You Don't Have to Be Good Enough for God to Want You
Who is the worst person you know? Not the worst person you know about, not a historical villain. Someone you actually know. Someone who'd call the cops on kids with a lemonade stand. Someone who steals from the breakroom fridge. What does your gut do when you think about that person? How would you feel if they showed up at church?
Hold onto that feeling. It's the only way to really understand what happens in Luke 19.
The Setup
Israel hadn't been a free kingdom in a long time. Rome ruled, Rome taxed, and Roman soldiers could beat or jail people with almost no consequence. Imagine another country invading and conquering the United States, leaving a figurehead president who answers to a foreign power, foreign soldiers patrolling the streets, foreign flags flying, and citizens of the occupying nation getting special treatment while Americans do all the work and pay all the taxes. That's roughly how Israel felt about Rome.
In every occupied country there are collaborators, people who work for the oppressors. Most had no real choice. But there was one category who did have a choice, and chose it anyway for the money: tax collectors. Rome didn't calculate a fair tax. It auctioned off the right to collect taxes to the highest local bidder, and whoever won squeezed as much as they could out of their own people, backed by Roman soldiers. Houses seized. Businesses shut down. Widows kept in poverty. Whatever it took.
Meet Zacchaeus
"He entered Jericho and was passing through. And behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus. He was a chief tax collector and was rich." (Luke 19:1-2, ESV)
Zacchaeus wasn't just a tax collector, he was a chief one, meaning he oversaw a whole network of smaller collaborators. He was exactly the kind of person the whole town would agree to hate, and would still feel a little guilty admitting how much they enjoyed hating him.
Jesus was passing through Jericho, and the crowd lined the streets to see him. Zacchaeus wanted to see him too, but he was short, and nobody was making room for the town's most hated man.
"And he was seeking to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was small in stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was about to pass that way." (Luke 19:3-4, ESV)
A grown man, one of the richest and most despised in the region, ran and climbed a tree in public. Running wasn't dignified for an adult. Climbing a tree wasn't dignified for a rich man. But it's what he had if he wanted to see Jesus.
Jesus Sees Him
"And 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.'" (Luke 19:5, ESV)
Of everyone in that crowd, Jesus stopped for the one man nobody else wanted anything to do with.
"So he hurried and came down and received him joyfully. And when they saw it, they all grumbled, 'He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.'" (Luke 19:6-7, ESV)
Two completely different reactions. Zacchaeus is thrilled. Everyone else is furious. And honestly, wouldn't you be? Wouldn't it sting to watch Jesus choose the one person everyone agreed deserved nothing?
But imagine what it felt like to be Zacchaeus. Imagine the shame, the loneliness, the certainty that no one, especially not the one people were calling the Messiah, would ever want anything to do with you. And then Jesus looks up into the tree and calls you by name.
A Changed Man
"And Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, 'Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold.'" (Luke 19:8, ESV)
That's not a small promise. Paying back four times what he stole, giving away half of everything he owned, this is what it looks like when someone is finally tired of who they've become and sees a chance to be different.
What Salvation Actually Looks Like
"And Jesus said to him, 'Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.'" (Luke 19:9-10, ESV)
Was Zacchaeus saved because he gave to the poor and paid people back? No, those actions revealed what had already happened in him. He believed Jesus was who he claimed to be. He knew he was a sinner heading toward judgment. He was sorry for it. And he believed Jesus could save him. That's the only way anyone is saved, not by being better than Zacchaeus, but by recognizing you're just as lost as he was and trusting Jesus to rescue you.
Why Zacchaeus, and not someone more respectable? Because salvation isn't for people who don't need it, it's for people who know they do. The world is full of people who look at someone like Zacchaeus and feel better about themselves by comparison. But everyone in that crowd was just as guilty. The only difference is Zacchaeus knew it.
So Which Are You?
Are you Zacchaeus? Someone so weighed down by shame over what you've done that you can't imagine God wanting anything to do with you? He's looking for you. He already knows your name and your sin, and He still wants you.
Are you the crowd? Someone who's made the right choices, grown up in the right home, someone people expect Jesus to associate with? How do you feel about a Savior who chooses to spend time with "those kind of people"? If Jesus choosing someone like Zacchaeus bothers you, that's worth examining, because the gospel was never for people who don't need it.
Whichever you are, the question is the same one Zacchaeus had to answer: do you know who you really are before God? And when Jesus looks up and calls your name, how will you respond?
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