said things like, "An outstanding piece of work. This book will be the standard for books in this field for decades to come. This book will become the basic textbook in the study of questions of time and eternity." See, Brian was wrestling in this book with the philosophical and

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theological implications of the eternity of God and how that touches time with questions like providence and foreknowledge and predestination, deep mysteries. But he did it in a superb way, committing the whole effort to God. And inside the book was also a note. And in the note, Brian said, "Dear Doc, I remember

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when I graduated that you said you expected me to write one incomprehensible philosophical book every ten years for the rest of my life. Here's the first one. [Pause] The obedience to God's will in their lives. I'm reminded of how God came to

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the gypsies and said to them, "I have some commandments. I'd like to give you one free." And the gypsies said, "What is it?" And God said, "Thou shalt not steal." They said, "We don't want that. That's basic to our way of life, stealing." So then God went to the Europeans and he said, "I have some commandments and I'd like to give

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you one free." And they said, "What is it?" And he said, "Thou shalt not bear false witness." They said, "We don't want that. Our whole political philosophy would fall apart if we gave that up." So then, according to this story, God went to the Jews and he said, "I have some commandments and I would like to give

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you one free." And the Jews said, "Free?" And he said, "Yes." And they replied, "Then we'll take ten." Well, in Brian you see that kind of hungering after God's commandments. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these other things will be added to you."

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Let me close by saying this. Some years ago in England there was a circus in London that had a very large elephant named Bozo, and Bozo was very popular throughout all of England. Everyone knew about Bozo. Bozo, though he was huge in size and magnificent to look upon, was very tender and gentle. They would bring

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up little children and the children would hold out peanuts and he would reach out and take them from their hands so tenderly that they would laugh when he tickled their palms. And then he would pop them into his own mouth with a kind of self-satisfied smile on his face. But then Bozo began to turn mean. He became

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hostile. He attacked his keeper on two different occasions. He couldn't be brought into the presence of children because he bellowed and trumpeted and shook his trunk and his great tusks back and forth. The owner decided that the only thing that could be done for Bozo was for him to be shot. But he didn't

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want to do that because it was going to cost a lot of money to replace Bozo. And then the owner of the circus got an idea. He decided to sell tickets to Bozo's execution. People could buy a ticket to come and see the great beast shot. And he sold out the house, not to people who wanted to see the elephant die, but

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people who were pleading that the elephant's life be spared. But three men with high-powered rifles were told to shoot together into the skull and the brain of this great pachyderm. And just as they were about to shoot, a stubby little man wearing a derby came out of the crowd, walked over to the owner who

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was giving the orders, and said, "This is absolutely unnecessary. Bozo is not a bad elephant." And the owner said, "He's a very bad elephant, and if I don't kill him, he's going to kill someone else." And the stubby little man said, "If you will let me go into his cage for two minutes, I will prove my point." And the owner said,

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"Well, you can go in if you want to, but you must write me a note absolving me of any and all responsibility." And so the man wrote out the note, signed it, gave it to the owner. He went over to the door, the door was opened, he went in, and the door was locked behind him. Bozo backed up. His ears went wide as an elephant's

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ears go before it attacks, began to move his head and his tusks. His trunk went up and he bellowed a loud shriek. But all the time that he was doing this, this stubby little man was walking toward him, talking to him. Those who were nearby could hear him talking, but they couldn't understand what he was saying. And

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suddenly, Bozo shivered from one end to the other. And then as he lowered his trunk, he began to moan. And he ambled over to where the stubby little man stood and put his trunk on his shoulder. And the man stroked it. And then Bozo reached down with his trunk and wrapped it around the little man and lifted him

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up and carried him over to the door to the cage and set him down very tenderly. And he made his exit. And as he went over to the owner who was holding the derby, he said, "Bozo is a good elephant, but you see he's an Indian elephant. He only understands Hindustani. So what you must do is find someone in London who speaks

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Hindustani to come in and to talk to him several times each week." And he took his little derby and disappeared into the crowd. And the owner, amazed just as all the people were amazed at what he'd seen, for the first time looked down at the note and saw the signature. It was the signature of one of the great poets and

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authors of English history. It was the signature of Rudyard Kipling. Now like Bozo, we'll never get enough just by listening to others. In the end their babble will become incomprehensible and directionless. And like Bozo, we won't get anywhere by blowing our own trumpets and bellowing what we ourselves believe. What

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we need is just what the elephant needed. Someone to speak to us in our own language. Someone who will give us loving and wise counsel. Someone who will be firm but quite evidently caring. We need, my sisters and brothers, to listen to God as he speaks to us through the pages of the scriptures, as he speaks to us

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through the confessions of our church, as he speaks to us through the lives of the saints, as he speaks to us through the inner testimony of the Holy Spirit. For you see, as the children of God, we do believe the majority rules. And the majority is always a majority of three. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

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