Monday
Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way. Luke 19:1-4
The story of Zacchaeus is familiar to most people who have grown up in the church. Many of us know the cute little Sunday school song about the “wee little man” who climbed up in a sycamore fig tree to see Jesus. I can even remember some of the hand motions that went with that song and I have vivid images in my memory of my 5th grade Sunday school teacher, Mrs. Kingston, wagging her finger at us as she sang the words “Zacchaeus, you come down! For I’m going to your house today, I’m going to your house today.”
Despite the cute (or obscure depending on your background) references to Sunday school lessons, there is a great deal more to this story in the Gospel of Luke. We can learn quite a lot form just these first few verses of the story.
First of all we learn that Zacchaeus was a tax collector. Tax collectors were hired by Rome to ensure that the citizens of a town or village paid the taxes they owed to Caesar on time. Most tax collectors were wealthy men, not because Rome paid them so well, but because they charged far more than Rome actually required. They paid Caesar what he was owed and they pocketed the difference. They had the backing of the Roman army (which they frequently bribed to turn a blind eye to their extortion), so it was useless for the common Jew to resist them. Luke tells us that Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector. This meant that he was in charge of the collection of Roman taxes for an entire region of Judea. He would have been very wealthy indeed. It is not hard to understand why tax collectors were so despised by their fellow Jews. They were considered traitors to their own people and sellouts to the hated Romans.
We also learn that Zacchaeus was vertically challenged – he was short.
Do you have the image of this man in your mind yet? A short, rich, unscrupulous, corrupt, little cheat, despised by his own countrymen. Ironically his name actually means “clean or pure”!
But the most amazing thing we learn about this man is that he wanted to see Jesus! He wanted to see Jesus so badly that he was willing to do some pretty astounding things in that culture. Notice that Luke tells us very specifically, that Zacchaeus did two things in order to catch a glimpse of Jesus.
1. He ran ahead
2. He climbed a tree
Those two details might not seem like much to us, but such behavior would have been absolutely shocking in first century Jewish culture. First of all grown men, especially respectable wealthy men, did not run around trying to see passers by. It was undignified and would have been looked at with scorn and disdain by other Jewish males. Secondly, if respectable grown men did not run around like teenagers at a rock concert, then they certainly did not climb trees like little children! This was unheard of and totally shocking behavior.
But (and here is the point) apparently Zacchaeus wanted to see Jesus more than he wanted his own dignity! He cared more about Jesus then he did about the opinion of the crowd.
What about you? What are you willing to do to see Jesus? How far are you willing to go to meet him? How foolish are you willing to appear to get a glimpse of Jesus?
Jeff Frazier
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