We have all seen or experienced the tension that comes in the face of peer pressure. If you haven’t personally known the pressure of the school playground crowd or the college party crowd or the workplace crowd, surely you’ve at least seen Ralphie get his tongue stuck to a frozen flagpole in A Christmas Story.
The power of the crowd to influence our behavior is no joke.
In Genesis 11:4-5 there is this phrase: “Come, let’s…”
In those verses, the invitation is humans calling for one another to band together to build a city and a tower. The motive is to make a name for themselves, so that they would not be scattered throughout the earth. They wanted to stay together. They knew the power of the crowd. It is comfortable to be surrounded by others. We are wired for community, but we need to be careful about the community we choose.
God had previously given these tower-building people a command to scatter and multiply after the Flood (Genesis 9:1). He had a plan. They resisted it.
It is hard to stand against the crowd when you are surrounded. It is hard to stand for truth and the commands of God when you swim in a sea of people who aren’t interested in His glory, but rather their own. We are surrounded by such a culture.
“Come, let’s…” can be a hard invitation to resist when it feels like you are the only one resisting.
I’ve been asking myself, “What do I align myself with because of the power of the crowd?” I can think of examples. You know those types of places. We all have them.
We’ve seen how viciously the crowd will turn on someone who doesn’t fall in line. There is not a lot of mercy for speaking out if what you want to say goes against the majority view. Even if the majority view is contrary to God’s love or His command to love your neighbor as yourself. There can be a high price to be paid if you buck the crowd. The path of least resistance is a very real temptation for me. I think it is for most people.
Yes, it is hard to stand against the crowd when you are surrounded. Here’s some good news: There is more than one crowd. We are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses.
“Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us” Hebrews 12:1 (CSB).
Where can we find this crowd, the cloud of witnesses surrounding us?
In our brothers and sisters in Christ, within our local churches, and also within the larger Body of Christ. Witnesses abound in the pages of Christian biographies and literature, and in the pages of Scripture. Furthermore, we are supernaturally surrounded by some pretty big guns.
The Holy Spirit lives within each believer and intercedes for us with God when we don’t know what to pray for ourselves (Romans 8:26). Jesus also is advocating to the Father on our behalf (1 John 2:1; see also Romans 8:34 and Hebrews 7:25). There is much more going on that what meets the eye. In the supernatural realm we are surrounded by the right kind of crowd.
Maybe what we could all use more of is eyes to see the reality of the unseen world. The prophet Elisha once prayed for his terrified servant to be able to see the resources available to them when they were surrounded by the Syrian army. “O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see,” the prophet prayed (2 Kings 6:17). And God did. What He revealed was that the crowd surrounding Elisha and his servant was surrounded by an even bigger crowd of those who were on Elisha’s side.
You probably aren’t surrounded by a weapons-weilding army right now. You may, however, find yourself tempted to be sucked in by the power of the crowd. Stand firm in the Lord. Remember you are also surrounded by His crowd. Ask Him to open your eyes to all the resources you have in Christ.