Why Don't We See Many Zacchaeus-like Conversions?

Zacchaeus was the gospel text this morning. Fear not! I am not going to give you my whole sermon here...just a few thoughts. What mainly struck me in the text was how rare it is to see Zacchaeus-like conversions. I'm specifically talking about how profoundly different Zacchaeus lives after he has met Jesus. Many of us know the story well as it a favorite for Sunday Schools.

Luke 19:1-10

1 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way. 5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. 7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, "He has gone to be the guest of a sinner." 8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount." 9 Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." (TNIV)

Zacchaeus responded to Jesus' invitation with radical repentance and restitution (which is arguably the true Jewish understanding of repentance..."You're sorry? Good. Now make it right again.") What I wrestled with in my sermon this morning was why this is so rare in the Church. It seems to me that if more of us responded as powerfully as Zacchaeus did, that our parishes would be overflowing with people who were in need. (Perhaps this is why many of our Anglican parishes in the Global South ARE overflowing!) Essentially, I argued this morning (talking as much at myself as to those gathered) that we often don't respond to Jesus like Zacchaeus did, because we haven't quite grasped what happened when we met Jesus. A conversion has taken place (we ARE in the Kingdom by grace through faith -- even faith as small as a mustard seed), but we haven't really seen the whole of the transaction. Through inattentiveness, hard-heartedness, or plain foolishness (that is always a possibility) we have missed much of the salvation-drama. Like the story of the burglar and Jesus:

A burglar watched as a family packed up their car and left for their family vacation. Confident that all was clear, he broke into the darkened house, only to hear a voice call out in the dark "I see you, and Jesus sees you." The burglar was startled, and responded, "who's there?" Again the voice called out in the dark, "I see you, and Jesus sees you." The burglar, now quite concerned, started shining his flashlight around until it rested on a suspended birdcage. The parrot inside said (in the same voice he had heard twice now) "I see you, and Jesus sees you." The burglar began to laugh. It was only a stupid phrase the bird had learnt. So he confidently flipped the lightswitch to illumine the room. But now he was shocked to see that seated below the birdcage was a large doberman pinscher. Suddenly the bird looked down at the dog and called out "attack, Jesus, attack!"

Can we begin to see what really happened when we met Jesus? I think Luke has placed the Zacchaeus story here as a prototype of what all conversions look like in some shape or form (is Zacchaeus not in many ways the prodigal son, or the counter-point to the rich young ruler?). Well, we can take our cues from the process Zacchaeus went through:

1) Zacchaeus knew he was wretched and hated. He had made his riches off the backs of his countrymen afterall.

2) But Zacchaeus heard the rumours about a man from Nazareth who was teaching a new way of living and demonstrating that way with deeds of power.

3) Zacchaeus did whatever was necessary to see this man (climbing a Sycamore tree was hardly the action suited to man of his wealth and standing).

4) And once he sought him, Zacch found that it was Jesus, in fact, who had been seeking him out. He was invited to host Jesus at his home (which in 1st century middle-eastern culture meant "full acceptance"). Jesus didn't tell Zacch to clean himself up before he accepted him. That is grace.

5) So, NO WONDER, Zacch responded the way he did! He responded because he recongnized just how amazing the grace of God in Christ Jesus is. And like another man (John Newton, the slave-trader turned slave-emancipator) who many centuries later found that kind of grace, I'm sure Zacch would sing out loudly his famous lyrics: "I once was lost, but now I'm found, was blind, but now I see"! Zacch saw how far down the Lord had reached to save this one lost son of Abraham. Having recognized just how much grace he had been shown, how could he not respond the way he did: Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.

If only we can see that this is exactly what happened when we met Jesus! Perhaps we'd see more radical responses like Zacchaeus!