To seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:1-10)
For a few weeks our society seemed mostly united, gathered around the approach being taken to the crisis. Of course not all spoke in support but there was a genuine feeling of solidarity and something of a wartime spirit seemed to settle over us.
That seems long gone now. Many voices are being raised in opposition not simply to the government’s handling of things but against strangers and colleagues and even neighbours and family, who are either breaking the rules or who want us to stick too firmly to them (you take your pick). Self-justification through damning others is back and in full swing.
We were - and we are - a divided society. Curved-in upon ourselves in sin; biting and devouring each other.
Zacchaeus knew what it was like to be on the wrong side of his society. An excluded, despised man and, many of his fellow citizens would have argued, for good reason: he exploited and cheated them and had got rich at their expense. He collaborated with their pagan overlords; if God was angry with the nation it was on account of people like him. A selfish man, looking after number 1.
What will Jesus make of him?
Luke’s Gospel was written to someone who was probably fairly well-to-do and Luke accents Jesus’ teaching about riches in a number of ways, essentially saying 2 things: use your wealth to benefit others and don’t rely on it to give you standing before God. The status it confers is fleeting and deceptive.
So you could imagine his response to someone like Zacchaeus is going to be pretty sharp. Yet one word sums it up: Lost (v.10). He is a man who needs to be found. A man needing rescue, from himself at the very least. A man whose social isolation is killing him. He needs to be rehabilitated, restored into true relationship with God and others.
The initiative to do so is taken by Jesus. He sees him, calls him down and demands they be friends. And it is these overtures of grace that change Zacchaeus and renew his heart, leading him to repentance ('If I have cheated anybody...I’ll pay back') and faith (which marks him out as a son of Abraham, not his ancestry). It is the sheer kindness of God that leads him to repentance and to owning Jesus as Lord.
Our Lord Jesus came "to seek and to save the lost", not to leave them high and dry, nor to engage in the politics of division. He rehabilitates into fellowship with God and pulls down the walls of hostility that divide us from each other. He saw us when we were hopelessly lost, badly scarred and prisoners of sin. He gave himself, to the death of the cross, to find us, to save us. "Amazing pity, grace unknown and love beyond degree!"
And that lays before us a pattern to follow, a spirit to imbibe. Where accusations fly and tempers fray, it is easy to see others as troublemakers, bitter-minded people who turn everything they touch into ashes, perpetually on the take and self-consumed. The reality is that they are lost. They need to be found by the grace and compassion of Jesus.
Let’s pray that our words - in person or online - will be “full of grace and seasoned with salt”; words that are flavoured with the winsome invitation of Jesus, words that are soft and calming, compassionate and humane. Words that open the path to friendship and perhaps even into God’s family.
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Not what I am, O Lord, but what Thou art!
That, that alone, can be my soul’s true rest;
Thy love, not mine, bids fear and doubt depart,
And stills the tempest of my tossing breast.
Thy Name is Love! I hear it from yon cross;
Thy Name is Love! I read it in yon tomb;
All meaner love is perishable dross,
But this shall light me through time’s thickest gloom.
Girt with the love of God on every side,
Breathing that love as heaven's own healing air,
I work or wait, still following my Guide,
Braving each foe, escaping every snare.
’Tis what I know of Thee, my Lord and God,
That fills my soul with peace, my lips with song;
Thou art my health, my joy, my staff and rod;
Leaning on Thee, in weakness I am strong.
More of Thyself, O show me, hour by hour,
More of Thy glory, O my God and Lord;
More of Thyself, in all Thy grace and power;
More of Thy love and truth, incarnate Word.
Horatius Bonar, 1808-89
