We, the Jury: How 11th Hour Prayer Helped 12 Jurors Decide
By Lu Kepron

“This was my second call to jury duty in three years. I thought, I’ve got to waste my whole day sitting in a room waiting to be called? What were the chances? I was certain I wouldn’t be called again. But it didn’t work out that way.”

--Bruce Dickinson

For those of us who have never experienced jury duty, briefly take us through the process with you.

You go down to the courthouse and they put you in this big room with 400-600 people with a number and you just go through a speech introducing everyone. They take care of their jurors. They know you’re taking a day off. You’re sitting there, and there may be 1 to 5 trials at the same time, 1 to 5 judges needing jurors. You get there at 8:30 a.m. You sit there until 9-9:15 when the judges send down their instructions to the jury pool. When they come down, it’s a lottery. When your number comes up, you gather your stuff and stand on line. For one jury pool, they’ll call 40 numbers or something, and you march up to the courtroom. The lawyers, the defendant and the judge go through the process. They randomly pull numbers out of a little box. If your number’s is pulled, the lawyers question you and decide.

So, your number was pulled. What was your reaction?

My heart sank the first time they called my number. Here we go again. You don’t know for sure that you’ll get on the jury. There are 40 people up there. But in this case, they called my number, and I am the last juror selected. I was within inches of going home. But not only was I the last juror selected. I was juror #1, and in the state of New Jersey, the juror #1 seat selected is the foreman. That’s the all the more pressure. I thought, “Now I’m not only on the jury but I’m the foreman as well.”

Did you have a preconceived motion of what being a foreman meant?

I didn’t have a preconceived notion of being the foreman, but I sensed I needed to provide leadership to a group of people who have no idea who they are, and make sure justice is delivered.

Tell us about the trial.

This was a car theft and armed robbery trial. The trial ran from Monday morning, all day Tuesday, and most of Wednesday. The arguments ended late Tuesday afternoon. So there was about an hour left in the business day for us to sit in the jury room and deliberate. We went back to the room, and when it comes down to it, there’s no help from anybody. It’s up to those jurors, to organize ourselves, and come up with the answer. When that door closed, that was sort of the moment of truth. In my mind, that’s when the thought came to me, we should really offer this process up to God right now. And that was the internal struggle that I went through for that hour. We started talking about the case.

But there was another conversation going on inside your head.

I kept saying to myself, we should pray this out, we should pray this out. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

Why?

I don’t know. I’m not the most ongoing person in the room. I’m more of an introvert. It’s hard for me to stand out there and put myself on a limb. This would be a huge leap. It’s a room full of strangers...

Was your reticence about them or about yourself? Were you afraid of offending or of defending?

I was afraid of being rejected, of God being rejected. What if they said, ‘What’s prayer got to do with whether he’s guilty?’ I guess it was a fear of putting myself in a position of having to defend my Christianity.

Ironic that you felt you might be in trial for your beliefs—on trial, at a trial, before a jury of your peers, while you deliberated another man’s innocence or guilt.

Yes. I guess I wasn’t sure I would be able to adequately defend my beliefs. All it had to be was one person who believed the polar opposite of what I did about God…to squash it. I thought, if they are more skilled, more passionate, more articulate and able to vocalize it than I am, then I can end up being defeated because of my own fear of inadequacy.

What did you do with your fear?

Nothing. I stayed silent.

So, you stuffed the feelings. You go on talking about the trial for an hour. You part ways.

Pretty much. Then it’s a knock on the door that suspends the conversation. The bailiff asked if we were close to a verdict. We weren’t. So we left for the day, to resume in the morning.

And the drive home?

I was thinking about it the whole time, kind of beating myself up for not having the courage.

Courage for what exactly?

I knew that requirements were going to be made of me as foreman. That I was shrinking away from those requirements really disturbed me. I was concerned for this person on trial. I didn’t want to make the wrong decision.

So you grew increasingly uncomfortable as the night wore on…

It kept me awake for most of the night. I prayed about it. I did ask for strength of the Holy Spirit to be with me the following day. I was lying in bed thinking and remembering the way that I shrunk away and wishing that I had been bold instead.

What did bold mean to you?

Brave. Courageous. Let me step out. Let me show courage. Let me show leadership in a God-honoring way—regardless of the consequences.

Did you wake up with a new resolve?

No. (chuckle) I think I still felt a lot of uneasiness. I wasn’t feeling dread, but I wasn’t excited about going back and finishing up the deliberations. I got there, this time directly upstairs to the jury room, and met with the other jurors. We gathered, made small talk, then we went back into the courtroom for brief instructions to deliberate again.

Now you’re in the room with the other 11 jurors. What happened?

The door closes. I remember this very clearly. It started out very quickly talking about the details of the trial again. There were some people who had some very strong opinions and things got heated. Then, I interrupted them. And I said, “Before we get started, I would like to offer this process up to God, if no-one has any objection.”

Did you realize what you were about to say?

No.

Even at the moment you interrupted them?

No.

I said what I said, and everybody agreed that I would lead the prayer. I did so. I finished it up, we prayed in the name of Jesus. One of the ladies at the end of the table said “Thank you Bruce.” And that was the moment that I felt, “You idiot, Bruce! What were you so afraid of?!” She sincerely appreciated that we brought God into the process.

Did the tone shift after prayer?

There was still dissension after the prayer. The difference for me was that there was a calmness in me because I knew now that God was in the process, that justice would be done for sure. That allowed me to do a better job of leading the whole process.

What was the verdict?

We found him guilty. I can’t say it felt good to be in judgment of someone and find that they are guilty, but the evidence was overwhelming. We actually found out that there was evidence that couldn’t be presented at trial that confirmed that the right end had come out of this trial. There were a couple of people who felt strongly that he was not guilty. But after we did find him guilty, the judge comes in and went through a debriefing that absolutely pointed to his guilt.

What was the lesson for you?

As a man of God, I need to follow my heart. That’s where the screaming inside me was coming from when I wasn’t able to do what I needed to do. Don’t be overcome by the fear. What’s on the other side of the fear is more than likely not going to be as dreadful as you think it will be. Be willing to go out on a limb for God. To look foolish. To be ready to defend your beliefs and not fear the outcome. S&L