On Tuesday, October 3, 1995, practically everyone in America stopped what they were doing and gathered around a TV or a radio. The conclusion to one of the most riveting courtroom dramas in modern American history came to a stunning climax: A jury acquitted former football great O.J. Simpson of two counts of murder. The verdicts set him free 474 days after he was arrested and charged. Between 1:00 and 1:10 p.m., when the verdict was announced, everything came to a stop. People didn't work. They didn't go to class. They didn't make phone calls.

They listened to the verdict.

Newspaper accounts noted that airplanes had to wait because passengers wouldn't board before they heard. News conferences were postponed. The New York Stock Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade slowed to a halt. The president of the United States, Bill Clinton, left the Oval Office to catch it with his secretary and aides. During that time period there was a 93-million-watt increase as people turned on something, somewhere, to catch the news. Even the aircraft carrier Independence, sailing in the Persian Gulf, contacted the Navy Public Affairs office in Washington and piped the verdict through the carrier's sound system.

All to find out the decision of twelve jurors on the fate of one man.

Trials are interesting things. Evidence is put forth, arguments are considered, and testimony is heard. Then a decision, based on certain understandings of what is right or wrong, true or false, admissible or inadmissible, must be made. And make no mistake about the value-based nature of the decisions. Consider the Simpson verdict: People across America were divided on whether O.J. was guilty. They heard the same evidence and listened to the same testimony, but they came to very different conclusions. Even a second trial, for civil injuries, found O.J. guilty.

What Are Values?

Values are those things that make up, for you, what is right and what is wrong, what matters and what doesn't matter. Everybody has values; the problem is that not everybody agrees on what those values should be, much less where they should come from.

My friend Lee Strobel tells a story about a panel that convened in a conference room in order to find out what the simple value of integrity was all about. First, they invited a philosopher to come into the room. "Tell us," they said. "What is integrity?" The philosopher thought for a minute and then said, "Integrity is what you're like when nobody's around." The panel thanked him and agreed, "That's a pretty good answer."

Then they invited a businessman inside and asked for his definition. "In my world," he said, "integrity means a person is as good as his word." They thought that was a pretty good answer too!

Then they invited an attorney to enter. "What is integrity? they asked him. The attorney's eyes cautiously scanned the room. He crept over to the door, opened it, looked outside to make sure nobody was listening, and then bolted it shut. He closed the windows, pulled down the shades, and then turned back to the panel. "Tell me," he whispered. "What do you want it to mean?"