There is something odd about the sight of a grown man up in a tree.
The Reuters news service carried a story sometime back about a Polish man who climbed a tree to avoid a taxi fare which totaled just a few dollars. Pursued by the irate taxi driver, the passenger climbed a tall tree, jumped from branch to branch and hurled bananas from a shopping bag at a crowd which soon gathered at the scene.
More than a dozen firefighters were called in and spread out an air-bag under the tree as a police psychologist was sent up in a ladder‑bucket to negotiate with the man.
After a two‑hour stand‑off, the man agreed to come down. But he learned a hard lesson. He may have to pay many times the original taxi fare he tried to evade. At last report the fire brigade was planning to send him a $4,300 bill for the rescue operation.
Why did a crowd gather to watch? Because it’s odd to see a grown man up in a tree.
One of the best known stories in the New Testament is about a man who was up in a tree. His named was Zacchaeus. He was a chief tax collector, which meant he was wealthy and powerful, but despised in his own community. Tax collectors perpetuated the oppressive practices of the Roman government. They practiced a form of legal extortion, charging whatever fees they wanted and pocketing the extra money for themselves. Zaccheus the tax collector wanted to see Jesus. Being a short man he could not because of the crowd. So he climbed a tree to get a better view.
That certainly says something to us about Jesus’ popularity. At this particular time in his ministry, Jesus was a star. Eventually the crowds would turn against him and even cry out for his crucifixion, but when he had his encounter with Zacchaeus, Jesus was a public sensation. A celebrity. An icon, with groupies following him around.
It’s amazing how taken ordinary people can be with celebrities. Zacchaeus reminds me of a man named Dennis Wise. Dennis earned a reputation as the ultimate Elvis Presley fan, back when Elvis was the number one entertainer in America. Wise’s love for Elvis drove him to bizarre lengths. He had his face lifted and his hairline contoured by a plastic surgeon to make himself look like Presley.
Wise began his worship of the rock idol when he was five years old. He has every record Elvis ever made and pictures in the thousands. He even has a couple of books about Elvis in Japanese and Chinese, and some leaves from the front yard of Graceland, Presley’s home.
Wise admits he never met Elvis personally. He did see him on the stage four times, he says. Once he stood up on the wall at Graceland for twelve hours trying to get a glimpse of the singer, but Elvis had so many people around Wise could never get close. (1)
That’s the sort of situation Zacchaeus found himself in. Too many people wanted to see the stranger from Nazareth. A short man didn’t have a chance. But Zacchaeus was determined. And so, he climbed a tree and waited.
I suspect Jesus was pleased with Zacchaeus’ zeal. A grown man up in a tree. Forget about pride. Forget about dignity. Zacchaeus wanted to see what kind of man Jesus really was.
Zacchaeus was what we would call today a “seeker.” He wasn’t one of the religious crowd. In fact, they looked down on Zacchaeus. They despised him. He was a tax collector acting on behalf of Rome, a traitor to his own people. He was wealthy, but not in a way that would bring credit to his name. So, you probably would not find Zacchaeus in the synagogue on the Sabbath. He would not have been welcome there.
And yet Zacchaeus had something missing from his life and he was painfully aware of it. He was searching for something more, something that his wealth could not provide. There are many people like Zacchaeus in our society today. They are lost and alone, and they want desperately to find what is missing in their life.
It’s like one young woman whom we will call Ann. Ann’s alcoholic father abandoned the family. Her mother and grandmother raised her in a home filled with anger and stress. But the family’s maid, Hattie, offered an oasis of peace and love for Ann. When she was done with her tasks each day, Hattie would sit at the kitchen table and read her Bible. It was through Hattie that Ann learned about God and God’s love for her.
Years passed, and Ann married and moved away. One Sunday, Ann’s pastor was under the weather and a friend asked Ann to fill in for him. That morning, she began the service by announcing, “I’d like to show you a picture of Jesus.” And she held up a picture of Hattie. Her message revolved around the example of love and caring that she first learned from the house maid who lived out her faith. (2)
There are many people like Ann and Zacchaeus, people who are seeking. People who need somebody to show them the Master.
Jesus was impressed with Zacchaeus’ determination. When Jesus reached the spot where Zacchaeus was perched in his tree, Jesus looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.”
Now it was Zacchaeus’ turn to be impressed. The Master knew his name. He wasn’t just a face in the crowd. When Jesus looked on the crowd of people who thronged to see him, he didn’t see a teeming multitude, a faceless mass of people, a blob of humanity. He saw Micah and Mary and Hosea and Ruth, and he saw Zacchaeus. This is part of the wonder of the Gospel message. Jesus knows each of us by name.
Many years ago, after the tragic war in Vietnam, the daily Congressional Record printed the names of 31,379 young people. The listing appeared to be a seemingly endless column after column, covering 121 pages. This was the roll of the United States war dead in Vietnam.
Years later a memorial was built to these soldiers in Washington, D.C. Some of you have probably visited that memorial. A great slab of black marble rises out of the ground. It too bears the names of those who paid the ultimate price. Often you will see family members or former comrades in arms reach out and touch a name. It is important for us not to think of the war dead as merely a number--31,379--but as individuals with their own personal dreams, people they loved and people who loved them.
God never thinks in numbers. That’s what Jesus was saying to us in the parable of the ninety and nine. The shepherd doesn’t look and see merely a flock of sheep, a mass, a blob of white. Every sheep is individually prized.
A few years ago a faculty member at the University of Pittsburgh made a survey among his students and colleagues to evaluate how many persons each one of them knew well enough to remember the first name; the answers ranged from 800 to 1,200.
Many adults remember more than 1,200 persons by name. The politician James Farley boasted of knowing more than 7,000 and achieved a certain fame by this kind of memory which he had cultivated for professional reasons. But knowing the name does not necessarily mean knowing the person. (3)
God knows each of God’s children by name. God knows our needs. God knows the road we’ve traveled. Jesus called Zacchaeus by name. Needless to say, Zacchaeus hurried down out of his tree and welcomed Jesus into his home.
Of course, the rest of the crowd wasn’t too happy about this. They began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a ‘sinner.’”
That’s very human, isn’t it? The crowd sees Jesus eating with Zacchaeus and they begin to criticize. “He has gone to be the guest of a ‘sinner.’” They couldn’t know Jesus’ intent. They couldn’t know why he chose to visit Zacchaeus. True, Zacchaeus was a tax collector, but they couldn’t see what was really in his heart. You and I are often guilty of passing judgment when we do not know all the facts.
Years ago Karel Capek wrote a short story with an intriguing concept of God. It’s about a murderer who went to heaven to face the final judgment. God was called to the stand to tell the truth about the man’s life. God gave details about each of the man’s nine murders, about his greed and his indifference to the suffering of others. When the judges left the room to debate the sentence they were about to hand down, only God and the murderer were left in the courtroom.
The man asked God who the judges were and why God wasn’t among them. “Because I know everything,” God replied. “Because my knowledge is infinite. If judges know everything, absolutely everything, then they would also understand everything. Their hearts would ache. They couldn’t sit in judgment--and neither can I. As it is, they know only about your crimes. I know all about you. “ (4)
God knows all about us. God knows what’s in our heart. God’s knowledge is infinite and intimate. If you are a seeker, do not be deterred by the judgmental spirit of others. God offers His love and His grace without condition. Obviously this is what Zacchaeus had been looking for. He stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”
We have a word for that. It’s called repentance. When Zacchaeus understood who Jesus was and how much Jesus cared about him, he couldn’t continue in his old lifestyle any longer. No longer could he be a cheat. No longer could he use his office to exploit others. Instead he would use his resources to reach out to others.
So often we hear the word “repentance” used as a synonym for “being sorry.” Being remorseful for our sins. Repentance is far more than that. Zacchaeus said, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” That’s repentance.
Speaker Les Parrot tells about a pig that flew aboard a US Airways jet from Philadelphia into Les’ home city of Seattle. Two passengers convinced an airline representative that the pig needed to fly with them as a “therapeutic companion pet”--like a seeing-eye dog--so the representative decided to permit the pig to sit with them in the first-class cabin of the plane. It was a decision he would soon regret. Passengers described the 300-pound pig as “enormous, brown, angry, and honking.” He was seated in three seats near the front of the plane, but the attendants reportedly had difficulty strapping him in. “He became restless after takeoff and sauntered through the cabin,” one passenger said. “He kept rubbing his nose on people’s legs trying to get them to give him food and stroke him.”
Upon landing, things only got worse. The pig panicked, running up and down through economy class and squealing. Many passengers, also screaming, stood on their seats. It took four attendants to escort the beast off the plane. And when they reached the terminal, the pig escaped only to be recaptured in another part of the airport. When asked to comment on the story, a US Airways spokesman named David said, “We can confirm that the pig traveled, and we can confirm that it will never happen again.” (5)
That’s repentance. It happened. It was a mistake. It will never happen again. Zacchaeus found what he had been looking for. He found it in this man Jesus. Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house . . .” Zacchaeus was a changed man. He wasn’t simply a better man, he was a man who had moved from darkness to light.
In 1898, a young bank clerk named William Porter was convicted of embezzling money from a bank in which he had worked. He spent the next three years in prison. In prison, Porter was determined to change his life. He began writing short stories to earn money for his family. One of his prison guards, a man by the name of Oren Henry, encouraged William Porter. He believed that the former bank clerk could make a fresh start after his release.
One day, the prisoner asked the prison guard for an unusual favor: could he have Oren Henry’s name? You see, a new man starting a new life needed a new name. Oren Henry graciously agreed, but he made William Porter promise that he would take good care of that name.
In 1901, after his release from prison, William Sydney Porter became a well-known writer; his short stories are considered classics of English literature. You may have heard of this reformed writer yourself. His pen name was O. Henry.
Zacchaeus had a new name following his encounter with the Master. Now he could be called Christian. I have a feeling he took good care of the name.
How about you? Are you a seeker? Is there a void in your life that only God can fill. God knows your need. God awaits you with open arms. Is today your day to begin anew?
1. Lynn Anderson, Finding the Heart to Go on (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1991), pp. 91-92.
2. I’m sorry, but I have lost the source of this outstanding illustration.
3. Larry King, The King (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1988).
4. Christine Wicker, God Knows My Heart (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), p. 142.
5. Shoulda Coulda Woulda: Live in the Present and Find Your Future (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003).