Homily - Thirty-First Sunday - Year C - The Story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10)

 

Our gospel reading ends today with teh phrase, "The Son of Man came to seek out and save the Lost."    "Save the Lost …", that has a nice warm sort of sound to it.  It reminds us the gospel is our good news.  We have sympathy for those who are lost, the lost seem kind of pitiable and it feels right to reach out to them and save them.  It reminds me of the old hillbilly proverb that, “Church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints!” 

 

Even the story of Zacchaeus has a homey, almost comical, kind of ring to it.  He was a very short man who quickly becomes a sympathetic character to us as we can just picture him trying to jump up above others to see Jesus just like the little kids will do at the Santa Claus parade in a few weeks here, to catch a glimpse of what all the excitement is about.  And yet, this seemingly gentle story has one of Jesus’ biggest challenges to us - buried right in the middle of it – and to the people of Jesus time, this story was more shocking than we can easily understand, living in freedom in our current day and age.

 

You see, Zacchaeus was a tax collector!  The reality of being a tax collector back then was that you were really little more than a state-supported thief.  The Roman overlords demanded a certain amount of income form each area they conquered and they franchised out the collection of that money to local people. 

 

These tax collectors would pay a fee for the privilege because they knew that the Roman authorities would let them get away with any kind of extortion as long as the Romans got what they expected.  The tax collectors would hire local thugs and criminals and even off-duty Roman soldiers to help collect and when they came to a house, they would take whatever they wanted, whether it was fair or not.

 

It was just like gangsters demanding protection money from local storekeepers.  Many people suffered loss and hardship and even beatings and death because of them.  They were hated by the people, particularly because they betrayed their own for money. 

 

Imagine how you would feel if the neighbour down the street who collects for the cancer society every year, suddenly showed up at your door with six large armed men and said, “I’m collecting for a different charity this year!” and just walked in to your home and took your most precious things while you stood by helpless, pinned against the wall by his henchmen.  When he left, you couldn’t complain to anyone for fear of reprisal, so you would just have to endure the bitterness of oppression and betrayal you would feel.

 

And then you hear that Jesus is coming!  Some are whispering that he is the Messiah, and you know that the Messiah is the one that the Holy Book promises will free us from our oppressors!  Then what happens, when he gets to your street, he walks by your family and he goes to visit with the man who robbed and cheated you.  Now can you begin to understand why the people started to grumble against Jesus?

 

And here is where the challenge of Jesus comes out in full force.  Because although the scripture says, “The Son of Man has come to save the Lost”, it doesn’t stop with this sympathetic phrase, “the Lost” because what that really means is that he has come to save the wicked, the despicable, the low-life scum of the earth, the cruel dictator and the heartless terrorist, those overcome with evil.  He wants them all back and here is where the real challenge of today’s story lies for us.  He wants the very people that we want to see punished severely to be forgiven and saved instead!  And that is a challenge.

 

What is ironic in this story is that Jesus, by his very presence, was able to turn the heart of Zaccheaus away from his life of crime and betrayal to one of charity and justice, and yet he wasn’t able to turn the hearts of his own followers away from judgement and spite to forgiveness and acceptance.

 

We will receive Jesus in the Eucharist here today, he comes to Mississauga today just as surely as he came to Jericho two thousand years ago, and we will have the chance to have him touch our hearts with his presence as the people of Jericho did.  Will we accept him as Zacchaeus did and immediately begin to change our ways or will we carry our anger back out into the world when mass is over, grumbling against Jesus for his readiness to accept those who we judge aren’t worthy.  In two thousand years from now, when the story of the people of St. Mary’s is told to our descendants, which role will we be playing, Zacchaeus or the grumblers.

 

I know it is not easy.  As a Deacon, I can tell you that the Deacons in our archdiocese have three principal ministries, to the sick in hospitals, to the aged in long term care facilities and to prisoners in our jails and penitentiaries.  I have heard many people say, “There are too few deacons and priests to even visit those good people in hospital who need comfort, why would you go see those horrible people in prison – they don’t deserve it – they had their chance, let them rot!” 

 

I would be lying if I didn’t say the same thought has occurred to me sometimes, when I wish I had more help with the aged residents at Sheridan Villa.  Yet remember the gospel two weeks ago when Jesus said, “You visited me in prison – you visited ME in prison - when you visited the least of my people!” and he might have said “when you visited the worst-behaved of my people!”  Could you find it in your heart to call up a prison chaplain and volunteer to go and visit a prisoner who has no other visitors, just to bring a sign of God’s love to the lost!  It is not easy to be a Christian!

 

When I was going through my formation program to become a deacon, we were at our mentor’s house one evening and he introduced us to a visitor.  The visitor seemed like a nice man and then he told us his story of how he had sexually abused his own children for years from the time they were 4 years old. 

 

As I listened to this awful story and heard how even though he had spent years in prison and in counselling, he still had these evil urges, he was trying to overcome them and asked us to pray for him, I thought, “Pray for him!?”  This was the kind of man that I used to swear that if I ever met I would take outside and beat to a pulp!  The worst kind of human dregs who deserved no respect and deserved to suffer!  Then I knew I had met my Zacchaeus!  Each one of us has to ask ourselves who is Zacchaeus for us, who is it that we want to see punished, that we hope Jesus won’t save!  And then we have to pray for them, that they will repent and come back. 

 

Jesus challenges our very foundations by befriending Zaccheaus!  Jesus loves our worst enemies!  Jesus does not condone what they do – he condemns it, Jesus does not give them permission to sin again but he forgives them if they ask, and finally as the first reading today said, “God does not detest anything he has made!” and we know that Jesus loves each person his Father has made and only wants them to be whole and good again.  Salvation has come to Zacchaeus!  Salvation has come for the Lost!  Salvation has come for all!

 

Are we angry at God for this!  Be honest, maybe we are!  Just like the people of Jericho, who don’t seem so unreasonable anymore, do they?  But remember, the gospel is the good news, and the good news is that this very promise of Jesus means that we can never do anything so awful, or be so lost, that we can’t come back to God.  No matter how viciously the world rejects us or punishes us, God still loves us.  Share your doubts with him when you receive him in communion, ask for his help to be forgiven, and to understand and forgive others.

 

Whether we are the lost because we sin, or whether we are lost because we judge those who are sinners, we can still rejoice that Jesus has come to save the lost.  Jesus has come to save us all.

 

- Deacon Steve