Jesus and Zacchaeus

He entered Jericho and was passing through it.  A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich.  He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature.  So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way.  When Jesus came to the place he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down for I must stay at your house today." So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him.  All who saw it began to grumble and said, "He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner."  Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, "Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much."  Then Jesus said to him, Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham.  For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost." Luke 19:1-8

The story of Zacchaeus is a story that catches the attention of most children who often struggle to see in crowds, who pull on the legs of their parents to be held or hoisted onto strong shoulders and who eagerly engage their imaginations and their bodies in climbing trees.  This wee man would have been jostled in a crowd, pressing up on his toes only to get knocked over, staring at the backs of other men and women perhaps frustrated by of his diminutive stature. But he is not easily deterred; he is a man who gets what he wants although mostly through use of his power.  Today however, he has success because of some ingenuity and physical prowess - he will run ahead of the crowd and climb a tree to get a birds eye view of Jesus.  Was he trying to be conspicuous and get the attention of Jesus or was he hoping to go unrecognized in this crowd? After all he was a chief tax collector; chief among the corrupt banking elite, getting rich off the backs of the citizenry, colluding with the Romans against them. In this city Zacchaeus would enjoy his own celebrity of sorts.  Truth be told though Zacchaeus is short, he is no victim.  He has been a part of a system that has victimized others and through this he has become rich.  And of all the people in the crowd on this particular day who does Jesus draw attention to, whose name does Jesus say, whose home will Jesus go to - but Zacchaeus'.  Who wouldn't throw up their hands at this! Not Zacchaeus, not his house.  Luke's gospel has contained some difficult stories about wealth - the foolish farmer who builds bigger stores for his grain, the rich man who walked past Lazarus each day, the rich young ruler who walks away from Jesus because the cost of discipleship is too great.  Surely he will rebuke Zacchaeus, not call him!

Zacchaeus is all too eager to welcome Jesus.  People in the crowd suspect this puffs him up - he just got the person of intrigue, the person people are most curious about, to his house.  Of course he did, that scoundrel.  He always gets what he wants.  Will no one deny him? I can feel my own chest tightening at this - think Wall Street corruption.  Mismanaged, dishonest and corrupt companies crumble or are bailed out by government resulting in economic collapse and many of those responsible for engineering the crisis walk away with massive severance pay and protection under the law.   The people in the crowded are justifiably affronted.  Or are they?  This is what Luke is chipping away at in us, in me - who is salvation for: the tax collector, even the chief tax collector, the woman caught in adultery, the one who comes home, the older brother, Lazarus, the Lepers, Nicodemus, the Samaritan - and even me.  This is the good news, that is sometimes hard news.  Because as much as we want people to love, the way the crowds loved Jesus when he rode into Jerusalem, we also want to heap scorn on others - we want to make someone else responsible for all of the injustice in this sad, sorry world.  We want Jesus on our terms just like the crowd on this particular day; just like the people whose cries would move from "Hosanna, Hosanna" to "Crucify Him, Crucify Him"within a week.

So what do we do with the salvation of Zacchaeus? Do you ever feel tempted to stand to the side like the older brother not trusting the refund and restitution cheque he hands you?  So angry that you just might tear it up? And yet all the while in your heart you know the right thing is throw your arms around your brother. But it stings and you grumble about the past and you want to be stingy instead of welcoming the new and generous work that God is doing in Zacchaeus.  Because even the most ethically bankrupt are not beyond his generousity.

If you have been following Jesus for a long you need this story too because it isn't just the story of someone who encounters Christ for the first time and receives salvation.  This is a story about being found, hearing your name and responding to Jesus; this is a story that is instructive for how to live as followers of Christ and sometimes the best people to offer that perspective and instruction are the people who glimpse it and receive it for the first time.  Our relationship with money is slippery isn't it?  We want to hold on, we want to cozy up with the illusion of control and self importance, when the right response to Jesus' grace and generousity to us is to joyfully let go and give back in abundance.  Just like Zacchaeus did.

The last line of this story reads: "for the son of man came to seek and to save the lost." Maybe that line will remind children of our earlier story in Luke - Jesus is the shepherd who will find the one lost sheep, the way he found Zacchaeus in that tree, called him by name and offered him salvation.  Zacchaeus for his part was an eager recipient! I love the physicality of this story - the man running ahead of the crowd, climbing the tree and then scurrying down from it and standing before Jesus to proclaim: "Look Jesus, half of my possessions I give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything I will pay them back four times as much."  May we all respond to Jesus with such vigour and whole-hearted expressions of thanksgiving for the generous gift of salvation.