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A very little man was he…

“Zacchaeus was a very little man

And a very little man was he

He climbed into a sycamore tree

For the Saviour he wanted to see

And when the Saviour passed that way

He looked into the tree

And said “Now, Zacchaeus, you come down

For I’m coming to your house for tea”

…A catchy little song many of us learnt in Sunday School as children. 

Just why was Zacchaeus up the tree in the first place? Because he was small, right? Nope. If you’re small and you’re in a crowd wanting to catch a glimpse of something or someone, your friends push you to the front. They don’t leave you at the back unable to see anything. But Zacchaeus is up a tree. Nobody wants to let him through for a better view. It would seem that tax collectors weren’t the most popular of people in Jewish society. I guess if you sold out to the brutal oppressors of your day and collected their extortionate taxes from your neighbours (as well as ripping them off royally in the process) you’d pretty much get labelled a traitor. So it’s startling that Jesus invites himself to dinner at the house of one of the most hated men in town. Sometimes we hear these stories so much that we get insulated from the gravity of Jesus’ actions. I find myself wondering who the modern day equivalent is. A ruthless drug dealer? A violent rapist? A paedophile? Does anyone want to invite themselves round for dinner with these types of people? It seems Jesus did.

Whatever happened in that house resulted in Zacchaeus deciding to give away half his wealth and pay back those he’d cheated four-fold. Jesus’ words confuse me somewhat. “Salvation has come to this home today, for this man has shown himself to be a true son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.”

So salvation has come? Isn’t salvation about giving your life to Jesus and going to heaven when we die? Maybe when Jesus talks about salvation he’s talking about more than that. Maybe he’s talking about a life turned completely upside down by the sheer power of God’s love. Maybe it’s about entering the kingdom of God… here… now. Maybe it’s about being saved from our own mess and selfishness that binds us now and beginning a life that honours God. I guess Zacchaeus did give his life to Jesus… he put his trust in whatever it was that Jesus told him, repented of his former ways, re-paid those he had stolen from, gave half his wealth to the poor and started living in the kingdom here and now.

I wonder if Zacchaeus shows us what salvation really looks like, and I wonder if we’ve shrunk salvation into a short prayer that determines our destination when we die.