March 18
“Jesus said to (Zacchaeus), ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham; for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost,’” Luke 19:9-10.
The Lord Jesus was on His way to Jerusalem, where He would be taken captive and be condemned to die like a violent criminal. He would be crucified. On His way to Jerusalem, He passed through Jericho, where a man by the name of Zacchaeus lived. By occupation, he was the supervisor of the local tax collectors. As such, he had become very wealthy, and according to what he admitted to Jesus, he had not acquired all of his wealth honestly.
Somewhere along the line, Zacchaeus had heard about Jesus, and he was very curious about who Jesus was and what He did. Having learned that Jesus was coming to Jericho, he decided to satisfy his curiosity to see Jesus. However, he had a problem. He was not very tall. The crowd around Jesus was so great that Zacchaeus was lost in them. Everyone around him was so much taller than him that he could not get a glimpse of Jesus.
To solve his difficulty, Zacchaeus ran ahead of the crowd and climbed up a sycamore tree, which enabled him to look over the heads of the people walking along with Jesus. To Zacchaeus’ amazement, when Jesus arrived at the tree, He looked up and called, “Zacchaeus, make haste and come down, for today I must stay at your house.” Jesus knew him by name! He hurried down and joyfully welcomed Jesus.
The people in the crowd complained about Jesus, “He has gone to be a guest with a man who is a sinner!” Jesus went home with Zacchaeus, who confessed his sins and his sorrow for living as a dishonest tax collector. Jesus’ response was, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham.” Zacchaeus was a son of Abraham, not only according to the flesh, but also according to the faith. He believed, as Abraham did, that God would send a Savior.
Jesus said, “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” He came to seek and save Zacchaeus, and He also came to seek and save you and me. Jesus also knows each and every one of us by name. We, too, want to see Jesus as the Son of Man and the Son of God, our Savior. We see Jesus by faith – believing that He is true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true Man, born of the Virgin Mary – who has redeemed us, not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death.
Like Zacchaeus, we come confessing our sins – our open sins and our hidden sins, those that we know and those that we do not know, our sins in thought, desire, word, and deed. We know that they have all been forgiven because Jesus washed them away with His precious blood. We see Jesus as our only Savior.
“Oh, guide and lead me, Lord,
While here below I wander,
That I may follow Thee,
Till I shall see Thee yonder.
For if I led myself,
I soon would go astray;
But if Thou leadest me,
I keep the narrow way.” Amen.