Grace
A Sermon by Rev. Mark R. Thomson
Harundale Presbyterian Church
31st Sunday in Ordinary Time
Scripture: Luke 19:1-10
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be
acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength and our Redeemer.[1] Amen.
|
E |
veryone
grumbled as Jesus picked Zacchaeus out of the crowd.
Why? Why did they grumble when Jesus chose to
stay with Zacchaeus?
In
the Gospel of Luke, people "grumble" three times,
each time complaining that Jesus
hangs out with sinners.
I'm
thinking Zacchaeus must have heard, as it was mentioned earlier in Luke's
Gospel, that Jesus was accused of being a friend of tax collectors and sinners.[2] Was it true? Could it be that this prophet didn't hold a
stone for Zacchaeus, but rather offered friendship.
For
a tax collector, this is a big deal.
Everywhere in scripture, tax collectors and "sinner" go
hand-in-hand. Tax collecting was a
profession that often lead to abuse, and no one liked to be taxed. To boot, Zacchaeus isn't just any tax
collector, he's a chief tax collector!
The
story is actually kind of humorous in its telling. Zacchaeus' name comes from the Hebrew
meaning "innocent" and must have sounded like an oxymoron to those
who knew him as Zacchaeus the tax collector.
The story also mentions the curious detail that he is small in stature -
the word used there is "micros".
He's a tiny man.
Its
just interesting that this little
detail is included. So we get this image
of a vertically challenged person jumping up and down trying to look over the
crowd to see Jesus. The crowd could care
less about this tax collector and is quite content to keep him from
seeing.
He
is excluded. Blocked out. He is the outcast. He is not in the mainstream. In the Gospel of Luke, these are the very
people Jesus gravitates toward.
Seeing
the Sycamore tree, Zacchaeus decides to rise above the crowd to try and catch a
glimpse of this friend of tax collectors and sinners and see if it is true.
This
is where the story turns the other way - the one trying to see Jesus, is first
seen by Jesus. Jesus, the seeker of the
lost, the seeker of the outcast, sees one of his sheep perched in a tree and
calls him down to the astonishment and scandal of the crowd. They grumble.
Zacchaeus
turns out not to be such a bad guy! Not
only does he give half of his money to the poor, its interesting that he points
out that if he defrauded anyone in the past he will repay it back, not the
required 120%, but 400%.
I
can't help but wonder if this is an allusion back to John the Baptist earlier
in Luke chapter 3. Was Zacchaeus among
the crowd of tax collectors who cried out to John's message of repentance,
"What shall we do?" To which
John replied, "Collect no more than is appointed you".[3]
Zacchaeus
joyfully lays before Christ his offering,
the fruits of his repentance,
the expression of his
Gratitude
to
the one who love him when others only saw a sinner and a tax collector,
and grumbled.
|
W |
hy
did the people grumble so much? Why
didn't they rejoice for Zacchaeus? Jesus
offered Zacchaeus Grace, the same as it is offered to us. People grumbled a lot because of Jesus.
Grace.
Today
we commemorate the Reformation, begun in the 1500's by great people like Martin
Luther, John Calvin, and John Knox.
Nearly 500 years ago, they rediscovered a lost and buried treasure of
the Gospel, "We are saved by Grace through faith".
We're
not saved by works.
We're not saved by what we do and
how well we do it.
We are saved by God's
gracious choice to save us.
That's
all.
It
is the greatest treasure to ever be unearthed, and it scares us too.
Why?
Because we can't control
it.
We can't
predict it.
That's
why people grumble.
Grace shows up where we least expect
it.
Grace shows up where we
least think it is deserved.
Tells
us something about ourselves doesn't it?
Yet
it is the very message of the Gospel.
The very message that reaches in and touches our
deepest longings....
Can
you love me God?
The
answer comes back an unequivocal "Yes".
If
you can believe this,
then you will be made well.
|
A |
ugustin
once said, "God's [Grace] ...goes before the unwilling to make them
willing."[4]
God
loves us into his service.
Its
kind of like the husband who remembers his wife’s anniversary not because he
must under penalty of death, but because his wife’s love for him inspires such
a love for her that he remembers gladly, and joyfully! He buys flowers, and plans romantic dinners,
and does the dishes, not because he needs to check off a list, but because he
wants to express his love and gratitude for being so wonderfully loved. The vice-versa is true for wives, except
they loving allow their husband to watch football all day.
This
is the difference between trying to earn your way into heaven through works,
verses accepting God’s Grace through Faith.
This is why James says that Faith without Works is dead. There can’t really be love between a husband
and a wife if neither is inspired to sacrifice something for the other. The same is true of Faith.
Zacchaeus,
the sinner and tax collector, received Christ joyfully. Why?
Because Christ received him joyfully first, by being a friend to tax
collectors and sinners. After the rich
man who sadly walked away unable to part with his precious money, Zacchaeus must have been a breath of fresh
air. Zacchaeus saw his money as a way to
help others whom Christ loved as much as him.
It
wasn’t the fact that he gave half his money away that impressed Christ. Here is one who has been loved, and his
response is to love by helping others and being an honest person. Jesus declares his whole household has
received salvation this day!
|
O |
ur
text also ties into Jim’s sermon last week about Loving your Enemy. Its only possible if you stop and realize
that God’s Grace is offered to them the same as it is offered to you.
There
is another character in this story that we can’t leave out: The grumbling crowd.
Why
did they grumble?
Because they didn’t think Jesus
understood who it was proper to hang out with.
They didn’t think God
knew the right people to be gracious to.
God's
Grace is God's to give, not ours.
Grace remains wild and
unpredictable,
despite human and religious
attempts to domesticate it.
For
Jesus to say, “Love your enemies”, Jesus
is saying that your enemy is perhaps the last person you want God to be
Gracious to, but God’s Grace is God’s to give, and God makes his sun to shine
on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Who are we to judge?
The
crowd saw the tax collectors as enemies – traitors who supported the Roman
establishment, sinners who exploit the people.
So they grumbled. Yet Jesus
didn’t see that. Jesus saw a
person. Pick whatever you want to
substitute for tax collector these days.
Given the state of politics in America, perhaps we should pick Democrat
or Republican.
I
am absolutely appalled at the state of our democratic process these days. Democrats and Republicans view each other as
enemies! I was scanning the radio
stations and came across a radio station talking about the elections. It was interesting until the host started to
call liberals “vermin” and it went down hill from there. There were two people on opposite sides
fighting each other on the news the other night. What is happening? Where is the Grace? Can we not see each other as two sides of a
coin that need to work together?
George
Washington predicted that the splitting of America into political parties would
do just what it is doing today – divide us as a nation into those who think
they are the only right way: red versus blue, right versus left, republican
versus democrat. When did compromise
become a dirty word in our political system.
When did we become a grumbling crowd.
|
P |
erhaps
it wasn’t just Zacchaeus who was saved that day, but also the grumbling crowd.
For they saw and heard God's Grace on a small man they thought unworthy. The crowd's arrogance was judged in
Christ's gracious acceptance of this tax collector.
Beware
of the grumbling crowd.
Church
tradition holds that Peter later appointed Zacchaeus as bishop of
Caesarea. Matthew was a tax collector
who became a disciple. See what God's
grace can do.[5]
In
this story, we are at once Zacchaeus and the crowd,
the saved and the grumbling,
the
joyful and the judged.
Amazing
Grace.
To him who
loves us
and has freed us from our sins by
his blood
and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and
Father,
to him be
glory and dominion for ever and ever.
Amen.[6]