Turn with me in the New Testament to the 19th chapter of the Gospel of Luke. Luke chapter 19, we'll be reading verses one through 10. You will notice that Dr. Patterson is absent today. If you have been around here any length of time, you will notice that virtually every time I preach, he is absent. There is a reason for that. It can be summed up in one word, intimidation. And so, being the coward that he is, he's not here today. So be sure and remind him that I said that when he does return. But nevertheless, we're here. Thank you, Dr. Blazing, for the kind introduction. And we turn our attention to the 19th chapter of the Gospel of Luke, these 10 verses. and a very familiar passage of Scripture since your Sunday school days, if you were raised in church in Sunday school. We begin reading in verse 1, Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. There was a man named Zacchaeus. who was a chief tax collector, and he was rich. He was trying to see who Jesus was, but he was not able because of the crowd, since he was a short man. So running ahead, he climbed up a sycamore tree to see Jesus, since he was about to pass that way. When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, because today it is necessary for me to stay at your house. So he quickly came down and welcomed him joyfully. All who saw it began to complain. He's gone to stay with a sinner." Oh, my goodness. He's gone to stay with a sinful man. But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, look, I'll give half of my possessions to the poor, Lord, and if I have extorted anything from anyone, I'll pay back four times as much. Today, salvation has come to this house, Jesus told him, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost." You have to see Jericho to believe it. Situated in the lush Jordan Valley, 18 miles northeast of Jerusalem, it is the city of the palms. It is a beautiful city, an oasis situated in the midst of a desert, an oasis of lush greenery situated in the brown, barren desert. Jericho is a very interesting city. Archaeologists tell us that Jericho is the oldest inhabited city on the planet. They will also tell you that Jericho is the lowest city on the planet, situated 820 feet below sea level. But in the days of Jesus, Jericho was a popular place. It was the Palm Springs of Israel. It was the place where people would go to vacation. Many of the Roman officials would come during the winter months and vacation in Jericho. It was the place that King Herod had built a winter palace, a beautiful palatial residence where he would go also during the winter months and stay. Jericho has an amazing history, doesn't it? Joshua fit the battle of Jericho and the walls came tumbling down. Elisha sprinkled salt into the bitter water at Jericho, we are told in the Old Testament, and God performed a miracle and the water became sweet. Just behind Jericho you see the lofty crags of the Mount of Temptation where Jesus was carried by the Spirit to be tempted for 40 days by Satan. Jericho is a beautiful place. And it was to this place that Jesus was making his way from north to south on his way to Jerusalem. You see, one of the key things about the Gospel of Luke to understand is that beginning in Luke chapter 9 verse 51 and concluding in Luke chapter 19 verse 41, That material in Luke's gospel is what we call in New Testament studies the Lukan travel narrative. It is the account of Jesus traveling from north to south down the lush Jordan Valley to the last major city on his way up to Jerusalem. And he's coming through Jericho. And from Jericho, he would turn right and go up the wadi kelt, 17 miles up the winding, dangerous, robber-infested road to Jerusalem. And we're told by Luke that as Jesus was on his journey to Jerusalem, he passed through Jericho. And there was a man there. We're told his name right there in verse 2, his name is Zacchaeus. We are also told he was a chief tax collector and unsurprisingly we are told he was rich. You see, Zacchaeus was sitting atop a pyramid scheme. The Romans would enlist chief tax collectors over certain provinces to collect the taxes from everybody, including the impoverished Jews, and Zach had one of the three major tax collecting provinces, because all taxes were primarily collected in three places, Capernaum, Jerusalem, and Jericho. And here is Zacchaeus sitting upon the Jericho tax cartel. He's the kingpin of the Jericho tax cartel. He's got one of the big three. And he would have underlings, Jews under him as a Jew, who would also extort money from those Romans, from the Jewish people, to give to the Romans. And that's just the way it was in that day. And by the way, notice that Zacchaeus is not a tax collector. He's a chief tax collector. He's one of the big dogs. He's one of the guys that has all of these underlings who are working for him and he was hated by the Jewish people. The Jewish people despised literally all tax collectors because these were people who were turncoats. These were people who were traitors to their own people. These were the most unscrupulous, unprincipled, sorry dog kind of people who would turn on their own people and work for the Romans. That's what Zacchaeus was. He was a chief tax collector. He was hated. He was despised. Nobody wanted to have anything to do with him. He was the kind of person who was unscrupulous, who would do anything to get the money that he needed to extort out of his own people. He was considered a traitor. He was considered, in Jewish social status, as worse than a thief, worse than a murderer. The Jewish Mishnah said that if a tax collector came to you, you could lie about your assets in order to protect your estate. Everybody hated the tax collectors, and Zacchaeus was no different. He was a sorry kind of a person. He was a traitor. He was the kind of person who would, like a longhorn, sitting in the bleachers with other longhorns, but rooting for the Sooners. He was a traitor. He was the kind of person that everybody despised. Nobody wanted to have anything to do with this man, Zacchaeus. But we're told something else about him. We are also told in verse 3, he was a short man. In the days of Jesus, scholars tell us that the average height of a male was about 5 feet 5 or maybe 5 feet 6 inches tall. I can identify with old Zach, he is a short man. If you look at my driver's license, it will tell you that I am 5'7". But in reality, I'm probably 5'6 1�2", and I rounded that up just a little bit. And so I'm one of the members of the short club along with Zacchaeus. There's nothing wrong with being short. By the way, those of us that are in that category, Dr. Patrick and Aaron and Dr. Song, don't you just despise tall people? I mean, I think what I'm gonna do, Dr. Patrick, is we're gonna start a short scholars club here at Southwestern Seminary, and it has to be only for short people. Dr. Seberhagen, you're out of here. Dr. Walker, no way, no way. Dr. Bingham, need not apply. Short people. And here's Zacchaeus, and I'm sure that he's hated by everybody, you know. And I can imagine the local disc jockey at KJER there in Jericho every day would play Randy Newman's song. You remember Randy Newman's song from 1977, released in 1977, called Short People? And I can imagine the disc jockey playing Randy Newman's song. This one's for you, Zach. Short people got no reason. Short people got no reason to live. They got little eyes and little hands, and they go around telling great big lies. They got tiny little noses and tiny little teeth, and they wear platform shoes on their nasty little feet. No, I don't want no short people around here. I can imagine that was a song that was played for Zychus there in Jericho on KJER. Hey, if I were casting for Zychus the movie, you know who I would cast? Danny DeVito. A sawed-off little slimy social scoundrel with an Armani suit and a fat bank account. That's who I would get to play the role of Zacchaeus. Nobody talked to him. Everybody hated him. Nobody ever invited him to a wedding. Nobody ever named a child after him. Everybody in Jericho despised the chief tax collector named Zacchaeus. But one day, Jesus came to town. He's on his way to Jerusalem, and word goes out, and almost the whole city comes out to meet him. We read about it in verse 3, that he was trying to see who Jesus was, but he was not able to do so because of the crowd, since he was a short man. Can you imagine? There's old Zaki sitting at his computer. He's working on Keeping up with all of those finances and there's a commotion in town and Zach turns to a servant. Hey, what's going on out there? Why sir, haven't you heard Jesus is coming to town? And Zach said, well, you know, I've never seen Jesus and I've heard about him. I would like to see him. So he leaves his tax table and he makes his way to the city. But tons of people are out there, people 10 deep, and they're pushing and pulling and shoving and jostling for a spot. And everybody's come to see Jesus. I mean the gray beards on crutches and the babies in arms and everybody in between, and they're all pressing for a spot in order to see Jesus. And I can see little Zach, and he's trying to get in here. People see him coming, and they block him out. And he's trying to get over there, and he still can't get in. And so finally, we're told, Zach has a brilliant idea. There in town is a ficus sycamorous. You know it as a sycamore tree. It is a tree about 40 feet tall. It has a broad, short, fat trunk, and it has limbs that are low-lying and that are stacked one on another and that come out parallel to the ground. It is a perfect tree for climbing. And so Luke tells us that Zach ran ahead of the crowd since he was a short man. And in verse 4, he climbed up that sycamore tree to see Jesus when he was about to pass by. Can you get the scene? Here's the man. richest man in town. Here's the chief tax collector, the head of the Jericho tax cartel, and he wants to see Jesus so badly that he runs ahead of the crowd, scampering down the street, and he's scampering like a squirrel up the sycamore tree. And there he is on his perch as Jesus and the disciples are coming, and the crowd passes by. What a scene! Verse 5, when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and he said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, because today I must stay. It is necessary for me to stay at your house. Can you imagine the shock and the surprise on Zacchaeus' face when he heard his name uttered by Jesus? Why, he could not have been more surprised if the tree itself had called out his name. Zacchaeus, why, he must have had a De Niro moment. Are you talking to me? Are you talking to me? I'm sure he had that kind of a moment. And here he is. He's hearing his own name. Zacchaeus, you come down, for today I must stay at your house. Zacchaeus was a wee little man. A wee little man was he. Climbed up into the sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see. And it's amazing that Jesus would call his name and invite him down. Now, here's the interesting thing about Jesus. He's blind. God and Jesus both are blind to something. They are both blind to crowds. They only see individuals. Jesus doesn't see the crowds. He only sees Dean. He only sees Kyle. He only sees Dr. Song. He only sees Susan, Bill, John, Jennifer, Karen. He doesn't see crowds. He's blind to crowds. He only sees individuals. And He calls your name. He calls your name, yes, your name. And he said, I wanna stay with you. I want to fellowship with you. And that's what he said to Zach, and he called his name and he said, you come down shades of Bob Barker and the Price is Right. Zach kissed, come on down, because I wanna stay at your house today. Now, isn't that interesting? Stop for a moment. Is there anything that strikes you as odd about that? You see, it is impolite to invite yourself to be a guest at someone else's home. It is certainly proper etiquette and protocol to invite someone to be a guest in your home, but it is not polite for you to impose and to invite yourself into someone else's home. Hey, Scott, I'm coming to your house today. Get a room ready for me. Well, Scott would think I was crazy if I were to invite myself. Uninvited, just invite myself. That's not socially proper. And yet, Jesus invites himself to stay in the home of Zacchaeus. It's still 17, 18 more miles to Jerusalem. They would need a place, he and his disciples, to stay for the night. And so, Jesus asks to stay. It's impolite for anybody else to impose, but not the Son of God. And so he says, I must stay. I've got a divine mission, Zacchaeus, and you don't know it yet, but I must stay at your house. Things are going to happen, Zacchaeus. You don't know about it yet, but I'm going to do something wonderful for you. I must stay at your house. He was on a divine mission, as we will see in just a moment. Zach, I'm going to stay. Hurry and come down. I've got to stay at your house." Verse 6 says, he quickly came down, and he welcomed Jesus joyfully. What a day, but not the rest of the people. Oh, no, look at verse 7. All who saw it began to complain. He's gone to stay with a sinful man. My goodness. Doesn't Jesus know what he's saying? Why, he must have lost his mind. Nothing. would do more to disqualify a hearing for Jesus than for him to go and stay in the house of a chief tax collector. Oh, my goodness. Here is all of Jericho, and you can hear some of the men, can't you? There you have it. That's the way it works. Oh, the prophets, they tell you they're for the poor, but then they want to dine with the rich. And you hear the complaining. All of Jericho is snickering up their sleeve to think that Jesus doesn't have better sense than to invite himself into the house of a man in town that nobody else would touch with a 10-foot pole. That's exactly what happened. Oh, he's gone to stay with a sinner. Oh, my goodness. That's the way people are, isn't it? You know what's tragic is when that's the way church people are. When that's the way church people act. When people come and they don't look like everybody else, and they don't dress like everybody else, and they don't talk like everybody else. They're not our kind of people. Oh my, we have sinners coming into this church. Oh my goodness, goodness gracious. But Zach stood there, verse 8, and he says the most amazing thing to Jesus. He says, look. By the way, if you look in the Greek text, you'll see that word early on. Luke reuses that word early on in 19, one and two. And now you see it here again. It's very interesting. It's sort of like when your grandmother, if you grew up in the South like I did, and somebody unexpected comes for Thanksgiving dinner or Christmas day, and the doorbell rings and you open the, she goes to the door and she opens the door. And there's Uncle so-and-so who's come to visit from California. And grandmother says, well, lookie here. Look who's come, everybody. Here's something special. Here's something different. Here's something unusual." And with that word, Zacchaeus exclaims to Jesus in verse 8, "'Look, I'll give half of my possessions to the poor, Lord, and if I've extorted anything from anyone, I'll pay back four times as much.'" You talk about tax reform. That was the day that tax reform came to Jericho. Oh my goodness, can you believe it? That the greediest man, the most unscrupulous, sorry dog piece of slime has gotten saved. And the evidence that he's gotten saved is he said, hey, I've done not enough good and too much bad. And so Lord, I'm gonna solve both. by charity and compensation. I'm gonna give to the poor and the people I've defrauded, I'm gonna give back to them. Hey, by the way, when somebody who is a greedy so-and-so suddenly becomes generous, something has happened to his heart. And something had happened to Zacchaeus' heart. Now, whoa, be careful. If you're not careful, you'll go messing around in this text and you'll blow off a theological finger with a booby trap because you'll read this and you'll say, oh, if I give money, then I can be saved. Salvation is by works. Of course not. Salvation is by grace through faith alone. This is...Zacchaeus was not saved because he gave money. He gave money because he had been saved by the grace of Jesus Christ. Make sure you get the order right. Luke doesn't record all the details of this conversion, but we know the theology of salvation and conversion from all of the New Testament well enough to know that no one is saved unless they put their faith in Christ. And then they are saved. Salvation is by grace. It's not by works. And Zicchaeus was not saved because he gave money. He gave money because he was saved. And look at what he gave. He says, Lord, I'm going to give half my possessions to the poor. The Jewish rabbis said and the Pharisees said that you are somebody in Judaism if you give 20% of your income to the poor. Zacchaeus said, I'm not giving 20, I'm not giving 40, I'm giving half. Friend, you know somebody's been saved when that happens. And not only that, look at this, not only charity, but compensation. He says, and if I have extorted anything from anyone, well, you know he had. If I have extorted anything from anyone, I'll pay back four times as much. Zacchaeus knew his Old Testament. He knew that Exodus 22 verse 1 says that if you steal someone's sheep, you pay back four times. If you steal other things, you pay back that with 20%, or if you really wanted to show you were sorry for what you'd done, you gave back double. But the law says if you take somebody's animal, then you pay back four times. And Zach goes to the extreme. And he says, for everybody in Jericho, if I've extorted anything from you, I will pay it back four times. Four times as much. You know, salvation has come to a house when that's true, and that's exactly what Jesus said in verse nine. So now, Luke the narrator turns us over to the words of our Lord. So come closer and listen carefully at what Jesus says in verses 9 and 10. Because he says in verse 9, today salvation has come to this house because he too, Zach too, is a son of Abraham. Now that is an interesting statement, is it not? First of all, Jesus acknowledges and declares that Zacchaeus has been saved. Salvation has come to his house, not because he gave, but because he had already opened his heart in faith to Christ, and Christ had done the saving work, the Holy Spirit had worked in his heart, And now he is willing to give to evidence a changed life because he is now a follower of Jesus. And Jesus confirms that and he says, today salvation has come to this house. Watch it, because he too is the son of Abraham. You see, all of the people of Jericho, the other Jewish people in Jericho, would have disowned Zacchaeus. Oh, you're not a Jew anymore. You're no longer a son of Abraham. You're like one of those Gentiles. You're a dog. You're a sorry, no-good, traitor, scum-of-the-earth kind of a person because you would dare to join hands with the Roman government and extort money from your own people. And therefore, they would repudiate him and treat him as dead and treat him as a Gentile and reject him. But now Jesus says, salvation has come to this house. And by the way, he too is the son of Abraham. He's the son of Abraham. But verse 10, for the son of man, not the son of Abraham, The Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost." Now, wait a minute. Jesus is the Son of Abraham, too, but He doesn't say the Son of Abraham. Jesus is the Son of David, but He does not say the Son of David. Jesus is the Son of Mary, but He does not say the Son of Mary. has come to seek and to save the lost. Now, Jesus borrows the terminology from Daniel chapter 7, and his favorite designation for himself in the Gospels, as you read the four Gospels, his favorite designation, his favorite reference to himself is to call himself the Son of Man. It is a statement of messianic import. It is a statement that affirms the full humanity and the full deity of Christ. It is a statement that connects the messianic promised Messiah from the Old Testament, and Jesus is declaring, I am He. Is He a son of Abraham? Yes. Is He the son of David? Yes. Is He the son of Mary? Yes. But had He said to the people, I'm the son of Abraham, there would be a national distinction and limitation. Had he said the son of David, that would have been a royal distinction and limitation. Had he said the son of Mary, that would have been a family distinction and limitation. But he says he's the son of man. He is the son of no nation because he is the son of all nations. He is the son of no nation because he is the savior of all nations. And he says the son of man has come to seek and to save the lost. Every human being who has ever been saved on this planet was sought after by God. So said D.L. Moody. Jesus is the Son of Man who has come to seek and to save the lost. Fourteen words, not a single one over five letters, all monosyllables. and yet describe in profound fashion in one sense the summation of the purpose of Jesus' coming into this world. The Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost. Look at that word, lost. It's a word that throbs with pain and hurt, lost. It's a stabbing word in any language. Lost. Lost dog. Lost ship. Lost child. Lost soul. Lost. There are many words the Bible uses to describe the spiritual condition of all of humanity. Guilty. Depraved. Condemned. But maybe there is no word that is more appropriate to describe our condition than the word that Jesus uses here, lost. Lost. And if we leave this earth and go to hell apart from Christ, the scripture says we are lost forever in that condition. Lost. Hear the Word, it describes every person you know who does not know Christ as their Savior, whether they be a family member, a friend, or someone you don't know, anyone on this planet, near or far, the description of them today, if they don't know Christ, is lost! And if they die in that state, they go out into an eternity, and their body will go to the grave, and their estate will go to their heirs, and their soul will go to hell. And forever they are lost. And every flame that licks up in hell on their body has inscribed on it, lost, lost, lost. And every chain that binds them spiritually for all eternity has inscribed indelibly on every link, lost, lost, lost. That's the condition. of every human being on this planet who does not know the saving grace of Christ and who has not had the benefits of the atonement of his death on the cross applied to them. That's their condition. That used to be your condition. He used to be my condition. That was Zacchaeus' condition until the day Jesus came to planet Earth. where Zacchaeus was. And he came to Judea where Zacchaeus lived. And he came to Jericho where Zacchaeus' house was. And he came to the street where Zacchaeus walked. And he came to the tree where Zacchaeus perched. And he came to the house where Zacchaeus lived. And he came into the heart of Zacchaeus. And Zacchaeus entered his house that day, the littlest man in Jericho. But he emerged the biggest man in town, all because of Jesus. He didn't stay lost. And lost people today don't have to stay lost. By the way, there are two kinds of loss. There's lost beyond recovery, and there's lost but can be found. Some things are lost beyond recovery. If your house burns down, that specific house is lost beyond recovery. You can build another house, but that house is lost beyond recovery. But then there is the lost and found. Have you ever lost something and then found it? You got lost it for a while, and then it turned up, and you could find it? Lost and found. Listen, listen. Hear Jesus. Every soul on this planet at this moment who is lost could be found. They are not lost irretrievably and irrevocably theologically until they die in that lost state. But as long as they are living and breathing, they can be saved. Why? Because Jesus says, the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost. Last time I checked, everybody on this planet is in one of two categories. You're either a saved sinner, that's where those of us who are Christians are, or you are a lost sinner. There aren't any other categories, and everybody who is lost, Jesus is seeking and desires their salvation. And the scripture is clear, 2 Peter 3, 9, God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 1 Peter 2, 4 through 6, that there is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who desires the salvation of all people. And furthermore, in verse 6, who has made atonement for all. Every human being on this planet is savable. because there is an atonement for their sins where Christ died on the cross in their place as their substitute and the gospel is to be preached to all of them because God desires the salvation of every human being on this planet. Jesus said, I have come to seek and to save the lost. So go get them. Go after them. Tell them about Jesus. Go to the furthest corners of the earth if you have to, to tell them the story of Christ. Because the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost. Any theology that you have that in any way denigrates or denies God's universal saving will and the desire of God to save every person on this planet, if you hold such a theology, that is a bad theology. The scripture is clear. God desires the salvation of all people. In theological terms, we call that God's universal saving will. I have come, Jesus says, to seek and to save the lost. Just before this event in Luke's gospel, there was another rich man Jesus encountered in chapter 18. He was a rich young ruler. And he came to Jesus just like Zacchaeus. He was interested in seeing Jesus. And Lord, what must I do to be saved? Well, you keep all these commandments. Lord, I've done that from my youth up, fine and dandy. So take everything you've got, sell it, give it to the poor and come and follow me. And suddenly his face fell and he was saddened. Why? Because Luke records in chapter 18, he was rich and he turned away and he didn't follow Jesus. But now the parallel account, here's another rich man. In fact, it is the last encounter humanly of Jesus before he enters Jerusalem. The last encounter of Jesus on his journey, his travel narrative journey to Jerusalem is Zacchaeus, another rich man who is also blind and lost. And yet Jesus changes his life and immediately he gives what he has to the poor. And here is the essence of the purpose and the mission of Jesus, and it is our mission today, and it's found in verse 10. The Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost. And you're here today, and I'm here today in order to do just that. That's our purpose. That's our mission. His mission is our mission, to seek and to save the lost. And oh, by the way, along the way, don't miss those in the trees.