On the Road with Jesus: Zacchaeus
Luke 19:1-10
March 31, 2019
Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. It all started when he raised Lazarus from the dead. This was obviously no small thing and many people were coming over to the teachings of Jesus. Many were claiming that Jesus could be the Messiah.
The religious leaders had decided that because so many were coming to Jesus that rather than recognizing the same thing, they were now looking at Jesus as a threat. After raising Lazarus, Jesus went north and that is when we heard from the one leper who was healed and came back to say thank you to Jesus and his faith saved him and the rich young ruler who couldn’t give up his possessions to follow Jesus.
In order to get to Jerusalem, Jesus would need to go through the city of Jericho. Jericho is a multicultural city. It is a center of commerce and trade. It is in this city of Jericho that there is a man by the name of Zaccheaus. Zacchaeus is a tax collector and is not well liked.
As we hear from Zacchaeus know that some creative liberties have been taken. Please read the story in it's entirety from Luke 19:1-10
Zacchaeus begins to speak:
I’m so glad you all sat down because before I was having trouble seeing everything. I am what you called vertically challenged or I guess you could just say that I’m short.
For those of you who share this same fate you know what I’m talking about. I’ve always been on the smaller side of life. My parents are short, in fact most of my family heritage is short and so as much as I hoped I’d somehow inherit some long lost height gene, well I didn’t.
I would have settled for even being average height. I was always shorter and smaller than other kids my age. When a bunch of us would gather to play games I would usually get picked last. No one wanted the little shrimp on their team.
My legs were short and so I couldn’t jump as high or run as fast as the other kids. Most of the time people thought I was a couple of years younger than I actually was. My parents just laughed about it and told me that I would get used to it.
Easy for them to say. Yet, I couldn’t always understand how they could have such a positive outlook on things. My parents were humble people of little means. We never had much but always seemed to have just enough to get by.
My father was a hard worker and did his best to provide for his family. My mother was extremely resourceful. We would wear our clothes until they were thread bare and full of holes. It didn’t bother me when I was younger but as I got older, well, kids can be cruel.
It was bad enough that they made fun of me for being small but they just piled on about being poor and such. It was so embarrassing and so infuriating. My parents just said that happiness wasn’t based on one’s wealth.
I wasn’t so sure. Being poor was no picnic. The rich seemed to be so much happier. You might even say that they were blessed and we seemed to be cursed. They always went for worship at the synagogue and made pilgrimages to Jerusalem when they could. They always gave praise to God. Their optimism even showed in the name they gave me, Zaccheaus which means – clean, innocent, pure & righteous
I didn’t quite understand their faith in Yahweh. If he was such a good God and my parents were so faithful then why didn’t we have more? Our religious system was okay. I learned all about it as a boy in the synagogue. I learned about the laws of Moses. I learned about the history of our people. I learned about the promised Messiah.
That was one of the things I was good at. I could learn things. I found I was good with numbers. I was good with facts and others weren’t.
One day of one of the boys asked if he could borrow some money. I told him only if he paid me back with interest, to which he agreed. A couple of days later he came to pay be back and he pulled some coins out and asked how much he owed. I took more than I told him I’d charge simply because he didn’t know any better.
As I look back on things that I guess is how it all started. You see I was tired of being picked on and I was tired of being poor. I didn’t like being made fun of. People with money, they were important. Nobody picked on them. People with money had power. I wanted all of that.
On one our family pilgrimages to Jerusalem we stopped for a period in Jericho. It was the first time I had been in the city. Jericho was quite the city. It was here that I saw great wealth and poverty exist in the same city.
Jericho was known also as the City of Palms. Jericho had become a beautiful city. It is located about 15 miles northeast of Jerusalem on the banks of the Jordan River. Herod the Great had built an amphitheater here as well as his winter palace in. It has lush springs and wonderful palm trees that made it feel even more like the oasis that it was. It had wonderful gardens.
Because of its location, Jericho had also become a major trading route. The highway going to the north headed toward Damascus, Tyre and Sidon, great trade centers of the north. Highway going through the west through Jerusalem, headed to Caesarea and Joppa, great trade centers also on the Mediterranean Sea. Highway going through heading to Egypt in the south and cities east of the Jordan into Moab and the far east from which all kinds of products came and went, great exchange center.
I decided that this is where a resourceful guy like me could make some money. When we returned back home I gathered what little I had and I left for Jericho. I didn’t bother telling my family.
I took work wherever I could find it. Occasionally I would have to resort to theft to make money. Many rich and political leaders would spend time in Jericho and so if you were crafty enough there was always someone to take advantage of. I found that I could take advantage of people’s lack of knowledge and overcharge for things. It was a risky business and sooner or later everyone gets caught and sure enough I did.
I was sure that a beating awaited me. I was stunned when instead of a beating I was presented with a business opportunity. I found out that the guy I was trying to cheat was actually a cheat himself. He knew the game even better than I did and that was the only way I got caught. He was impressed with my knowledge and the way I conducted business.
I must admit that I was surprised at this turn of events. He explained that he collected taxes from people and he would have me go out and collect the money and bring it to him. In exchange he would not turn me into the authorities and he would pay me a small amount.
That is how it started. I soon learned the tricks of the trade. I would collect taxes and then I would charge the people a little extra, a collection fee I called it. That was for me to keep. If people complained I told them that by paying me the collection fee that I was saving them from other taxes….and they bought it. I would pay my boss and sometimes I would even give him a little more just so he wouldn’t expect anything although I think he probably knew.
Jericho was a tax collection center for the southern part of Israel. I soon realized that a lot of money could be made as a tax collector. As soon as I could, I became my own tax collector. In order to do this you had to purchase it from Rome. When I had made enough money I purchased my tax franchise.
Rome demanded a certain amount of taxation but whatever else we made on top of that we got to keep. There were certain taxes that were set by Rome and we made sure we collected for those but because most of the people were clueless we made up some more.
How were the people to know? Most of them weren’t educated. It was just like the first time I took advantage of that boy that asked me to borrow some money. I soon taxed ever axel on a cart that entered the market. When that didn’t generate enough I taxed the number of wheels and then we taxed the animal pulling the cart as well as the merchandise that people were selling. Since Jericho was such a center of commerce there were all kinds of extra taxes we could charge to do business.
People began to hate me because I took so much of their money, but I was becoming rich. What did I care anyway? If they challenged me I hired certain people to persuade them to pay up. Unfortunately the down side to this was it alienated me from others. Not that I had ever had many friends. They didn’t understand what it was like to be me.
I was surprised to find out that eventually I was not allowed in the synagogue anymore because I was considered a traitor to Rome. I was called “unclean” by the religious leaders.
“Who cares…..who needs them anyway?” I soon became the chief tax collector which means, that everyone brings their taxes to me. I was a wealthy man. I mean extremely wealthy. I had done it, I had accomplished what I had set out to do as a kid. I didn’t care who I had stepped on the way to getting here.
The problem was that now that I was here I found out that it was a lonely existence. I was never with any of my own people. I was not welcome there anymore. My “friends” often wanted things from me and I felt like the only reason they were my friends was because I had money.
To be honest I didn’t like to be out in public very much anymore. As a chief tax collector I had people collecting taxes for me and when I did go out I didn’t get treated very well. Jericho was a large city but people knew who I was and when they saw me coming it meant that they were going to be parting with their hard earned money.
As much as I loved my money I grew to hate my life. I was so empty. I was so lost. I was so unhappy. As much as I hated my childhood I will admit that I missed parts of it.
That all changed when one day I heard that Jesus was on his way to Jericho I decided that I would like to see this man that everyone was talking about. He had become quite the talk of the town for a while but ever since he had raised Lazarus from the dead a few weeks back, well yeah, people were talking about this guy.
There was a lot of talk about him as the Messiah. The one who would lead the Jews and establish a new kingdom. I wondered what made this guy tick. I wondered what he was like. I had heard all the stories about him. How he had healed people and such.
I heard how he not only healed people but he claimed to forgive their sins. He gave people new beginnings. Wow, what would that be like? My sins were numerous. If I could make things right I would. If only someone would just give me another chance in life.
I guess the ones that really stuck out to me was that I heard he had dialogued with other tax collectors and one of his followers, Matthew, used to be a tax collector. I had known of him and I was curious what kind of a man would get you to leave this life and follow him.
There was no mistaking when Jesus was entering Jericho. He had a large following with him and everyone was coming out to see the miracle man. There were large crowds of people lining the street to welcome him and his followers to Jericho.
It was good that the crowds were focused on Jesus because no one was really paying any attention to me, which was nice for a change. The problem was that I couldn’t see anything. There were too many people.
I was pretty sure I knew where Jesus was headed to I ran ahead of the group where the crowds hadn’t yet gathered and I was sure I could get in front of everyone. Then again I didn’t want to face ridicule and so I found a sycamore tree that I could climb up in. It was perfect. I would be above the crowds here so I could see everything perfectly and no one would see me. So I climbed up and I waited.
It wasn’t long and the crowds began to form in the streets and a large crowd of people came closer. I was trying to pick out which one was Jesus. Then I saw him stop and talk to some children. He said something to them and patted them on the head and smiled at their parents. At times people would press into the group and his disciples would do their best to give Jesus some room.
As they approached where I was Jesus suddenly stopped. I was curious to hear what he was going to say to all of those gathered around. He stopped and he looked up at me. Everyone looked up at me. For a moment I wished that the tree would have swallowed me up.
Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house.
He knew my name. How did he know my name? How is it that this holy man, this miracle man is talking to me, a tax collector, an unclean. Not only was he talking to me but he wants to go to my house. Doesn’t he know that if he associates with me that people might assume….well he would take on my sins too.
Oh yeah, people knew. You should have heard the grumbling in the crowd. People knew who I was and what I was all about. There was something however about Jesus, the kindness in his voice, the acceptance in his look. He was willing to give up his good status just for me. He cared about me. Here was my chance, this man was giving me a second chance. A chance to make things right.
I made a decision right there and I said to him, “Look Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four time the amount.
At that moment, my money meant nothing to me. I wanted these people to see me as something different but moreover I wanted to please this man, Jesus. I had a change of heart but that wasn’t enough I needed to have my actions back it up.
Jesus then looked at me and said loud enough for all to hear, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.”
You see Jesus saw me for what I was. A lost soul. I was a Jew but I had lost my way. I had chased fortune and had not used it for good. Jesus found me. He came seeking me because he knew I was lost. He knew my name, he knew my past and he sought me and he saved my life.
From that moment, I was a changed man. An encounter with Jesus has a way of doing that. If Jesus could save an awful person like me, he surely can do the same for all of you. I was one of the worst and Jesus came seeking me.
Jesus comes to seek you as well. No matter what you have done or who you are, Jesus comes seeking you. He wants to forgive you of your sins. He doesn’t judge you like everyone else does. He just wants to come into your heart.
Don’t be afraid. It is never too late to make a change. Jesus is the only one who can fill our life and give it purpose. He is seeking you, will you welcome him and will your life show it? My life was forever change that day, the day that Jesus saved me on the road to Jerusalem.
Amen
There is no copy write on this so feel free to use it in any form you'd like. I put on a hat and sunglasses to begin the message. I had someone else read the into. I put a few pictures in during the message to give it context. If you'd like them please email me - jamiebogaard@gmail.com
