Zacchaeus

Luke 19: 1 – 10

We are all familiar with the story of Zacchaeus which we probably learned in Sunday School. Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector and as such would have been hated by the people firstly because he worked for the Romans, the occupiers of their land and then he took more money from the people than was necessary by cheating and extortion. Tax collectors and sinners were always mentioned in the same breath. When Zacchaeus heard Jesus was in town, he wanted to see this man that everyone was talking about but being short, he couldn’t see over the heads of the crowd so he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree for a good view.

Now if Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector he was not a young man and it must have been a bit undignified to have climbed up and joined the local youths up a tree! I suspect though something in his spirit was drawing him to a divine appointment for when Jesus passed, he stopped, looked up and called Zacchaeus by name. Jesus invited himself to his house. I think this may have been the nicest thing anyone had done for Zacchaeus in a long time. Tax collectors were very unpopular and cheating ones even more so. Now here the celebrity preacher, teacher and healer wanted to come to his house and Zacchaeus did not pass up on the opportunity.  He received and welcomed him joyfully the Amplified Bible says. Kindness opens the hardest of hearts –condemnation keeps them firmly closed.

Of course the crowd were not as happy and could not understand why Jesus would want to go to his house. There were plenty of worthy local dignitaries who would have been delighted to host Jesus and show off to their friends their exalted visitor. Jesus though had salvation on his mind not hospitality. Salvation came to Zacchaeus’ house and to his household and he made generous restitution for all his past sins and extortion. What a wonderful outcome from one act of kindness to a ‘sinner’.

The crowd’s reaction though is one that dwells in all our hearts. Who is worthy to be honoured? It is the elder brother syndrome from the parable of the prodigal son. Every one of us has a tendency towards deciding whether a person is worthy or not of honour.  However, when we can learn to genuinely rejoice over the honouring and prominence given to others, especially those considered unworthy because of faults or sin, something of self righteousness will have been broken in our lives.

A pastor I know tells the story of a prostitute who got saved in his church and everyone was delighted until she started dating one of the elder’s sons. All the joy then turned to condemnation. Let us examine our hearts and root out those self righteous tendencies to judge others and decide whether we think they are worthy of honour or not and let us rejoice with the Father over every sinner saved and every unworthy person exalted by him – including ourselves!