Among the best religious mugs or t-shirts I’ve
seen is this classic: “Jesus loves you, but I’m his favorite.” It’s a little sassy, I’ll grant you. But … what if that sentiment were true? Just indulge me in a little thought experiment.
Imagine that you are at the
center of the heart of the sovereign of the universe. Accept, just for a moment, that this is the
truth – that you are God’s favorite. What would it mean for you? How would it change your life if God loved you
more than anything?
I think something like this is what
happened to Zacchaeus in today’s Gospel story.
So, who is this guy? Well, Zacchaeus
is a parasite. He’s spent years growing
rich and powerful by helping the Romans suck the life out of his fellow Jewish
people. He himself is a Jew with a wonderfully
ironic Hebrew name, translating to “innocent” or “clean.” So, Mr. Clean here is a tax collector, someone
employed by the occupying Romans to bleed the people dry … and allowed to take extra
for himself along the way, skimming off the top. To make matters worse, Mr. Clean is the chief
tax collector there in the city of Jericho, so I imagine he's skimming from the
other skimmers, too. It’s the great
pyramid scheme of the ancient world, how imperial power enriched the people at
the top and incentivized the locals to participate in a corrupt system.
So, Mr. Clean is not a popular guy. In fact, to his neighbors, he’s even worse than
the Romans, having betrayed his own people by collaborating with the enemy. Don’t you wonder how Zacchaeus feels about
himself? I mean, he’s not an idiot; he knows
what he’s doing, just how dirty Mr. Clean really is. By the time he climbs that tree, wanting to
see this Jesus who’s setting everybody’s hearts on fire, Zacchaeus must have
spent years convincing himself the system enriching him isn’t his responsibility. I’m a cog in the wheel, he thinks. History is what it is, and the Romans are here,
stealing the land and profiting from the people. It’s just the system we’ve got, he thinks, so
I might as well get what I can.
But something’s eating at Zacchaeus. He’s heard about this amazing prophet
traveling around Palestine standing up to the religious leaders, standing up to
the Romans, performing miracles, speaking hope to these people he’s been
defrauding. Zacchaeus wants to see the
rising star, so he climbs a tree to get a better look at the visiting prophet. But it turns out, it’s Jesus who’s looking for
Mr. Clean. Amid the crowd of more-righteous
people, amid the pious folks who go to synagogue every week, Jesus looks up and
says to the collaborator, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your
house today.” I’m not sure who’s more
shocked – Mr. Clean or the crowd. Why does
the miracle-worker and social critic want to visit this traitor?
We don’t know what more Jesus may have
said, if anything. But this much we know
for sure: Jesus saw Zacchaeus, saw into his heart. Jesus embraced Zacchaeus as the child of God he
was, making it clear he was worthy of a divine encounter, even worthy of having
this prophet come under his own roof.
But the story’s focus is Zacchaeus’
response. Now, you could see this as Mr.
Clean making up for his sins, trying to buy his way out of condemnation: “OK,
Jesus, what’s it going to cost me to get right with God?” But I think the change goes much deeper than
that. Jesus has shown Zacchaeus that God
holds him at the center of God’s heart.
And if that’s true, then Zacchaeus’ heart has some changes to make in
response. Now, Zacchaeus knows he can’t
change this system that’s enriched him at the expense of his neighbors. He can’t change history or throw off Roman
rule by himself. But he can decide how
he will participate in it.
And having found his way home to the God who
loves him more than anything, Zacchaeus sees he can’t participate in the system
around him like he has been. If Zacchaeus
the traitor actually lives at the heart of God, then his own heart must be
remade in God’s image. His actions must be
true to his true identity. So, he decides
to follow the strictest requirement of the Jewish law, promising to make
restitution four times over to those he’s defrauded … which, by the way, is every
household in his community. But his
healing isn’t just about meeting a legal requirement. He also chooses to give half of what he has
to the poor – to the people unable to rise in a system that sees them as nothing
but a commodity, a source of labor and taxation. Zacchaeus now sees who he is, the one who
rests at the heart of God, so he aligns his own heart with that identity, loving
God and loving neighbor in response.
So, back to our Stewardship Season and
John Norton’s reflection on tithing. Yes,
a tithe means giving 10 percent, but it’s easy for us to get distracted trying
to figure out what rules we’re supposed to follow. Is it 10 percent of net or gross income? Does it include 10 percent of wealth, for those
of us whose lives include that concept?
Does it have to be 10 percent right now, or is God OK with us moving
toward giving 10 percent? Does all 10
percent have to go to the church? All
those are great questions for prayerful reflection, because each of those
questions will lead us closer to the heart of the One who loves us more than
anything. But I think God would probably
say something like this: Just do
something. Just start a journey of
giving, God would say. Just put yourself
forward so I can find you, God would say.
Let me heal your heart and show you the way home.
To me, that’s where Zacchaeus’ story and
our stories intersect. Those of us who
tithe, however we operationalize that concept, we do it not so much as an
obligation but as a sign to remind ourselves of that unfathomable truth, that God
loves each of us more than anything. We
know that the sovereign of the universe stops by to meet us in the everyday-ness
of our world – in whispers of the wind through falling leaves, in the beauty of
a sunrise painting the sky, in the love of a spouse or another best friend, in
the abundance of wealth that means we never have to know what hunger feels
like, in the abundance of love in the Body of Christ known as St. Andrew’s, and
in the abundance of love in the Body of Christ that we take in our hands each week,
reminding us that we are eternal beings momentarily inhabiting a transient world. We know all that, but it’s also easy to
forget. It’s easy to forget that, to God,
you are of utmost value and worthy of heavenly gifts.
So, to me, tithing is giving back to God
in a way that mirrors God’s giving to us.
It’s a gift that says, we want to align our lives with the reality that
God loves us more than anything, and that love is not something we can keep for
ourselves. When we know that we’re worthy
of God’s ultimate investment, we also remember that the same truth holds for every
other one of God’s beloved children.
And that’s how love changes the way we live. Like Zacchaeus, when we come to know the depth of God’s love, we can’t look the other way anymore when we benefit from systems that bless us while leaving others behind. When we know the depth of God’s love, we can’t assume anymore that we can just take whatever we want from the earth because it’s there. Ironically, when we know the depth of God’s love, that isn’t license to do anything we want. Instead, it’s power to live differently, outwardly and visibly aligned with the way of Jesus Christ, who wants nothing so much as to come and stay at your house and inhabit your life and heal your divided heart. When we experience his love, like Zacchaeus, we know deep down that a heart divided against itself cannot stand. But a healed heart stands with all those around it, giving richly to bless all those other beloved children, each of whom is also God’s favorite.
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