Villains in the Bible: The Crowd | October 25, 2026

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Grace to you and peace from God our Creator and Jesus Christ our Redeemer. Amen

Before we get to today’s Bible stories, I want to let you know that I made a mistake this week. I responded to a random text message and took a political survey. I think that let some database know I was a real live person, so you can imagine how many more survey texts I’ve gotten.

Basic cybersecurity: Don’t click links in texts you didn’t sign up for. But I figured since I’ve been reading polls in some races, I should do my part and contribute.

I know when politicians don’t like a survey’s results, it’s really easy for them to complain the polls were fake or they surveyed the wrong people or asked the wrong questions. And of course, we all know polls aren’t perfect. But did you see the story this week about a company that was actually publishing entirely fake polls?

After a political site questioned them, Wedgewood Polling put out a statement saying they’d been running a social experiment by literally just making up polling results, which a bunch of major media outlets had shared. One Michigan Senate candidate claimed she’d had to suspend her campaign after a Wedgewood poll in June showed her support plummeting, which led to volunteers and donations drying up. (source)

I have no idea if she had a chance in her primary anyway, but isn’t interesting that when her supporters thought the crowd had turned away from her, they turned away too? There’s something comfortable about going with a crowd.

Over the last few weeks, we’ve looked at some pretty villainous villains in the Bible. We’ve talked about the serpent’s playbook of convincing Adam and Eve they were lacking something. The Pharaoh and King Herod were willing to kill children in order to hold on to power.

David started to believe he deserved whatever he wanted, no matter what cost others would pay; a good king turning into a villain. This week’s villain might be harder to dress up as for Halloween, but this one’s probably the most frightening.

Most of the time when we confess our sin, we talk about sins of commission, the things we’ve done that are wrong. Villains choosing an evil path. But we also confess our sins of omission, the things we have left undone. The times when we should have acted, but failed to do so.

Becoming part of the crowd and causing harm doesn’t require evil intentions, just apathy. Just looking away. Staying home. You don’t need to be a powerful leader, full of hate. You don’t need some dramatic, supernatural temptation story.

All you need to do to become part of the crowd is stop paying attention, just go along with everyone else, assume they know what they’re doing.

It’s hard to go against a crowd, but what about when you know the crowd is wrong?

I remember learning in high school about the Asch conformity experiments. Have you heard of these? It’s famous set of psychological experiments from the 1950’s. They brought groups of people into a room and different sets of lines, telling them to identify which ones were the same length.

But seven of the eight people in each group were actors and at certain times, they would all give the same wrong answer. So, of course, there’s a lot of pressure on the one person to go with the crowd.

And most people did. Overall, 74% of participants gave at least one incorrect answer. They were so concerned about going against the majority that they went against what they could see with their own eyes was correct.

That experiment shows something about both of our Bible stories today.

In Exodus 32, the Israelites are on their way from Egypt to the promised land, and Moses is up on Mount Sinai receiving the 10 Commandments from God. God had rescued them from slavery, but now they’re in the wilderness, and they’re not sure what exactly is going on.

Moses—their leader—went up the mountain, but he hasn’t come down. He’s been up there 40 days and 40 nights, and the people are wondering if they’ve been abandoned. The crowd is restless; they want a leader to follow.

So they ask Aaron—Moses’ brother, the one in who’s supposed to be in charge—they ask him to make them a god to follow, something they can see. Pastor Derek Tronsgard writes:

“Aaron, who knows better, who has seen the plagues, who walked through the Red Sea on dry ground, just…does it. He collects their gold. He builds a calf. And he tells the people: here are your gods who brought you out of Egypt.

Aaron is not a villain in the traditional sense. He is a man who caved to crowd pressure. He knew exactly what he was doing was wrong, and he did it anyway because the crowd wanted it and he didn’t have the courage to say no.

[…] When we ask ourselves how ordinary people end up doing terrible things, Exodus 32 is the answer. They forget. They get anxious. They go along. And before long they are dancing around a golden calf wondering how they got there.”

The same thing happens thousands of years later at Jesus’ crucifixion. The religious and political leaders—the people with power—are threatened by Jesus’ teaching. So they stir up a crowd against him. They bring him to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, and accuse him of sedition, rebellion against Rome.

Pilate knows better, he knows the accusations are unjust, but he goes with the crowd. Sometimes people have used these verses to try to blame the Jewish people for killing Jesus, so we have to be careful how we read these verses.

Two quick points: First, remember Jesus himself was Jewish. Second, this is human nature, the way a crowd works, including us. Humanity killed Jesus. All of us. Roman political leaders. Religious leaders. People afraid of losing power. No one is willing to stand up for Jesus, to stand up and say this is wrong. So Jesus is killed.

Tragedy happens when no one no speaks up. We see this in war crimes; we see this in frat parties that turn into abuse; we see this in riots. No one sets out to be evil; we just go with the crowd.

When you take a first aid or CPR class, the first thing you’re told to do in an emergency is to call 911. But you can’t just yell “Someone call 911.” You have to point to someone specific and say, “You! You go call 911.” Because if you just say “someone do it” everyone assumes someone else will take care of it. It’s called the bystander effect.

That’s true for a whole lot of things, right? I see there’s a problem, but I assume someone else will take care of it. How do we find the courage to step out of the crowd, even go against the crowd, to do the right thing?

We’re marking Reformation Sunday today, where we remember the story of Martin Luther. In 1517, Martin Luther looked at over a thousand years of church tradition, and he said this could be different.

He stood against the crowd of his peers who benefitted from church corruption and greed, and said this is not God’s vision for the church. The Reformation started small, with an invitation to a debate, 95 Theses, 95 points Luther wanted to discuss.

A man named after Martin Luther, Martin Luther King Jr. stood up in a segregated society and led people in protest. God works through people who speak up. The coach who insists everyone gets to play. The friend who makes a phone call when someone’s been absent for a while. The church where the excluded are welcomed.

Last week, when we talked about Satan tempting Jesus in the wilderness, I said the key is baptism. In baptism, God pulls us out of the crowd and claims us by name.

God’s love is personal. God’s call to each of us is personal. God’s claim does not depend on our understanding or our faithfulness or our abilities; everything is up to God.

In baptism, we are commissioned to trust in God for our identity, not to allow ourselves to get swept up in the crowd. We’re commissioned to proclaim Christ through word and deed, even when that’s hard. Even when that means going against the ways of the world. We’re called to care for others and the world God made, and to work for justice and peace. We’re called to notice and lift up the people the world ignores.

As people of God, as the church, we fall short all the time. We are constantly in need of renewal, of forgiveness. But God’s claim doesn’t depend on us.

Jesus’ disciples get caught up in the crowd, not yelling for his crucifixion, but not willing to defend him. They run away in fear, watching from a distance. And yet, they are the ones Jesus appears to on Easter morning.

Tronsgard points out, “[Jesus] doesn’t replace them with braver, more faithful people. He comes back to the ones who failed him.” There are no qualifications or tests to pass to be part of God’s family.

When we lose our way, Jesus offers forgiveness and grace. A few weeks later, in the same city where the crowd called for Jesus’ death, the Holy Spirit converts a crowd and commissions them to become the church.

That’s what the Reformation is all about: God’s grace, God’s forgiveness and love given to undeserving people. We are claimed in baptism by the Holy Spirit, named beloved children of God, and sent out to love and serve our neighbors.

We don’t need to be heroes fighting villains; we are simply called to pay attention to the needs around us. To speak up. To pray. To allow God to act through us. To live out the grace we have received, in Jesus’ name. Amen

Villains in the Bible Series

Week 1: The Serpent
Week 2: The Pharaoh
Week 3: The Fallen Hero
Week 4: The Crown
Week 5: The Devil
Week 6: The Crowd