Joel Snider's Sermons from FBC Rome

April 13, 2008

Your Mission, If You Decide to Accept It

Luke 19:1-10

It is hard to think about the name Zacchaeus without starting the children’s song in your mind. If you did not grow up in Sunday school as a child and are not familiar with the song, it goes something like this: Zacchaeus was a wee little man, a wee little man was he. He climbed up in the sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see.

If I tell you that, the playing field is now level in terms of what we all know about Zacchaeus. Everybody is up to speed because that is our basic Zacchaeus knowledge. He was a tax collector, and not just a tax collector but a chief tax collector. The Roman system was to get a local person to do it I think, in part, because a local person would know all the excuses and all the dodges that people use to try to get out of it. “I really don’t have that much. My farm is not that big.” A local person could listen to all those excuses and know. “I know you. I have known you all my life. You owe me more than that.”

Zacchaeus lived in Jericho which happened to be at a crossroads. Traffic coming and going on all the roads was subject to his tax collecting. The expression, “What the traffic will bear,” comes from taking up taxes at crossroads because the tax collectors, like Zacchaeus, would take up as much as they possibly could without creating unrest. That is how he made his money. You can imagine, in Jericho, how the resentment grew as Zacchaeus’ success increased.

He started off looking like everybody else, but as he got better at his job, his clothes probably got nicer, his servants more plentiful, and as the trajectory of his tax collecting career reached its zenith and he is made chief tax collector, you can imagine that a lot of people were resentful of him.

Some people admire and emulate those who are successful, but then there are other people that no matter how well they do, somebody is always poking fun, particularly if they think their livelihood has not been honest. You can imagine that as a person who has a physical characteristic that is easy to point out, the more successful Zacchaeus became the more resentful his neighbors became, and how they probably poked fun, kidded him, left him out, and would not include him. We always say that he climbed up in the sycamore tree because he was short and could not see the parade with Jesus in it, but I imagine there was some of that resentment going on in the crowd. There were probably people who were making that firm stance, arms folded, no eye contact movement that was basically saying, “You are not getting to the front. You may take my money, but I am not budging for you. I don’t know who you think you are, but you are not getting to the front.”

So Zacchaeus goes up the tree. As Jesus passes by, of all the people in Jericho, he chooses Zacchaeus. “Come down, I am going to your house today.” The story seems to be abbreviated, but somewhere in there, as the people are condemning Jesus’ choice, Zacchaeus stands up and makes this incredible turn around and says, “I am going to give half of what I have to the poor. If I have defrauded anybody, I am going to give them back four times what I took from them.”

In a typical tax collecting situation, I am not sure he is going to have anything left. He might go in the hole. If he gives half to the poor and also gives four times what he has cheated anyone out of, there won’t be much, if anything, left.

In the New Testament, we think of conversions quite a bit. The classic conversion is the Apostle Paul. You probably know the story. He is on the Damascus Road, Jesus speaks in a blinding light, and he is thrown from the animal he is riding on. We often speak of a Damascus Road experience. But that is not the only conversion in the New Testament. This is a conversion, too. What happens here? He sees this commotion. He climbs up in the tree. Somehow Jesus has found out who he is. Jesus calls him by name, goes to his house, and he is changed incredibly and offers all these things—half of what I have to the poor, four times of whatever I have taken from someone dishonestly. The one thing that conversions in the New Testament all have in common is change. If someone really encounters Jesus, they change. That is the common theme. I counted at least ten times in the Apostle Paul’s Letters where he is talking about what was before encountering Jesus Christ, and then he says, “therefore,” and describes something new, something different, that people now do because they are Christians.

For Zacchaeus, it was a life of taking, a life of cheating, and a life of self-interest. Now, therefore, he is giving. I imagine Jericho was a very interesting place the week after Jesus came through.

How do we describe this change that takes place in a person’s life? A person meets Jesus Christ and something is different. Sometimes we try to describe it as moral. “They are a better person now.” We like them to go to church because they are going to be better. Maybe they are a religious person. Now they go to church more often. “He got saved. She found Jesus, and now they go to church a lot more.” We try to find ways that describe the difference. What is the real change though that is taking place in a person’s life because they have met Jesus Christ? Is it that all of a sudden they are more socially acceptable because they are nicer people with a higher morality? Is it because they now have their membership on the roll of a church in town?

Luke Timothy Johnson has written a book called The Creed which is a book about The Apostle’s Creed. He says that we have been invited to be a part of God’s life and that when we come to Jesus Christ, it is no longer that we are just a part of our own lives, but Christ has called us to share God’s life.

Have you ever seen someone that you thought, “I wish I had their life”? Typically, you can wish that from a distance, but when you get close you find it is really not what you thought it was. People who are famous, on television or in the movies, we think, “Oh, I wish I was as good looking as that,” or “I wish I had that person’s money. I wish I had their life.” We might know somebody who lives down the street or across town who seems to have the perfect life and we say, “Oh, I wish I had their life.” Usually those don’t pan out like we would want, but what about God’s life? What if you could say, “I wish I shared God’s life”? In my life, I see selfishness, pettiness, anger, and self-centeredness, but in God’s life, there is freedom. Where God is living, there is forgiveness. In God’s life, there is the rejection of turning away from sin. In God’s life, there is restoration where people who have been divided are put back together. In God’s life, people who are hungry are fed and clothed and people who are thirsty find something to drink. Who wouldn’t want to share in God’s life?

Luke Timothy Johnson says that is exactly what the change is. It is the change of leading our own life to leading a life that is sharing a life with God. I think if you look at Zacchaeus, he has been living his own life. He is up in that sycamore tree, rejected by everybody who lives around him. He may have all that he wants but he doesn’t have much in terms of what really matters in the soul. Jesus calls his name and, all of a sudden, he realizes that he matters to this man who is God’s son. At least that is what he was thinking at the time. He says, “He is calling me by name,” and he catches the vision, he believes he can now share in God’s life, and there is nothing that he can see in this world that would be better than that. So he takes Jesus up on that offer. He says, “Hey, I want a part of this. My life is now different. I am going to give half of what I have to the poor. If I have ever cheated anybody, I am going to make it right. I am going to give them back four times what I cheated from them.” This change is not just the actions of giving to the poor and restoring the relationships. It is the change. Jesus says, “Don’t you see it? This man is the son of Abraham. This is a child of God. Salvation has come to this house. Just look at the change. He is living with God now. He is living the life that God lives.”

In two weeks, we will have Hands of Christ Days. Those of you who have been members of the church for a while are familiar with this. Saturday, April 26, will be the heavy-lifting work day. On Sunday, April 27, we will have some other ministry projects. Typically, we invite people to come and work, but I realize that is the wrong emphasis. We say, “Come and participate in missions,” which sounds like work and that is the wrong emphasis. Hands of Christ Days are not a couple of days for busy people to come and try to work some nice tasks into their busy schedule. It is not for people who are too busy and just need to do something good for a day. Hands of Christ Days are an opportunity for people who are busier than they should be to stop and experience God’s life and to be a part of it. They are days in which we perform acts of Christian compassion that reflect all of this heart of God which I mentioned a few moments ago. What do people say who do this? Year after year, people who participate say, “It meant more to me than it did to the people that I helped.” Why do people say that? Sometimes people feel guilty. I will tell you why people say that. For those moments, those hours, that day, we are participating in God’s life to a greater depth than we normally do. We realize that this is what Jesus had for us. This is what Jesus has called us to all the time. We just stop and experience it in a new and deeper way.

My invitation to you is not, “Come and do a mission,” so that you have to come and work. My invitation to you is experience what Zacchaeus did. Catch a vision of God’s life where, indeed, the hungry are fed, the thirsty find drink, the naked are clothed, the lonely are visited, and where people who don’t have a sense of God’s presence in their lives catch just a whisper that God is real and active in the world that loves them. Come, be a part in a deeper way in the life of God and you will say, “Hey, this meant more to me than the people I ministered to.” Amen. We are experiencing God’s life the way God called it to be when he called us to be children. This is not work. This is the blessing.

Zacchaeus met Christ and was changed. Most of you have met Christ. You have indeed been changed and God has invited each of us to participate in God’s life.

Stop for just a moment and experience that at the depth God really wants you to experience it all the time. You may find that it matters enough to do it again and again—not just one day a year but as a way of life.

Accept the invitation. The joy will be yours.

Copyright 2008. P. Joel Snider. All rights reserved

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