Luke 19:1-10 – Zacchaeus the tax collector
1 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, ‘Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.’ 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.
7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, ‘He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.’
8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, ‘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 times the amount.’
9 Jesus said to him, ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.’
Once again I am looking at Lectionary passages set for this Sunday and this time particularly at the Gospel reading from Luke 19:1-10. It’s a very well known story. Some of you may, like me, have grown up going to Sunday School and may remember one of the choruses we used to sing – I’m not going to sing it to you:
Zacchaeus was a very little man,
and a very little man was he.
He climbed up into a sycamore tree,
for the Saviour he wanted to see.
And when the Saviour passed that way,
he looked up in the tree,
and said, 'Now Zacchaeus, you come down,
for I'm coming to your house for tea.'
The name Zacchaeus is an abbreviation of the name Zechariah. It’s a good Jewish name. So this man was Jewish, a descendant of Abraham. Like other Jews of his day, he was probably looking for the coming of the Messiah.
But this man was also a chief tax collector. He was the boss of a group of tax collectors in Jericho or the Jericho area who were working hand-in-hand with the Roman occupiers. They were responsible for raising taxes for the Romans, taxes that would pay for the occupying armies and for all of the Roman administration of the province.
Now taxes are never popular. But as you can imagine, these taxes were particularly unpopular as they were being paid to an occupying power. In the very next chapter of Luke’s Gospel you may remember that we find the chief priests sending spies to ask Jesus the trick question “Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” They thought that they could make trouble for Jesus with this question. If he said they should pay taxes, Jesus would lose all credibility with the people who surrounded him and listened to his teaching but who hated the Romans. But if Jesus said they should not pay taxes, they could report him to the Roman authorities as one seeking to stir up rebellion. You will remember that Jesus asked for a coin in which taxes were paid and asked “Whose image and inscription is on it?” When they told him it was Caesar’s he said, “Then give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”
Taxes were hated because they were a constant reminder of Roman occupation and oppression.
And so tax collectors were hated as those in league with the occupying power. Remember the parable Jesus told about a Pharisee and a tax collector at prayer in the temple recorded in the chapter before this one in Luke’s Gospel. The Pharisee prayed, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people – robbers, evildoers, adulterers – or even like this tax collector…” Tax collectors were considered the worst of sinners and no respectable person would want to associate themselves with such a person.
And Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector. The way in which the system of tax collection worked was rather like a pyramid selling scheme. The Romans would appoint someone over the area to raise taxes for them and he would be required to provide them with a given sum of money each month. That person would then appoint others to work for him and require each of them to raise a certain sum for him. They would then tax the people, always exacting more than was absolutely necessary so that having passed on the sum the chief tax collector asked of them they would have money to line their own pockets. In turn the chief tax collector had demanded more than the Romans required of him so that he also would have money to line his own pockets. This way the chief tax collector would become a rich man. For this reason also tax collectors were despised – they ripped off the people.
Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector in the Jericho region was, we read, a wealthy man. He was also, we may guess, a very lonely man: a wealthy man, a large house but an empty life.
We have already noted that in the preceding chapter Jesus tells a parable about a Pharisee and a tax collector at prayer. In that chapter we also read of a wealthy ruler who came to Jesus and asked what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus tells him to sell his possessions and give them to the poor and to become one of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus promises him that he will then have treasure in heaven. At this the young man turns sadly away and Jesus tells the crowd, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” The disciples are astonished and ask Jesus, “Who then can be saved?” Jesus replies, “What is impossible in human terms is possible with God.”
Those reading Luke’s Gospel then have heard that it is hard for a wealthy person to enter the kingdom of God. It is hard for them to abandon their trust in their riches and to place their trust in God. But they have also heard that God can do the impossible; he can change hearts and minds. And this is what we now see in the story of Zacchaeus.
Jesus was travelling through Jericho
Jesus was passing through Jericho on his way to Jerusalem. He was going there for his final confrontation with the Jewish leaders which would result in him being handed over to the Roman authorities to be crucified. This must have weighed on Jesus’ mind.
As he had entered the outskirts of Jericho, surrounded by a crowd of followers, a blind beggar had called out to Jesus to have mercy on him. Jesus healed the man. We read in the last verse of chapter 18, “Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God. When all the people saw it, they also praised God.” The crowds are now much larger as everyone wants to witness what Jesus will do next. So Jesus, surrounded by this great crowd, enters the city and begins to make his way through it.
And Zacchaeus, the wealthy tax collector but social pariah, wants to see something of who this man is that can attract such a large crowd to himself. But he is a short man. He cannot see over the heads of the crowds, neither dare he push his way through for fear of the violence he might suffer at the hands of those who hated him. So he climbs up a tree ahead of the route that Jesus is taking, simply with a desire to gain a glimpse of the man.
There are many people like this in our society today. They are lost. They may have all that this world can give them but they know that it is not enough. Many are looking around for something that can satisfy. Sometimes they may come into our churches, maybe staying at the back, just wanting to see what is going on and whether there is anything here for them – just like Zacchaeus trying to remain in the background, unnoticed up his tree.
But Jesus stops by the tree, he looks up into its branches and calls Zacchaeus down by name. With all that crowd surrounding him, Jesus focusses on this one man. He knows all about Zacchaeus and addresses him by name, calling him down from his safe place in the tree and saying “I must stay in your house today.” Jesus is saying, “Zacchaeus, I want to spend time with you and I want you to spend time with me. Zacchaeus, we read, “came down at once and welcomed [Jesus] gladly.”
And I want you to know this morning that Jesus knows each one of you. He knows you by name. He knows all about you, all about your hopes and fears. He knows you intimately. And he calls you each by name saying, I want to spend time with you and I want you to spend time with me. I want you to know me.
And this is true not only of each of us who are here week by week, its true of the many in our community who feel cut off and alone, who struggle to understand a purpose for their lives. For the many who are seeking but don’t know where to turn. For the many who are lost. Jesus looks upon the crowds today who are harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd and he has compassion on them. Nor is it a general compassion; he knows each one by name and his heart aches that they might come to know him. He calls each to come out of the shadows and into the light.
Jesus goes to spend time with Zacchaeus. But, we read, ‘All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”’ The implication is that either Jesus is ignorant of the character of this man, or he is a sinner himself for wanting to spend time with such a person. They make harsh judgments about Zacchaeus and so make harsh judgments about Jesus.
Jesus was often accused of being a friend of tax collectors and sinners – of mixing with the wrong crowd. But all too often the Christian church is viewed by outsiders as a place only for respectable people. All too often, those who feel lost and lonely fear that they will not find a welcome in church – it’s not for them. They fear that if they were to make any contact with Christians they would only face judgment.
At the beginning of his book What’s So Amazing About Grace?, Philip Yancey recounts a story he heard from a friend who works with down-and-outs in Chicago:
A prostitute came to me in wretched straits, homeless, sick, unable to buy food for her two-year-old daughter. Through sobs and tears, she told me she had been renting out her daughter – two years old! – to men interested in kinky sex. She made more renting out her daughter for an hour than she could earn on her own in a night. I could hardly bear hearing her sordid story. For one thing, it made me legally liable – I’m required to report cases of child abuse. I had no idea what to say to the woman.
At last I asked if she had ever thought of going to a church for help. I will never forget the look of pure, naďve shock that crossed her face. “Church!” she cried. “Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They’d just make me feel worse.”
Philip Yancey comments, “What struck me about my friend’s story is that women much like this prostitute fled toward Jesus, not away from him. The worse a person felt about herself, the more likely she saw Jesus as a refuge. Has the church lost that gift? Evidently the down-and-out, who flocked to Jesus when he lived on earth, no longer feel welcome among his followers. What has happened?”
Perhaps we should stop waiting for folk like that to come in. We should go out and address them by name and tell them we want to spend time with them – we want them to know the love and the welcome of the Lord Jesus.
Zacchaeus’ life is utterly transformed through his encounter with Jesus. Jesus has spent time with him and Zacchaeus has learned from Christ. A preoccupation with money had dominated his life and had destroyed his relationships: it had held him captive. Unlike the rich young ruler whose encounter with Jesus was recounted in the previous chapter, Zacchaeus had now been freed from the love of money. We read that he stood up and said to the Lord, “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 times the amount.” He is a changed man. His life has been utterly transformed. He is determined now to live for the glory of God and to use all he possesses in the service of God.
And this is Jesus’ verdict on the man, “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 the lost.” Jesus is saying that he came into the world to save Zacchaeus. He came into the world to save all those lost souls we come across in society around us and whom, God forgive us, we may sometimes write off as beyond the pale. Jesus calls them by name. Jesus has time for them. Jesus calls us to have time for them also.
We also need to feel ever and afresh the transforming presence and power of the Lord Jesus who calls us each one to follow him, learn of him and serve him. We need also to follow Jesus in seeking out lost souls, calling them by name and seeking to bring them into the freedom and joy of knowing Jesus, the Saviour of the world.