Never Not With

Luke 19:1-10 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

Jesus and Zacchaeus

19 He entered Jericho and was passing through it. 2 A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was rich. 3 He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. 5 When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” 6 So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. 7 All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” 8 Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” 9 Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”

I never grew up with the Zacchaeus nursery rhyme. You know, “Zacchaeus was a wee little man/ and a wee little man was he. / He climbed up in a sycamore tree / For the Lord he wanted to see.” But I did grow up climbing trees. There was a vacant lot full of mulberry trees that we’d climb, build forts in, pretend to run away in when we got in trouble or didn’t get the second slice of birthday cake. And I was short. Really short. My very first drivers license said that I was 4’11” and 85 pounds. I was always on the top of the pyramids and in the front row in the pictures. Bigger kids would throw me around like a rag doll, and my mall rat friends would tolerate me by patiently waiting outside of the Gap Kids store.  

Zacchaeus and I have some more things in common, besides tree climbing and being short in stature. We also both have this drive to want to prove ourselves, a competitive edge, a need to succeed and be “better” than the person next to us. In a lot of ways, Zacchaeus is the American Ideal. He’s worked the system better than any Jew; he’s pulled himself up by his bootstraps and bought his way into the power system of the Roman Empire. He has amassed for himself enormous wealth by collecting taxes from those “beneath” him, scraping a little off the top for himself as he goes. But this has put him in a precarious position. He’s hated by his fellow Jews because he has become wealthy and powerful at their expense; he’s despised and distrusted by the Roman elites above him who feared that he may become too wealthy, too powerful and threaten their own status. But Zacchaeus knew how to play the game. He may be short in stature, but he’s the big man in town. Anyone who wants to grow their business, improve their status, or better their livelihood has to go through him. One of my commentaries states, “That Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector implicates him more deeply in the corrupt tax system of the Roman Government. In a corrupt system, the loftier one’s position, the greater complicity in the system.” 

He was the chief tax collector of Jericho, fully immersed in this give and take, tit for tat, this for that culture of his time. It was a culture of “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.” If a favor is done, one was indebted. If you needed something, you’d better have something to offer in return. He’s the perfect politician, and he’s worked his way to the top at the expense of the poor at the bottom. Diana Butler Bass says, “This is a story about the guy who cuts in line, cheats on tests, and stuffs the ballot box in order to become class president.” This way of life has worked very well for Zacchaeus, for although he’s alone, he’s alone with all his stuff, his wealth, his prestige, his tight connections to the ruling classes. 

And yet, here he is, the supposed hero of our gospel story today. For some reason, he needs to see Jesus. For some reason, he climbs that tree. For some reason, Jesus invites himself over to his house for dinner. 

This is especially perplexing because Luke is so very hard on those with wealth in his Gospel. Unlike Matthew’s “blessed are the poor in spirit.” Luke’s Beatitudes say “blessed are the poor,” full stop. Luke’s gospel emphasizes the beloved-ness of the lowly and poverty-stricken, the oppressed and the downtrodden. And in the passage right before ours today, Jesus has just stated how hard it is for the wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God, harder than for a camel to get through the eye of a needle. 

Luke has set us up to hate Zacchaeus and everything he stands for. He’s the one doing the oppressing. He’s the one benefitting from this broken system of haves and have nots. And here he is, the hero of our story.

My favorite professor from college likes to tell this story about his daughter, who, when she was really little, once said that the word “with” is the most important word. Because you’re never not “with.” You’re with someone else or the trees or the birds or with yourself. You’re never not with. 

Except maybe for Zacchaeus. Maybe he’s not with anyone or anything. Could he be the exception to the rule of “with?” He’s hated by his community, he’s intimidating to those above him. He’s alone in the world of with. 

Zacchaeus was certainly not “with;” he’s given up all of his with-ness so that he could have stuff. But there’s something about Jesus. Zacchaeus wants to get back “with” so that he can see Jesus. We don’t really know why. Is it for bragging rights? Does he want something from Jesus? Is there a spark of faith deep inside him that is just curious to see what this man is about? We don’t know. We just know that he wants to see Jesus. So first he tries to get with the crowd. But he’s too short to see over them and too disliked to make his way through them. Rejected by the “with” of community, he tries a tree. 

He’s so desperate for some kind of with that he ignores all propriety, eschews the behavior associated with his social status, and climbs a tree, like a little kid, like when I was young and would stain my fingers with all that mulberry juice. Finally, he can see. He can see Jesus coming down the road, but he’s still separate, still alone, still tall in finances but short in everything that matters. 

“Come down from that tree,” Jesus says. “Come down.” Come down from all your prestige and social climbing, come down from your greed and your power and come have dinner with me. What a perplexing thing to do. Jesus, of lower status, a scruffy wandering ascetic who hangs out with the prostitutes and the lepers and the outcasts, invites himself over to Zacchaeus’s house for dinner. 

This upends all the social standards of the time. Zacchaeus should be the one asking Jesus over for dinner. And then Jesus will be indebted to him, and Jesus will have to find some way to pay him back. That’s how the social world is set up at this time. That’s what Zacchaeus expects. A this for that. A quid pro quo. You do something for me and I am indebted to pay you back. It’s a barter system. The beginnings of a capitalist economy. Jesus should want the prestige of having Zacchaeus over for dinner, not the other way around, and yet, here he is, rudely inviting himself over to Zacchaeus’s house, expecting all the honor and hospitality that comes with it. 

See, I think that Jesus returns Zacchaeus’s “with.” Jesus is with Zacchaeus. And the crowd is outraged. This is not at all what they have come to expect of Jesus. Out of all the lowly and struggling, out of all the pious and holy, out of all the people in that crowd who deserve to have Jesus over for dinner, Zacchaeus is the least worthy. And that’s what makes all the difference. Jesus is once again turning the tables on us all. Just when we think we’ve got Jesus figured out, just when we think we know what to expect, Jesus flips it around. He offers his “with” to the people we all love to exclude. 

Again, my commentary states, “Luke’s audience might assume that the wealth and those who rule are out, sinners and tax collectors are in. What then do we make of someone who is all of these things? […] In his characterization of Zacchaeus, Luke pulls the rug from under every cliche, every formula by which people’s status before God might be calculated.” Jesus saves those who are routinely excluded on every level.

Diana Butler Bass says, “The whole structure of society was based upon elites doing favors for those beneath them to secure political loyalty. In normal circumstances, Zacchaeus should have invited Jesus to his home. Once Jesus accepted Zacchaeus’s hospitality, then Jesus would owe Zacchaeus his gratitude, an obligation to repay the favor that had been extended to him. […] But Jesus undermined this whole gratitude business by inviting himself to Zacchaeus’s house. Jesus offered the gift of his presence to one who did not deserve it. This made Zacchaeus not a benefactor, but a beneficiary of a gift. Technically, Zacchaeus now owed Jesus something.” 

And the crowd grumbles. They gripe. They moan and complain. How dare Jesus spend time with their enemy? But Jesus isn’t done with Zacchaeus yet. Because Jesus upends the social norms and invites himself over to Zacchaeus’ house, he’s messed everything else up as well. Jesus has placed himself on the other side of Zacchaeus’s “with.” Zacchaeus isn’t alone anymore, he isn’t separate anymore, he’s not up in that tree or hidden by the crowd. He’s seen by Jesus, and when Jesus says he will eat with him today, Jesus is officially with Zacchaeus. And being seen and known by Jesus gets him to the point where he’s willing to lose everything he thought was worthwhile so that he can be on the other side of with. 

Zacchaeus responds with gratitude. His life is completely changed. Zacchaeus has found another way in his encounter with Jesus. No more tit for tat. No more quid pro quo. In fact, he goes above and beyond what he needs to do to make things right again. Butler Bass says, “Out of his sense of gratitude, Zacchaeus promised to give away half of his wealth to the poor and pay back all those whom he defrauded four times as much as he skimmed. Ultimately, it would have been impossible to give back this much money. Zacchaeus promised to bankrupt himself. In effect, he resigned his position. […] He got out of the tree - extricating himself from the Roman hierarchical structure of debt and duty.” 

And with this promise, he is suddenly with his community again. He has rejected his old paradigm and adopted an entirely new economy, from an economy of “what can I get” to an economy of “with.” Zacchaeus is back with. He’s back with his community. He’s back with his God. He’s back with himself. That’s what it means to be saved. God is on the other side of with. 

This is such good news for us, isn’t it?

Because just when we think of a way to exclude ourselves or one another, Jesus comes in and tells us to get down from that tree. Jesus invites himself over to our house. Jesus puts himself on the other side of our with. Jesus with us. Us with Jesus. This is salvation. 

Thanks be to God.