Zacchaeus and healing

Healing and Wellness  •  Sermon  •  Submitted
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Scripture

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.”

Introduction

Parents are the worst?
Am I right?
I can say that because I’m a parent. And as a parent I am the worst.
Truthfully, I didn’t think I’d get here. I always assumed I’d be the best.
All those times when I thought my parents were the worst there was this little voice in the back of my head that said “if I was a parent, I’d do things differently. I’d be the best!”
But here we are. Now I’m a parent.
Even if I don’t actually say it out loud I have a new little voice in the back of my head. It says “If you had kids you’d understand.”
And so goes the circle of life.
And this isn’t a bad thing. Just the opposite! It’s healthy and good. As children grow they develop a sense of self and autonomy and that means pushing back against their parents.
Even if you had the best relationship with your parents there were probably times you thought they wore the worst.
It seems like every time this year Lindsay and I rewatch the old television series Gilmore Girls. The hook behind the show is that the titular Gilmore Girls aren’t your normal Mother/Daughter. They’re best friends.
But one of the things they get right and I really like about the show is that sometimes they aren’t best friends, sometimes the daughter thinks her Mom is the worst.
It’s normal.
Well one of the ways my parents were the worst was rock concerts. I attended my first real rock shows when I was 16 and I loved them. I couldn’t get enough of them. I wanted to go whenever I could. Sometimes my parents let me. Sometimes they said no.
Now, as a parent, I get it. I was 16, 17, 18 years old. I barely have had my license and I’d be driving 45 minutes to Portland and getting home at 1:00 in the morning. Even though they trusted me that had to give them pause.
Well any time they said no, I had the same thought: “they’re the worst. When I’m a parent, I’ll be the best!”
Now here we are. I have a child that wants to go to concerts. This time I have an out because I still like going to them. And a few times over the last couple of months we’ve gotten to be concert buddies. We’ve had a blast. It’s been a fun thing for us to do together.
Our most recent concert was last weekend and Rory got to experience “short person at a concert” phenomenon. It goes like this:
You’re up front but the stage is short. Everything is fine until a taller person steps in front of you. Now you can see nothing.
They had to experience this last week and it was lame for them.
Not seeing what you want to see, not experiencing what you want to experience is hard.
Today’s reading is a famous passage. This is a story kids sing songs about in Sunday School.
I think it’s famous because it’s both funny instantly relatable. Who hasn’t wanted to see something but they couldn’t because someone was in your way? Small kids really get this.
Then you get this comedic scene were Zacchaeus run ahead, climbs a tree. Then Jesus looks up, sees this grown man in a tree, tells him to come down and he’s going to his house for dinner.
It paints quite the scene.
When I was young I remembered he was short and couldn’t see anything. But I didn’t remember much beyond that.
But today. It’s much more memorable: Jesus saw him and the mere act of being noticed by Jesus brought healing and restoration to a surprising character.
Prayer

Zacchaeus

Luke begins the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus with a simple bit of scene setting.

He entered Jericho and was passing through it. 2 A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich.

I want to stop right there.
When you read through the Gospels the primary character is Jesus. Then you have secondary characters. John the Baptist. Peter.
Then you have alot of nameless characters. They’re often named by their occupation. A priest. A leper. A tax collector.
Here, for whatever reason Luke gives him a name. He gives him the name Zacchaeus.
This, in and of itself, is perhaps a bit of irony.
Name is derived from Hebrew word Zakkay which means pure or innocent. There may be a bit of Wordplay going on here. Based on his reputation around town Zacchaeus wouldn’t be called pure or innocent by anyone.
Tax collectors, also known as publicans (publicanus), charged tolls and taxes on behalf of the Roman government.
These private government subcontractors would tax travelers who were carrying merchandise between properties or delivering goods along certain well-defined roads.
Rome preferred to hire locals who were familiar with a region’s inhabitants, land, and roads. Some tax agents were responsible for such large territories that they functioned as subcontractors, hiring their own employees to collect the taxes.
Zacchaeus seems to fit this category, as he is described as a “chief” tax collector.
Since tax collectors could get a bonus on top of what they were collecting they weren’t well liked. And as the boss of the unlikable, Zacchaeus was probably doubly so.
But why give him a name. The story could be told without giving him a name. Zacchaeus didn’t appear in the rest of Luke’s gospel. He doesn’t appear in Luke’s sequel: the book of Acts.
His name doesn’t appear anywhere else. He just disappeared. Why give him a name?
Maybe he was famous? Maybe he was well-known. According to legend, Peter appointed him to be the bishop of Caesarea against his will. But this is probably just a legend. It was probably a way to solve a mystery: why was he named.
At this point I can only conjecture.
Last week Seth preached on Luke 18:9-14. If you recall in that story, Jesus tells the parable of two men: one a pharisee, a religious leader and the other a tax collector.
The pharisee, if you recall stood up and gave a lengthy prayer about how great he is and how good it is that he isn’t like the bad ones.
The tax collector, one of the bad ones, can’t look up to heaven. Beats his chest and begs God for mercy.
At this Jesus declares only one went home justified: the sinner.
Perhaps Luke gave Zacchaeus a name to put some skin on the game.
The parable of the pharisee and the tax collector was a parable. It’s general.
Once you give someone a name, it gets real. He has parents. He probably has a spouse, kids. This is a real person.
The parable of the pharisee and the tax collector wasn’t a hypothetical. It wasn’t an intellectual excercise. It wasn’t a puzzle to figure out. It mattered. It was real. And to prove it. Here’s a real life tax collector. This matters.

What Happened

As the story goes, Zacchaeus hears Jesus is coming to town. We don’t know why but he wanted to see him. But Zacchaeus had a problem: Zacchaeus was short, the crowd was big and he couldn’t see Jesus.
So he runs up ahead and climbs up a tree, so he can see Jesus.
And he sees Jesus. But more than that, Jesus sees him.
I mentioned Rory and I went to a concert last week. We were off to the side a bit but when the first band took the stage the singer looked out in the audience and told everyone to move up to the front of the stage.
Then he called out a specific guy: “you in the rugby shirt, up here!”
The guy did but I was so glad that wasn’t me. I would not have wanted to be seen like that.
And Jesus does something similar:

“Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.”

What on earth was Zaccheaus thinking? Uh, I just wanted to see the famous guy coming through and now he’s inviting himself over to dinner?
Whatever he was thinking he was moved to action
Not just action but joyous action.
He jumped out of the tree and happily welcomed him into his home.

End Result

And this encounter changed him.
He had heard of Jesus. He met Jesus. He was changed.

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.”

This was exceptional. By the law of Moses he was obligated to pay only 20% on top of what he extorted. He offers to pay 4 times as much.
He devotes himself to using his great riches to benefit the poor.
Jesus is often and rightfully understood as a friend of the poor and the oppressed.
But here Jesus reveals himself as something else: a friend of the rich. Even the rich oppressors.
But the friendship here looks different. It results in a radical transformation of Zacchaeus life.
For him that transformation was in his relationship with wealth. It was no longer his alone. It was something to be shared and given away.
In this he experienced salvation.
When I was in college or just after college I was on a mission trip. I don’t remember where or all the details but at one point we were invited by our ministry partners to share our birthday.
But by “birthday” they didn’t mean the day you came into the world. They meant the day you were saved. The day you became a Christian.
This befuddled me and befuddled many on the trip. Most of us didn’t have a date.
Some of us grew up in the church. They didn’t know any other life.
Some were involved in youth groups in high school and slowly moved closer to faith. For some it was in high school.
I doubt there were any in the group that could name their birthday.
But during that week we’d gather together at night and people would take turn sharing their life stories.
Whether they grew up in church or started doing this whole Jesus thing later in life it was clear that they experienced salvation in a myriad of ways and a myriad of times.
We’re only born once but the experience of God’s salvation can be ongoing.
Zaccheaus was seen by Jesus. It transformed him. He changed his life. And to this Jesus said:

“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.”

Conclusion

During the month of October we’ve looked at Jesus’ encounters with people through the lens of healing and wellness.
The gospels care little about the interior lives of those who interact with Jesus. The whole purpose of the gospels is to shine a light on who Jesus is.
As such it’s dangerous to read too much into characters.
Outside of these ten verses, we know nothing about Zacchaeus. It’s dangerous to read into his past or future behavior. For all we know he could have been a fairly honest tax collector.
So why did Luke include this story?
Perhaps Luke included it to remind us that salvation comes to all and it takes many different ways and forms.
It even comes to our cultural villians.
Salvation isn’t just for the down and the out.
Salvation is for the stereotypical, nameless villians. 2000 years ago that was tax collectors.
Today we have our own stereotypes but salvation is for them too.
Salvation is for the tech bros of Seattle and Silicon Valley. Salvation is for the spectulative real estate investors who gentrify and push out marginalized people. Salvation is for the politicians who take money on the side and serve only a select few.
Here we have a stereotype and it’s given a name.
And this salvation takes a form, it’s the form of radical change.
When we look at Zaccheaus and Jesus it was more than a photo-op. This was more than opportunity for Zaccheaus hitch a ride to an up and coming Jesus of Nazareth. It was more than opportunity for Jesus to get some capital investment in his new start-up.
For Zacchaeus it was a radical re-orientation on how he lived. He was seen and as he was seen he also saw others. His eyes were opened to defrauds and financial abuses.
But more than simply saying “I’m sorry” he changed.
And lets be honest his change is one of the hardest changes one can make.
One chapter earlier Jesus met an anonymous ruler.
This ruler asked Jesus a simple question: “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus begins to recite many of the ten commandments.
This anonymous ruler tells Jesus: “I’ve done these. I’ve kept them my entire life. I’ve never commited adultery. I’ve never murdered. I’ve never stolen. I’ve never lied. I’ve honored my parents.”
And Jesus responds: “OK. Good. There’s one more thing left to. Sell all your things. Get rid of it all. Give that money to the poor.”
And this ruler grew sad and walked away because he was very rich.
And Jesus knew it was hard. He said as much: “how hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the Kingdom of God.”
Hard but not impossible.

Pledge Drive

In November Saint James will be kicking off their annual pledge drive. Having spent much of my adult life being on church staff’s or married to elders on the finance committee, these are awkward times for a church.
Believe me when I say, this isn’t a time of the year the staff and session circles and puts together a chain ring counting down the days.
It’s awkward. It’s hard to talk about money.
But it’s an important thing.
The story of Zacchaeus contrasted with that of the young ruler tell us its not just important it’s hard.
And those stories also tell us it’s important. For those of us with means to do so, how we handle our money, to the extent of our generosity is a matter of discipleship. It’s a sign of our commitment to God.
As we think about stewardship and finances over the next month I want to encourage you to keep this story in the back of your mind.
I’m going to assume the best and no one could accuse you of being an enemy of the people and financially sucking dry those around you.
But I’m going to challenge you to think about the ways you’ve been seen by God.
I’m going to challenge you to think about the ways you’ve experience healing, salvation.
I’m going to challenge you to think about how that has changed your life and continues to change your life in all aspects of your life even the way you approach money.
None of us are annonymous nobodies. We all have a name. We are all seen. And like Zacchaeus we’re invited into a meal with Jesus. Let us be transformed.
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