November 3 & 4, 2007 - Looking for the Wee Little Man

Sometimes the easiest part of my week is writing a sermon. Words come together as if you had just come from a coffee chat with God where you learned some fascinating new things about the kingdom of heaven and you simply write down the stories. The earth is crammed with heaven after all. You look around and you see God around every corner. It’s like a trip to the zoo where you walk all around the God exhibit and take pictures from every angle. You see things clearly. God’s message of love and grace just makes sense. Those moments make for great weeks and easy-to-write sermons. And then there is this week…lots of extra things on the schedule and some unexpected turns. I was on the phone a great deal, wheeling and dealing with turkey farmers who were interested in taking the leftover pumpkins. There’s no class about this in seminary. There were extra meetings, trips to the hospital, letters of recommendation to write for our young people, unexpected office interruptions, family staying at our home from out of state, Spiderman, Sponge Bob Squarepants, and all other sorts of candy goblins showing up at our house on Wednesday, and the list goes on. You know how these weeks can be… you live them too. And so, when I knew I had a break in my schedule, I holed up in my office, shut the door, muted my phone, and turned out the light to see if I could see the kingdom of heaven anywhere in my office in order to write a sermon.

I closed my eyes and had a friendly competition between inhale and exhale to clear my mind… exhale always wins. I opened my Bible to the selected lectionary passage for the weekend. It was the story of Zacchaeus from Luke’s gospel. I smiled and may have even sung out loud a little, the song about this wee little man that I always sang when I was a kid. I got out my study commentaries and some of my favorite books that I thought might relate and spread them out across my office. I thought I was going to get somewhere with this sermon writing but apparently it was not meant to be. A man peered into the darkness of my office window and even though the lights were off he could see me. He knocked on the door and I had to answer it. He was dressed in a nice suit and slipped into my office when I opened the door. He introduced himself by saying, “My name is Zach and I’m from the IRS.” Don’t you hate it when that happens? When people introduce themselves and immediately tell you what they do in the same sentence, you know you’re in trouble. I asked what I could do for him and his response was strange. His car had broken down outside the church and he was running some very important errands that couldn’t wait for him to get transportation on his own so he wondered if I could drive him around to complete the remaining errands on his list. There was more to the story but that was the gist of it. Looking around my office at my books and the kingdom of heaven that was served as a cubicle sized commodity in my office, I knew I wasn’t going to get anything written. So, I negotiated with him. I would drive him around to complete these errands if we could fill his car with pumpkins. Remember, there is no class about this in seminary. I grabbed my pile of books assuming I could read and prepare for the sermon when the man was inside taking care of business.

So Zach and I leave church in my 1996 Honda Civic that is about sixty percent held together by duct tape and though it purrs like a cat that has sung in smokey night clubs for twelve years, it still purrs. Zach and I began exchanging pleasantries. I felt a little awkward about driving this stranger around but he seemed safe enough. He was carrying a Bible, his checkbook, and a list. As we drove toward our first stop, I was telling him about the sermon I needed to write and he asked me what passage I was using. He thumbed through the pages of his worn Bible to Luke and began reading it aloud. We both chuckled a little once we made the connection that Zach the IRS agent was reading about Zacchaeus a tax collector. Zach went on to ask, “Why is it that whenever Jesus sits down to eat with someone, the biblical writer always has Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners? As if tax collectors and sinners were always paired together. How would you like it if it always said, ‘Jesus was always hanging with the riff raff, you know, ministers and sinners.’” I see your point, I said. I went on to share that tax collectors were considered among the greatest thieves and traitors because they collaborated with the super-power Rome and could set their own tax rate above that which they had to pay to the government. Because many tax collectors took advantage of this unfair system they were often very wealthy. Zacchaeus was the chief tax collector which made him, in some ways, the king of thieves and perhaps the king of all sinners. I could tell this made him feel better.

We pulled up to a house. It was kind of rough looking outside. There was an old car sitting out front with the classic dice hanging from the rearview mirror. I thought it was strange that Zach needed to stop here. They didn’t seem to be in the same class as this man or certainly worth the need to make this stop today instead of another time when his own car was fixed. You know how this works. You likely feel that some people are more deserving of your immediate attention than others and it is usually because of what that person can do for you instead of what the true need happens to be. We tend to rank people in terms of their value to us and this didn’t seem like a place that could offer Zach anything, but he got out and went in. He asked me to come with him, but I didn’t feel comfortable doing that so I stayed in the car and read from my commentary about the story of Zacchaeus.

It was a fascinating part of the story line in Luke’s gospel. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem where he would ultimately find his death on a cross. But on the way, we see him reaching out to people that are unassuming; people in need. There was the story of the good Samaritan, the rich young ruler, the dishonest steward, the unjust judge, the prodigal son, the healing of the blind man… all along Jesus sharing stories about the Kingdom of Heaven and about his fate of the cross and yet none could see. Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem takes him through Jericho, a place he did not intend to visit but pass by. Crowds had begun to travel with him and around him and Zacchaeus must have learned of this and went out to see for himself.

This is where Zacchaeus gained his wee little man status. How would you like to have that designation for all of history? As the crowd, with Jesus in the middle, is passing by, the text says that Zacchaeus “was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature.” At a closer look, is it Zacchaeus that is short or is it actually Jesus? You English majors can help me break down this sentence structure. Many scholars have suggested and accepted that Zacchaeus was not a wee little man at all but instead it was Jesus who was “short in stature”. If you examine the sentence closely you can see how that may have been interpreted. Bible scholars suggest that this would fit nicely with Luke’s attempt to keep Jesus as the humble King, an unassuming Savior.[1] Matthew’s gospel, the priestly gospel that brings the three kings to the manger to visit Jesus and has Jesus delivering the Sermon on Mount creates this tall, handsome, television worthy Son of God. Luke’s story brings the dirty and lowly shepherds to the manger and has Jesus preaching the Sermon on the Plain instead. Having a short, face-for-radio Jesus would be fitting for Luke.

It was about that time that Zach returned to the car. He was smiling as he got in and we pulled out to go to the next stop. He crossed something off the list. I didn’t ask any questions. As I put my book down in the backseat, Zach asked me what I was reading. I shared with him what I shared with you and we both agreed that we couldn’t mess with one of the greatest children’s church songs of all time so Zacchaeus would remain the wee little man for now. I told him I was just getting to the point in the story where Zacchaeus was scurrying up the sycamore tree. “Pretty demoralizing, don’t you think?” I said to Zach thinking of this grown man, wealthy as could be, climbing a tree to see another man pass by. How many of you would humble yourself to the point of crawling up a tree in your best suit in front of your coworkers or employees in hopes of catching a glimpse of another man? We aren’t that comfortable talking about our faith in Jesus to those we work with let alone going to this extreme. It may be that we’re too proud to admit that we need Jesus. Maybe in our context it wouldn’t be climbing a tree but getting on our knees in a three piece suit in front a crowd… we couldn’t fathom that, could we? Because we are not that desperate. We get along just fine on our own. Our relationships are all great, our wit and smarts are more than enough, our killer instinct gets us by without needing any Savior to help us. Our egos are bigger than we might like to admit.

“Speaking of egos,” Zach said, “did you ever see that Volkswagen commercial that combined the whole environmental effort to “go green” with image consciousness?” (I hadn’t seen it.) The commercial suggested that everything has a reading on the The Ego Emissions Index. The Ego Emissions Index is a 1 to 100 rating scale that assigns an ego emission rating (“EE”) to almost anything you can imagine. Low EE items include dirt (18 EE), nose hair (13 EE), a butter churn (9 EE) and a paper clip (1 EE). On the high end, you have your saber-toothed tiger at an EE of 88. Bodybuilders (97 EE), celebrities (91 EE), and “your boss” (92 EE). The VW pitch was that if you buy the Passat, you get a car loaded with high-end German engineering but a car that emits low ego. You buy this car, you won’t be bragging, but you’ll love it.

It was a cute idea and we decided to give Zacchaeus an ego emission rating. We slightly disagreed but came to agree somehow on 93, guessing that this little guy exudes ego. Zach, acting like the movie preview guy with the low movie preview voice throws out this preview for a movie that could be called Looking for the Wee Little Man starring Danny Devito as Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus. This is a guy, not much bigger than a Smurf, with more ego than Donald Trump but with better hair. More ego than a Category 5 hurricane. And he’s about to meet someone with zero ego, who’s going to ask him to hang up his ego, and get a life. [2]

About this time, we pull up in front of the Damien Center downtown (a Christian outreach center designed to support persons with HIV/AIDS and to bring awareness to the cause). Zach popped out of the car while I stayed, worrying a little that I would never get around to writing a sermon. As I sat there, I wondered more about this whole ego thing. I wondered if Zacchaeus climbed the tree, not as a desperate act of humility, but instead to distance himself from Jesus. Maybe he wanted to see Jesus but not be too close to him. The tree allowed for a good view but he also didn’t have to worry about running into Jesus or confronting him head on. That’s something we all probably feel sometimes. We like the “Jesus thing” from a distance but we don’t want to get too close. We want to see what’s happening but we don’t want to have to come face to face with Jesus. Doing so might mean we have to do something about our lives and we really don’t have time for those sorts of changes. If we had that kind of encounter with Jesus we might have to volunteer more at the church, or get involved in a Bible study, or adopt a child named Ndugu from the television ad for $23 a month because we were now convinced that every child is a child of God and when we have plenty and others have nothing, that is not part of God’s plan. Having an eye to eye meeting with Christ might require me to change the way I treat my wife, my kids, my coworkers, and my in-laws. It might require an attitude modification or make me pray more often or reconcile with a friend I betrayed. Brushing shoulders with the Savior might make me want to tithe to my church, or start a new ministry, or volunteer at the pumpkin patch. Sometimes, it’s easier to blend in. To slip into worship or climb up a tree, to see what Jesus is up to but not to get too close.

Zach hops back into the car, grinning again like he was when we left the last stop. I still decided it was not my business so I didn’t ask what that stop was all about. I saw him mark off another item on the list as we pulled away from the curb and headed on to the next destination. I shared with Zach my idea about Zacchaeus trying to separate himself from Jesus and that notion didn’t fly with him. He suggested that Zacchaeus just wanted to get a different perspective on this man Jesus. It’s like the movie Dead Poets Society with Robin Williams,” he said.

You may remember that Mr. Keating, who is an English teacher at a New England prep school for boys, is trying to break the traditional mold for how these boys see the world. For years they have worn the same uniforms and studied from the same classic curriculum in the same manner that had been taught for decades. Mr. Keating’s personal mission is to create freethinkers out of these boys who’ve been trained to walk in lockstep. In one of his unconventional lessons, he jumps up on his desk at the front of the class and explains that he’s standing on top of his desk to remind himself that we must constantly look at things in a different way. “You see,” he explains, “the world looks very different from up here.” He then instructs the boys to come up and stand on his desk, one at a time, and look at the room from a different perspective than they’ve ever seen it before. They were hesitant and nobody wanted to be first or look silly but they began to do it and you could see on their faces how this understanding that things do look different from a different perspective. Zach said that’s what Zacchaeus was doing and it would be good for us to do the same. Sometimes a different perspective is what it takes for you to see Jesus for who he truly is.

As we journeyed back towards the Geist area, Zach and I talked about this, we talked about that, and then we talked about “it”. What’s the list all about, Zach? “I’m surprised you’re just now asking,” he said. “I created this list of people and organizations that I had taken advantage of when it came time for them to pay their taxes. The first house… a single mother with three kids who is struggling to get by. The Damien Center… I manipulated the system and charged them for extra things which I didn’t report and just skimmed off the top for myself. I’m making things right.” “So this is like a My Name is Earl episode or something,” I said. “Something like that,” he said. Just then I got a glimpse at the list and wondered if my name was on it. My property taxes did seem to blow up this past year so maybe I made the list. Before I had time to say anything else, we pulled into our church parking lot and I thought my job was done and I could get back to sermon writing. But as I tried to say goodbye to Zach, he said he actually wanted to come into the church for a minute to make sure things were ready. “Ready for what?” I asked. “Ready for company,” he said. “You see I convinced that single mother of three and the families I saw at the Damien Center that they should come to church here next Sunday.” And I said, “Oh, well, that was nice of you but I’m not sure they would feel comfortable here…our people don’t hang dice in the mirrors of their cars and people in our congregation don’t deal with issues like HIV and AIDS. I’m not sure if they would fit in.” “Fit in?” he asked. “Your church follows Jesus, right?” “Well of course we do,” I replied. “How would Jesus fit into your congregation? He was kind of a scandalous misfit. That’s why he climbed a tree and was crucified… because he didn’t do all of the right things… He lived what was true but not what was deemed right by the culture. And look who followed him…. people who didn’t fit in. Fisherman, tax collectors (there I am again), lepers, outcasts… misfits. He transformed the world with a bunch of misfits. What about Zacchaeus? He was a misfit too. People hated him… he was a fraud, a liar, a selfish, cutthroat businessman but he sought Jesus and Jesus sought him. Did you know that Clement of Alexandria, a great historian and teacher in the church not far removed from the time of Jesus wrote in his book Stromata that Zacchaeus was actually surnamed Matthias and was the very man who replaced Judas Iscariot as one of the twelve disciples?”[3] “No, I didn’t know that and you can’t know that for sure,” I said. “You’re right,” he said.

“But is it too hard to believe that you don’t have a Zacchaeus or two or three or many sitting in your congregation right now? Just waiting to have an eye to eye meeting with Jesus and be transformed too? Is it impossible to think that one who is worshipping in your midst, who has failed and cheated and lied might be redeemed and just might come to know forgiveness and go about changing the world they touch because they climbed a sycamore and saw the Savoir calling to them? Who is beyond redemption? The guy who struggles with pornography? The alcoholic housewife who hides her secret? The kid who stopped believing God cares after years of watching his parents fight with each other? The single mother who strips to make money and sits in the back row of the church so she doesn’t have to talk to anyone? Too messy to consider? Not if ‘the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost’ (v. 10) Remember, Zacchaeus was the biggest train wreck Jesus could find in town that day. Jesus is messy when it comes to loving people and if that is the Christ we follow, then it will be messy for us sometimes too. The real stories behind the suits and dresses in the pews would shock you. But a living God is just that kind of God…one that can still shock you. One that calls to any and all to follow him. Is that the kind of God you follow?” I was stunned still. Zach went on, “If it is that Jesus you follow, then sometimes you go against conventional wisdom. Sometimes you eat with the wrong crowd, you advocate for the wrong crowd, you pray with and love the wrong crowd, and sometimes you are the wrong crowd. Mark, you're emoting a significant amount of ego right now. Let your ego go and realize that you too are just a beggar of grace and when at your best, you are one beggar showing another beggar where to find bread.”

We chatted some more and I led Zach to his car that had been repaired while we were away. We loaded the pumpkins and he drove away. Zach reminded me of who I am… just a man lucky enough to have an encounter with grace, with Christ, and some people like this congregation to love me along the way. As I turned to walk inside, another car passed by and began honking at me repeatedly… a constant beep. I rubbed my eyes enough to see that it was not a car but the alarm clock next to my bed. My ride with Zach was all just a dream… but dreams aren’t all that bad. They can speak truth to us and this dream reminded me of my place in the kingdom. Perhaps it’s a dream for us all… one that checks egos at the door, that expects a face to face reckoning with Christ, that discovers the wee little man inside us all that finds salvation and in turn offers our best in humble service.

On my nightstand was a book I was reading before I went to sleep. I had highlighted these words. “In exchange for our humility and willingness to accept the charity of God, we are given a kingdom. And a beggar’s kingdom is better than a proud man’s delusion.”[4] You are given a kingdom…what will you do with it?

[1] Preaching Through the Christian: Year C. Craddock, etal. Trinity Press International. 1994. Pg. 460.

[2] How to Deal with Ego Emissions. Homiletics Online. Bob Kaylor, Senior Writer. Nov-Dec 2007 issue. This quote and Ego Emission info come from this source. Also some examples and ideas about Jesus’ “messiness” are inspired by this source as well.

[3] Stromata. Clement of Alexandria. This information drawn from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromata.

[4] Blue Like Jazz. Donald Miller. Thomas Nelson Publishers. Nashville, TN. 2003. Pg 86.