A Terrific Moment: Jesus and Zacchaeus

“Terrific” is not a word that I use often, but you can see how it fits here. Zacchaeus had the most remarkable moment of his life in the passage we heard this morning. If he had spoken English, he might have said, “Wow! That was terrific!” As it is, whatever he said was in Hebrew or Aramaic (something like “Metzuyan!” according to Google translate), and we would not have known what he said if we had heard him. What was so wonderful, so amazing about this encounter with Jesus? Let’s look together at this familiar story and see where it takes us.

The Story

We don’t know very much about Zacchaeus. From the song many of us learned as children, we know that he was short – “Zacchaeus was a wee, little man and a wee, little man was he.” This sets us up to think of him as not very important. I am a little sensitive about my height – not very, but a little. I remember when someone I met called me by another friend’s name, my first internal reaction was, “Don’t call me that! He’s really short!” I can sympathize a bit with Zacchaeus in his lack of height.

The fact is, however, that he was probably a fairly important person. As the head of the tax bureau in Jericho, a fairly wealthy city, he had political power and influence, as well as a lot of money himself. When people saw him, they probably thought more about his wealth than about his height. He reminds me of the subject of one of Simon and Garfunkel’s early songs:

They say that Richard Cory owns one half of this whole town,

With political connections to spread his wealth around.

Born into society, a banker’s only child,

He had everything a man could want: power, grace, and style.

It’s a depressing poem, revealing the emptiness that lies beneath a surface of glitter and wealth. This reality is a perennial human reality. Paul Simon wrote the song in 1965, and he based it on a poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson, written in 1897. This same reality was present when Jesus walked the earth, and it is part of our own lives in the 21^st Century. Real life is deeper and more vital than the surface of what Richard Foster calls “money, sex, and power” – the title of one of his books on Christian discipleship.

These three aspects of life are the most common ways that human beings try to give meaning to life. Money, sex, and power are good things. They are God’s gifts to us in this life, but when we make any of them the goal of life, they lead to nothing; they leave us empty. We need something else at the centre of our lives. Zacchaeus had money and power, but they were not enough. He knew they were not enough.

Luke doesn’t tell us more, but we know this much. Zacchaeus had money. Zacchaeus had influence and power. But Zacchaeus’s life was empty, and he knew he needed help. When he heard that Jesus was coming through Jericho, he joined the crowd who was hoping to see this travelling teacher and miracle worker. He reminds me a bit of the woman who had “an issue of blood” (whom Bev preached on a few weeks ago): If I can just see him, I may learn something.

But he was short, too short. He saw a sycamore tree by the road, handy and easy to climb. I don’t know if climbing a tree was seen as dignified in those days, but I suspect that it wasn’t. Dignity was not on his mind at that moment, and he climbed the tree. This would give him more than a glimpse; he expected to see Jesus well.

Well, he did! He got more than he could have hoped. Jesus stopped under the tree, looked up and invited himself to Zacchaeus’ house. The old Sunday School song says, “I’m coming to your house today.” I learned it as “I’m coming to your house for tea”, which tells you that I grew up in an English colony where we did everything over a cup of tea. Given his culture, I suspect that Zacchaeus provided wine and olives and figs and bread.

The story tells us that Jesus went to Zacchaeus’ house, while the crowd grumbled that a teacher of Jesus’ reputation should not be the guest of so obvious a sinner. They saw Zacchaeus as a traitor. He was a Jew by birth, but he served the Roman Empire. His name means “Innocent”, but he was guilty of cheating many people in the whole community. Rome told him how much he needed to bring in through taxes; as the “chief tax collector”, he mobilized the machinery of the Empire to bring in more than that and took his cut off the top. How could Jesus compromise himself by inviting himself to the home of such a corrupt man?

Zacchaeus responded quite differently than the crowd had. We don’t hear what Jesus said to him, but the previous chapter in Luke 18 gives us an idea of what he might have said. The rich young ruler could not part with his wealth to follow Jesus, and instead he parted with Jesus rather than leave his wealth. Zacchaeus states his readiness to follow Jesus with two powerful declarations: “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.” He does not say, “I give everything away.” He does say, “I will cheat no one again, and I will pay back anyone I have cheated.” The “four times as much” makes it clear that Zacchaeus had considerable resources and that he was not trying to save something for himself. He was ready to follow Jesus, no matter what it cost.

Jesus’ final comment is interesting: “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.” Here he says that God’s salvation is present when Zacchaeus shows that he means business. Zacchaeus steps out in faith, and Jesus confirms his step. The step includes “his house”, which suggests a fuller understanding than the individual salvation we normally think of. Real freedom in Christ is both individual and communal.

Working Out What This Means

To understand the essence of what happened, I turn to an idea that I have described before. You can think about your life as a story, and we must choose who we want to write our story. There are not many real choices in this life. I did not choose my height; it was given to me without my consent. I have some control over my weight, but even that depends partly on genetics, not just on how much I eat. The colour of my hair, my personality, my love of music – all of these were given to me. I work with them, and I can change them to some extent, but I did not choose them. There is, however, one real choice that each of us must make: Who will write our story?

In the end, this choice comes down to two basic possibilities. Either I insist on writing my own story, or I allow God to write the story of my life for me. Most people insist on writing their own story. You know the 1969 Paul Anka song (Anka was a Canadian songwriter), which Frank Sinatra made famous:

And now the end is near

And so I face the final curtain

My friend, I’ll say it clear

I’ll state my case of which I’m certain

I’ve lived a life that’s full

I’ve travelled each and every highway

And more, much more than this

I did it my way

There speaks the voice of Canada: I want to do it my way. I want to write my own story. The Mamas and the Papas described the same idea in a hit from 1965: “You gotta go where you want to go/ Do what you want to do/ With whoever you want to do it with.” These songs are from the 1960s, and children of the Sixties believe this completely: I want to be in charge of my own life.

Zacchaeus had made his choices and written his own story, but he found that the result was an inner emptiness. In another song from the 1960s, Peggy Lee describes that emptiness with the eloquence of despair:

I remember when I was a very little girl, our house caught on fire

I’ll never forget the look on my father's face as he gathered me up

in his arms and raced through the burning building out to the pavement

I stood there shivering in my pajamas and watched the whole world go up in flames

And when it was all over I said to myself, is that all there is to a fire

Is that all there is, is that all there is

If that’s all there is my friends, then let’s keep dancing

Let’s break out the booze and have a ball

If that’s all there is

She describes a full life, each time returning to the empty refrain. The whole sets to music the old saying, “Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” I believe that this describes what Zacchaeus had learned about life, and this is why he climbed a tree to see Jesus. And Jesus found him! When Jesus found him, Zacchaeus gave up the right to write his own story and became part of God’s story. He gave up the right to organize his own life and received God’s life.

What Did Jesus Say?

Jesus said, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.” Luke doesn’t tell us exactly what happened to trigger this announcement. What happened that led Jesus to announce salvation? What did Jesus say to Zacchaeus that led him to his decision. What did Zacchaeus do that showed that he was saved? If we look at this question through the lens of story, we can ask who Zacchaeus wanted to write the story of his life. He had gone his own way for many years, and he didn’t like the story he was in. He was alone and lost, and he knew it.

Although we don’t know what Jesus said, we do know that he usually said just one thing when people asked how they could be saved: Follow me! That’s what he said to the Rich Young Ruler in the previous chapter: “Sell what you have and give to the poor and follow me.” When it came to the point, the young man could not give up his wealth and make Jesus the author of his story. Zacchaeus could and did.

This offer of salvation combined with Zacchaeus’ embrace of salvation is seen in his willingness to give up everything to make things right and follow Jesus. I think the key to the whole event was that he stopped trying to write the story of his own life and stepped into God’s story.

Shakespeare has expressed what Zacchaeus may have felt in lines that his character MacBeth speaks (Act 5, Scene 5):

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time, and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

That speech of course comes from someone who knows his life is about to end. He knows that he will die, and that his life has meant nothing. But all of that changes when we meet Jesus. Our lives belong to God, who writes the play and gives our lives meaning.

Writing about the Second Coming, C.S. Lewis has described what it means to know that God has written the story in which we live. Listen to how he puts it:

The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when the world drama will end. The curtain may be rung down at any moment: say, before you have finished reading this paragraph. This seems to some people intolerably frustrating. So many things would be interrupted. … Not now, of all moments!

But we think thus because we keep on assuming that we know the play. We do not know the play. We do not even know whether we are in Act I or Act V. The Author knows. The audience, if there is an audience (if angels and archangels and all the company of Heaven fill the pit and the stalls), may have an inkling. But we, never seeing the play from outside, never meeting the characters except the tiny minority who are “on” in the same scenes as ourselves, wholly ignorant of the future and very imperfectly informed about the past, cannot tell at what moment the end ought to come. That it will come when it ought, we may be sure; but we waste our time in guessing when that will be. That it has a meaning we may be sure, but we cannot see it. When it is over, we may be told. We are led to expect that the Author will have something to say to each of us on the part that each of us has played. The playing it well is what matters infinitely.

Lewis’ point is that our lives find meaning as part of God’s story. If we refuse to play our part, our lives are meaningless – “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”. Zacchaeus chose to be part of God’s story, to follow Jesus, to do what God called him to do. He no longer cared if he had the money to pay Rome. He could do his job, and he could do it well; but what mattered most was to know Jesus and to follow Jesus and do what Jesus called him to do. Now his life had meaning. Now God had found him and saved him. What about you? What about me?

28 June 2020

Steinbach Mennonite Church

Texts:

Psalm 119: 137-144

¹³⁷ You are righteous, O Lord, and your judgments are right.

¹³⁸ You have appointed your decrees in righteousness and in all faithfulness.

¹³⁹ My zeal consumes me because my foes forget your words.

¹⁴⁰ Your promise is well tried, and your servant loves it.

¹⁴¹ I am small and despised, yet I do not forget your precepts.

¹⁴² Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and your law is the truth.

¹⁴³ Trouble and anguish have come upon me, but your commandments are my delight.

¹⁴⁴ Your decrees are righteous forever; give me understanding that I may live.

Luke 19: 1-10

Jesus and Zacchaeus

19 He entered Jericho and was passing through it. ² A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. ³ He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. ⁴ So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. ⁵ 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.” ⁶ So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. ⁷ All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” ⁸ 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.” ⁹ Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. ¹⁰ For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”