Palm Sunday 2012, Luke 19:1-10

Good morning. Bob tells me I'm forgiven, so I guess for how I led this IKEA song. At any rate, we'll be taking a seasonal detour, as we typically do for today, often times called Palm Sunday, and next Sunday, Resurrection Sunday. We'll be looking at a couple of seasonally appropriate passages today and next Sunday. And then we'll return to our regular and ongoing study of Matthew in the Law and Grace series. So at any rate, thanks, Wayne, for reading the passage for today. We'll be taking a look at that in a fair amount of detail. It'll be important as we go through it to look at the setting and some of the cultural background of this unique account. It's quite relevant, as you'll soon see.

We'll also be looking through how Dr. Luke, the author of this account, wrote in rather a pattern as he went through Luke and in some degree in the book of Acts as well. And that helps provide the setting and understanding of how Dr. Luke used the words in this passage. Now, Jesus told his disciples that he must be killed uh... by the gentiles and that took place in uh... luke chapter eighteen and be raised on the third day he had in fact been telling them that uh... all along and uh... salute luke eighteen thirty one two thirty four records that and uh... so he tells them in advance this is going to happen essentially multiple times and that on the third day he would rise again so did the disciples get it did they? no they were clueless Verse 34, But the disciples understood none of these things, and the meaning of this statement was hidden from them, and they did not comprehend the things that were said. That sounds like it's redundant again also as well.

Jesus was passing through Jericho, it says, on the way to Jerusalem with this in mind and with this as the future just about a week later. And the way it would be done is you'd start from Galilee, and you'd head towards Samaria, and then you'd go to the Jordan Valley, typically. Go down along the River Jordan to go around Samaria. That's some area, right? And then to go up, as we'll see, to Jerusalem.

And this is an example of the roadway. Wow. Hope you brought some water with you and hope you find some places to rest. So anyway, it gives you an idea what it's like. Here's the road from Jericho to Jerusalem, pretty steep. And this here is called the Wadi Kilt. Now that's different from a wadded quilt, right? Okay. Now, looking at the schedule for how things happen, this is the traditional chronology. Some others have proposed some others.

But on Thursday evening would have been what we call the Lord's Supper or the Lord's Table, essentially a Passover meal that was a handoff to the Lord's Table as we celebrate it. The next day would have been the crucifixion from about 9 a.m. till about 3. the next day in the tomb and on Sunday, a week from today as we look at it, the resurrection. Now something interesting, the church not long after the time of the New Testament established a way of putting Easter on the calendar and what they did is they said we're not going to do it at all the way the Jews do it so what happens is the Jews have their Passover and we have Easter and they kind of bounce all over This year, somewhat uniquely, will have Good Friday, and then Passover, and then Easter. So it will be in sync with the Jewish timing of things, and as would have happened in the New Testament. So you have those Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday events that we talked about. This would have been the Friday before Christ was crucified.

Most likely, there's some area of discussion in there, but as a good summary, that would be the case. Jesus was in Jericho a week before his death, so this would be the Friday before the Friday of his crucifixion. The one possibility Jesus may have stayed with Zacchaeus a few days, or he may have been in Jericho for a little bit and then got in contact with Zacchaeus. Okay, now one of the other things, it's real interesting, here's this Zacchaeus who is considered by the Jews being a tax collector for the Romans, a filthy man. But his name comes from a Hebrew name that means clean or innocent.

I'm sure that was something that caused them to raise eyebrows or snicker or something worse. This is pure irony because Zacchaeus was this chief tax collector for the despised Romans. Patriotic Jews considered the tax collectors for the Romans to be the worst of the worst. As a matter of fact, their way of saying it was somewhat equivalent to the scum of the earth. They thought them automatically guilty, automatically evil.

The phrase tax collectors and sinners shows up multiple times in the Gospels. Similarly, tax collectors and prostitutes, multiple times. And also references to an individual tax collector shows up a few times, including the one we'll be looking at today, Zacchaeus. Now there's some additional irony here.

While the Jews do tell a lie as a violation of the Law of Moses, as a matter of fact, a violation of what we call the Ten Commandments, right? Thou shalt not bear false witness, right? But, They considered it permissible to lie to a Roman tax collector if needed to protect your property. Lie and it's death penalty unless it's lying to a Roman tax collector. That's justifiable. Of course. So understanding this Dr. Luke's account of the interactions between Zacchaeus and Jesus is a totally shocking revelation. We'll see shortly there are even more shocking revelations to come. So here's Zacchaeus.

He was not just a run-of-the-mill average tax collector. No, he was a chief tax collector. Verse 2 points this out. I mean, he was a head of other tax collectors, a supervisor of tax collectors. He lived up to the infamy of his occupation by accumulating a great deal of money. As a matter of fact, the account says he was rich.

No doubt he'd heard about Jesus, and perhaps initially his interest was simple curiosity. But we're going to see in verses 3 and 4 that he was quite strongly motivated to see Jesus personally, whatever the challenge might be. So Zacchaeus' solution, as Jesus was being followed by a crowd of people, and as he was approaching and passing through Jericho, this Luke 18.36. So Zacchaeus' solution was to climb a tree, to see.

Now, some of you may be thinking, well, Jericho, I thought that was the city that got destroyed. Yes, it's in the same area, the Old Testament city that was destroyed by Joshua and by the Lord's miraculous action. That city still remains a heap to this day, but nearby Right nearby is New Testament Jericho. As a matter of fact, we have on the bottom of the screen there modern Jericho, which is sort of a resort city. It is way below sea level and stays quite warm and there's plenty of air there. It's not like Colorado air, right?

So, since Zacchaeus was small in stature, that posed a large problem. And his solution was to run, climb, in order to see Christ. So far as we can tell, that's all he initially had in mind, is just to see Christ. Zacchaeus would get into a place where he could see Christ over the crowd, and then when Christ would come by the tree, then Jesus would be there and Zacchaeus would see Him. That was his plan. Here is an example of a sycamore tree in the Middle East, a rather larger one, generally in the vicinity of where this might have taken place. Another one here by water. So the first part of verse 5 shows that Achaeus had this resourceful strategy of climbing a tree in a place where Jesus would certainly pass by. And as long as just seeing Jesus was the ultimate goal, that would certainly get it done.

Zacchaeus was about to find out that his was not the only plan that day. Jesus had some plans that would change Zacchaeus' day big time, and his life, and his eternity. With the crowd around, how did Jesus know to look up to see Zacchaeus? Very interesting. How did Jesus know Zacchaeus name.

Was it a miraculous revelation? Or had Jesus asked or even asked about his name? With a great many of the people in the crowd pressing around Jesus, at least since the beginning of the time he'd come into Jericho, why take note of a very short, socially and morally rejected man up in a tree? That's very interesting, isn't it? I'm not sure I have the answers for all these, but the Lord does.

Here in verses five and six, and you have this pattern on your handout here as well, when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for today I must stay at your house. And he hurried and came down and received him gladly. So Jesus' command to Zacchaeus in verse five was to come down and hurry was to tell him, be quick about it. Don't just kind of eventually come down, do it right now.

Zacchaeus' action in verse 6 is a direct response, even to the point of matching words, not only in English, but in the original language. He did exactly as Jesus said. It tells us, by saying he received him gladly, that was the attitude of Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus, you can imagine, was, and this might be an understatement, pleasantly surprised. So Jesus said, hurry, and he also said today, not like, hey, in a few days I'm going to do this, or sometime this week. Not even, I'd like to, but this is going to happen.

You must do it. Zacchaeus had not been, so far as we know, given any advance warning, and by sundown, assuming the timing of things is correct, it would be Sabbath. So that would be another reason to hurry, right? In order to comply with the Sabbath rules, he would have to really hurry in order to get everything done and do no work on the Sabbath. It may even have been later in the day, we don't know, making time of the essence. Hurry, get down and start preparing because I'm coming to your house.

We might not catch the significance of what Jesus was saying, that he must stay at Zacchaeus' house. In the Jewish culture, It was thought that to eat with someone evil was to participate in their crimes and to be a co-conspirator and an accessory to their crimes. And of course, being a tax collector was the worst of the worst and the scum of the earth. Jesus says, I must stay at your house.

That's amazing. This must was used as a pattern throughout the gospel of Luke. for something that God required. Isn't that interesting? So when Jesus said, I must stay at your house today, it's something God intends and requires that I stay at your house today. Of course, Jesus being, in fact, God, that makes a fairly direct statement, right? So we have this pattern, and you have it on page two of your slides, this pattern of God requiring something from Luke 2, 48, 9, 22. and 1725. The last two of those references being Jesus telling him in advance about how he must be crucified. So, the crowd, what do they think about this? The crowd when they see Jesus looking up, Zacchaeus, I must stay at your house today! Are they happy about this? Clapping? Hooray! Not so much, right?

He's going to stay at the house of the sinner. Verse 7 is at once significant Pivotal and totally predictable. So let's move in for a closer. Look The crowd hasn't been mentioned since a brief reference there in verse 3. It said that they were traveling with Jesus now what we hear about the crowd what the crowd saw and what they say in response and What they then said to each other the crowd could not have missed what had just happened Think about it, Zacchaeus was up in a tree where he could see Jesus, but everybody could see him, especially when Jesus called out his name. And to speak over the crowd, he may have spoken even more loudly. So, Dr. Luke uses a word called an onomatopoeia, and by the way, that'll be in the test afterwards, okay?

So, get that. Onomatopoeia, it's intended to imitate a sound, like we would have a sound like cuckoo, right? It's imitating a sound, that's our word, or sizzle, right? Now, so this is a word that is used there, diagonguzo. That's the idea of... That's a crowd grumbling noise. Right? So grumble, grumble, grumble. That's the crowd. Here's Jesus. I must stay at your house today. And people are... You're kidding. You've got to be... What a disgusting thing. Right?

So the buzzing of person to person in conversation, this moving through the crowd with an overtone of negativity is passing through the crowd. The brief exchange between Zacchaeus and Jesus had impact. And at least for the crowd, it was not a good one. What was he thinking? Before we skip over the hugely important small words in this verse, let's take a look at the key word, all.

Ever heard, everybody's doing it, right? Yes, they were all doing it. The grumbling among those in the crowd was universal. Everybody's doing it. Dr. Luke said they all responded alike. The grumbling rumbled through the crowd. What's puzzling is they all passed negative judgment on the one who would one day judge them all. How much does the crowd's opinion, even when it's unanimous, actually matter? So, Zacchaeus isn't just a sinner. He is a sinner, right? You see here that Zacchaeus' place as the tax collector was virtually equal to being a sinner as they thought he was the one who sins habitually by a fundamental character.

You can't get any worse than that. My second son Ed is a prison guard in Nevada and he recently changed roles there. He previously was in a place where every shift that he went in to work, he was in charge of Nevada's worst of the worst. Guys so bad you can't even let them out of their cell. And if you go into the cells, you have to go in with several people ready to do some fighting and being careful that you don't get injured.

Zacchaeus was looked upon like that. He was the worst of the worst. really, really awful. The only thing he was, he wasn't in a prison cell. But he should have been. So they thought. So verse 8 says that Zacchaeus stopped in the New American Standard, stood in the King James, implying that he said this right away in response to the crowd. Now, it may be, and some have suggested that Zacchaeus stood later on to speak after he had talked with Jesus and his disciples, and perhaps over a meal. And that may be the case.

But the language here doesn't require that. Either case, what Zacchaeus said was very likely not a private declaration. Now, here's an important cultural insight. Even if this happened later on around a meal, it wasn't private. We might think that Zacchaeus and Jesus went from a public gathering in the crowd, and then when he stayed at Zacchaeus' house, that they were able to speak in private.

That's not the case. Because in Jewish culture of Jesus' day, people, even crowds, often gathered to watch others eat. and to listen in on conversations, and make comments, and interact with those eating. Ah, I see what you're eating. Is that good? Could I have some? Yeah. And you, oh, look, he ate that. Ew. See? And they would make comments. Can you imagine that?

They would make comments, and you'd have people around the doorway, people looking in the windows, people even coming into the room. And that was considered normal behavior. So even if Zacchaeus made these statements at home, in his house, it would be normal for all kinds of people to be looking in and standing around and watching and commenting and asking questions and things of that sort. Even to the point where it was hard for people to get in and out of the house. So that would be normal. The bottom line is, whether it's out in the crowd or in Zacchaeus' house, either way, this is a very public statement for Zacchaeus to make. He spoke in a public forum with a number gathered, no matter how this came about.

Now, the other offers of giving half in scripture were made in a public forum by royalty. Isn't that interesting? We read, for example, the king of Persia doing this with Esther. We read of Herod Antipas doing this, as recorded in Mark. Up to half the kingdom was the normal way of saying it.

Now, Zacchaeus tells of his intent to restore dishonest gains to people, and he gives two numbers to work with, as well as giving to the poor. He will start by giving half of what he has to the poor outright. He's a very rich man. half to the poor. Then he says he'll restore four times as much as any taxes taken dishonestly.

Now what's very interesting, this will take a lot of digging through a bunch of Roman tax records to accomplish, and he's a chief tax collector, so this is a lot of records to go through, and he didn't have a laptop, and he most certainly didn't have an emperor version of TurboTax.

Not that. Now here's another interesting cultural background. The rabbis taught that it was not prudent, it was not wise to give away more than 20% of one's possessions. Why? Because if you did that, you might not be able to remain self-sufficient. And so the rabbis cautioned against giving away more than 20% of your income, and he doesn't care about that. He says, I'll give away half to the poor. Now, As for paying back four times anything taken dishonestly, that was, according to the Law of Moses, the rate of restitution if you stole sheep. So, very interesting. This is like an open admission that, yeah, I've done something. But there's also a big if here. And the big if is this.

He says, if I have defrauded anyone, and the original language Greek that he spoke that in implied this. If, and it is assumed to be true, that I have defrauded anyone, okay? So Zacchaeus isn't denying or casting in doubt that he's been dishonest with people. He says, yes, I have. He's openly saying that it's assumed to be the case. He was, in fact, dishonest with people. And he's going to pay it back four times what he took. What does Jesus say? Salvation has come.

Being a tax collector was looked upon with such disfavor in the Jewish culture, it was assumed the tax collector was guilty. He is guilty to the core. You know, we have this innocent until proven guilty. It was the other way for tax collectors. They're guilty until proven innocent, right? So, the tax collector could be proven and publicly declared not guilty, and Jesus did exactly that after Zacchaeus' public declaration. Now, was Zacchaeus innocent? No. Zacchaeus himself said he was not.

But what had he done? He had done restoration in order to resolve the problem. He had dealt with the issue, right? Now, we have a question here. Why is it that we hear salvation announced without hearing that Zacchaeus trusts, believes, or has faith? Hmm. Do we have a problem? Do we need to get our Bibles out? Do we need to scramble through the pages? Well, let's take a look. We've been presented here with what was actually a faint outline. In fact, more conversation may have taken place and very likely did. And what was actually said went way beyond what is recorded here in this brief outline by Dr. Luke.

Nonetheless, in the typical Jewish mindset there was an obvious logical connection between being a Jew and daily living out the law. We talk here at Holly Hills about our position in Christ, about who we are in Christ and who Christ is in us. We talk about our position that it is fixed and unchanging. The Jews didn't have to worry about explaining that because they knew, I'm a son of Abraham. I am of the people of Israel. Their position was fixed.

That you would live out the law as a result was a fairly automatic conclusion. Placing one's faith in God was expressed in living out the law, the law of Moses. The law of Moses and the Old Testament prophets also told repeatedly of the Son of Man, the Messiah. So faith among the Jews was expressed through obedience to the law and hope in the Messiah.

But Jesus also said he too is a son of Abraham and I think that's where he's talking about faith. Jesus declares that he is to be a son of Abraham. In terms of his genealogy, that was already true, so that can't be what Jesus is talking about. Abraham was not under the law of Moses, but the faith of Abraham was accounted to him as righteousness, apart from the law. Very important. So beyond being a physical son of Abraham, which Jesus said didn't matter much anyway, Zacchaeus was a son of Abraham in the sense that he had placed his faith in God. That's why Jesus could say this truly is a son of Abraham.

Not just about his genealogy, but him having put his trust in God. That's the reference to faith there. Jesus talks in his passage about the Son of Man. That's a phrase out of Daniel 7, 13, and 14. It refers to the Messiah. the Christ, the Messiah, as he will come and reign in the Millennial Kingdom and forever after in the new heavens and new earth. Jesus often called himself the Son of Man.

This is only one instance. And he says, therefore, the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. And so it makes reference that that's exactly what Jesus was doing and that the expressions of faith on the part of Zacchaeus meant that he had been sought after. And was he not deliberately sought after? His name was mentioned. Zacchaeus, okay? Talking about you. He came to seek and to save that which was lost. He had sought him out. He had sought out Zacchaeus. And Zacchaeus, by expression of faith, was saved. These words draw upon what Jesus had said in Matthew 5, 24, 10, 6, and several other references that we give there.

And we have that, and I won't go through them, but the lost sheep is a common theme in the Gospels and in several passages there in the Old Testament. The lost sheep of the house of Israel. We have a slide here that says, your problem is you're not Jewish. If you're a Jewish, you wouldn't have those problems. You'd have other problems, right? God had worked through three primary groups of people in the working out of his eternal purpose. Gentiles, Jews, that is Israel and the church. Gentiles are simply non-Jews, right? Those who are not Jews. Since the account in Luke here that we just read is so much about Christ's singular ministry to one particular Jew in Israel, what part of that applies to us here in the church? Did we just read a nice Jewish story? Or is there something that we can take home?

Well, let's talk about that. First of all, God isn't just dealing with grand sweeps of things. You know, a lot of times we might think, well, you know, God's so busy causing a tornado over here and causing some famine over here and causing this to happen in this group and causing people to move forward, and He doesn't really have time for me. Well, what does this story say? Does God have time for you?

Most certainly. Here is a guy that nobody else would give the time of day to, and Jesus looks up and calls his name out personally and says, Hurry and get down. I'm going to spend time at your house today. There were lots of other people around, but he picked out Zacchaeus. And you know, we are here as a church body, but he cares about you personally. He cares about you personally. Zacchaeus was in a tree for a passing look. But Jesus was pursuing personal fellowship with one man. That's Achaeus.

You may recall this passage out of Revelation 2.17.

To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna and I will give him a white stone. I'll talk about that in a minute. Give him a white stone and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it. A white stone was given as a pass to the victor's banquet in an athletic competition.

So what's he talking about here? There is a relationship and an identity between you and the Lord that is known only between you and the Lord. The Lord is going to have a relationship with you that will be like no other. Individually you. That's what he's talking about. The Lord cares about you, not just the mass of us as a group of people. Each and every one he cares about. Your new name, a name known only to you and to him because you will have a unique relationship with him forever.

Ah, yes, the crowds, the grumbling crowds. The crowd may get in the way of our beholding the Lord Jesus Christ. The crowd may not like it, in fact. The opinion of the crowd may well be in direct opposition to what God has in mind for us as well as for Himself. By outward appearance, the crowd was close to Jesus and was even moving along with Him. You can get that. The crowd is close to him, physically, moving along in the same direction as he was. But looking, appearing close to Jesus was not the same thing as being close to Jesus. What everybody else is doing is not a good indicator. And just because everyone else is doing it doesn't mean that there is intimacy with Christ. The other thing is that Jesus referenced to a son of Abraham. This is something that the Apostle Paul points out in Galatians 3, 6, and 7.

Even so, Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. It's out of Genesis 15, 6. Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham. Jesus' comment was not just Zacchaeus, you are descended from Abraham, but you are a son of Abraham by faith. That's what's happened today. by faith. Zacchaeus was the son of Abraham because as an ethnic Jew he had expressed his faith in Jesus as the Messiah. We are now sons of Abraham by faith in Christ apart from the law of the Jews.

The Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled his appointed ministry among those of Israel on that day there in Jericho as he came among those of Israel that day as he came into the earthly life of a lost Jewish man named Zacchaeus, restoring him among Israel, among those who believe. In just a week, Jesus would fulfill a necessary ministry to all fallen humans, all those in Adam, by dying on a cross. And in doing so, he would take upon himself the sins of the whole world, including yours and mine. You see, by birth, by physical birth, God gave the Jews a door of opportunity by faith for spiritual position based on their own earthly ethnicity.

That faith was to be expressed in living the law in their daily condition. We in the church by spiritual birth, by faith, have been given an eternal position in the heavenlies. In Christ, it is apart from the law. We're not under the law or any part of it. Faith is expressed by Christ's life in and through us in our daily condition.

You see, Jesus said to Zacchaeus, the lost Jew, hurry and come down. Is that what he says to you? No. To you, he doesn't say hurry and come down. Jesus says to you, the church saint, stay right here where you've been seated, up here with me. Stay right here where you've been seated, up here with me. Don't hurry and come down. There's no reason to. I've put you there. Let's pray.

Lord, we are thankful for what you have done. We see you having worked in the life of Zacchaeus in an extraordinary way. And in fact, you have worked in each of our lives in an extraordinary way. What an amazing thing that Zacchaeus was told to come down. And we were placed miraculously up there in the heavenly seated with you. And we thank you for that marvelous, awesome privilege, that blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. We thank you for it in Jesus' name. Amen.