Zacchaeus in the sycamore tree
In Luke 19:1-10 we can read the story of Zacchaeus the tax collector who had climbed up in a sycamore tree to see Jesus. But when Jesus called him, he right away accepted Jesus’ invitation to give meaning and direction to his life, even if it meant making serious changes in his life. He became a great example of what God can do in a human being who accepts this invitation and personally takes Jesus’ words to heart.
There are probably many people today who also sit up in their “sycamore tree”, wanting to see what signs and miracles Jesus is doing. They are just watching from a distance but are not really interested in what Jesus preaches.
Jesus stopped under the sycamore tree and told Zacchaeus to come down quickly, because He wanted to stay at his house. Zacchaeus had to make a choice. Until then he was just watching from a distance, but now it had become personal. He had to decide what to do with this invitation — and thank God, he made the right decision!
A personal invitation to you
But what has all this got to do with us today? There is no Jesus on our path who stops beneath our “sycamore tree”, saying that He wants to come and stay with us. Maybe not literally like that, but the Master Himself says in Revelation 3:20 (NCV), “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in and eat with you, and you will eat with me.” This is actually the same as what He said to Zacchaeus. Today, Jesus is inviting people just as He did then, to open the doors of their hearts and accept Him as Lord in their lives.
Jesus said the following to someone in the church in Laodicea who was lukewarm – he was not hot or cold, so that Jesus felt like spitting him out of His mouth. Jesus told him: “You say, 'I am rich, and I have become wealthy and do not need anything.' But you do not know that you are really miserable, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked.” Revelation 3:17. So you can say that this person wasn’t any better than the tax collector Zacchaeus, who had been cheating people. But Jesus was standing at the door of both of them, asking them to repent and live a wholehearted and happy life for God.
In the case of Zacchaeus, he listened to Jesus. May it be the same with us, that we understand that Jesus is talking to us personally—as if He were saying my name.
The prophet Isaiah says in Isaiah 50:4 (NCV), “Every morning he wakes me. He teaches me to listen like a student.” Zacchaeus was willing to listen to Jesus’ words, and when he heard His voice, he immediately followed Him. He understood very well that Jesus was speaking to him personally. In John 10:3, it says that the sheep hear the voice of the shepherd, and that He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out. That is how He did with Zacchaeus and that is how He wants to do with all of us, if only we are willing to listen to His voice and His invitation.
A lifelong love
The beginning of Zacchaeus’ life of faith was very good. When people feel a special love for another person who really means a lot to them, this love makes it possible for them to do things that otherwise would be extremely difficult or even impossible to do.
This we see in Zacchaeus. The love he received from Jesus created such a strong love in him for Jesus in return, that it was not difficult for him to clean up his life within a few days and put things right where he had harmed other people. He even gave half of his possessions to the poor, and repaid four times as much if he had cheated anyone.
In 2 Corinthians 5:14-15 (NIV), Paul describes it like this: “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.”
The Bible does not say much about Zacchaeus’ life after this. We can hope that he continued in this love for his Lord and Master until the end of his life, as it says in Hebrews 6:11-12 (GNT), “Our great desire is that each of you keep up your eagerness to the end, so that the things you hope for will come true. We do not want you to become lazy, but to be like those who believe and are patient, and so receive what God has promised.”
Have you been forgiven much?
There is also something else to learn from the story of Zacchaeus: how to deal with people when you want to win them for Christ. Zacchaeus the tax collector was probably very surprised that Jesus showed so much kindness towards him even when he had sinned so much. He would probably have expected a serious rebuke rather than these good and kind words.
So if we want to be a successful “fisher of men”, we should take the words in Romans 2:4 to heart, where it says that “the goodness of God leads you to repentance.” Zacchaeus was a clear example that this method can work much better than accusing and reproaching someone and acting as a taskmaster.
The sinful woman in Luke 7 who washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, anointed them with sweet-smelling oil and dried them with her hair, probably had the same experience: “… her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.” Luke 7:47.
We can learn a lot here from how our Lord and Master treated people, even though we may feel that they don’t deserve such love and so much goodness because of all the wrong they have done.
And we can also learn from Zacchaeus and the sinful woman, that we too have been forgiven much and that we therefore should be thankful and show our love to Jesus and God just as these two did!
