Bible Passage: Luke 19:1-10
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: November 23 & 24, 2022

Bulletin Thanksgiving 2022

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus,

Jericho is one of the oldest inhabited cities in the world.  It was already a walled city when the Israelites crossed into the Promised Land in about 1400 B.C.  We remember the story of how the walls of Jericho came tumbling down at the trumpet blast of Israel.  At the time of Jesus, it was busy and active.  King Herod even built his winter quarters at Jericho.  To this very day, you can still travel to Jericho.  If you do, you can go to the town center called Al-Jummezeh Square and there you will find a little monument built around the stump of an old sycamore tree.  The little monument is called Zacchaeus’ Sycamore Tree.  This is supposed to be the tree little Zacchaeus climbed to see Jesus.

That is the way history remembers Zacchaeus.  He is the little guy who climbed a tree to see Jesus.  And that is fine to remember that about Zacchaeus.  But today we want to remember something else about Zacchaeus.  We want to remember something that happened after the whole tree climbing thing.  What happens in Zacchaeus’ home is worth remembering too.  Here we will remember Zacchaeus’ Thanks…and Zacchaeus’ Giving.

Jesus is passing through Jericho.  Jericho at the time of Jesus was a happening place.  In and around Jericho they grew date palms and balsam, which is sweet smelling resin.   So there developed a bustling agri-business in Jericho.  And profitable business means taxable income.  And that brings us to Zacchaeus.  We are told Zacchaeus is a chief tax collector.  The head-honcho.  This would have been very lucrative.  Our text simply says:  He was rich. (v. 2)

Zacchaeus learns that Jesus is passing through, and he wants to see him.  As often happened, Jesus drew a large crowd.  Zacchaeus was a shorty and couldn’t see over the crowd, so he has an idea.  He runs ahead and climbs a sycamore tree.  (Don’t know if it is the one you can see today!)  And there he waits for Jesus to come by.  Eventually, Jesus comes to Zacchaeus’ tree.  Jesus looks up into the tree and addresses the wee little man in the branches.  “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today.” (v. 5)

Friends, right here something incredible has happened.  We might not notice it right away in the English.  But there is a word that is used twice in the Greek text.  It is used first of all in verse 3 for what Zacchaeus did.  Literally the Greek says that Zacchaeus was “seeking to see the Lord.”  In verse 10 the same word is used of what Jesus was doing:  The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.” (v. 10)  Zacchaeus thought he was seeking Jesus.  In reality, Jesus was in Jericho seeking Zacchaeus!

Jesus was seeking him to save him!  And he did!  Later, when Jesus is at Zacchaeus’ home, Jesus declares, Today, salvation has come to this house. (v. 9)  That’s a good day.  The day Jesus comes to your house.  The day you come to know Jesus as your Savior!  I don’t know if Jesus and Zacchaeus were at a table when Jesus said those words, but if they were, I know for Zacchaeus, it was a thanksgiving table.

As you sit down at your table this Thanksgiving, let your thankfulness begin at this point:  Jesus has come to your house!  Salvation has come to your house!  I have looked down on DeForest out of an airplane window.  And you see hundreds of rooftops.  And I looked down and saw my own house.  Out of all those houses, Jesus has come to mine!  To yours!  And he came not because you were seeking him, but because Jesus came seeking you.  You were lost in sin.  And in your “lostness” Jesus sought and found and saved you!  As the hymn puts it:  “Love that found me, wondrous thought!  Found me when I sought him not.”  As you sit at your table tomorrow,  and you look into the faces of people who know and love the Lord – your children, your grandchildren –  thank God that salvation has come to your house!

The day of our text was truly a day of thanks for Zacchaeus.  And then, it also became a day of giving.  A grateful Zacchaeus says, Look, Lord, I am going to give half of my possessions to the poor.  And if I have cheated anyone out of anything, I will pay back four times as much. (v. 8)  One has to wonder at this point whether Zacchaeus was thinking of something he had learned from the Law and the Prophets.  As a Jewish man, it is likely Zacchaeus had learned the regulations of Exodus 22.  There the Lord God had outlined what was to be done in the case of stealing oxen or sheep.  The thief was required to pay back 2x, 4x, or in one case 5x what was stolen.  But the Lord had nowhere given any laws about paying back stolen money.

By pledging to give half of his possessions to the poor and to pay back 4x what he had stolen, Zacchaeus was going above and beyond the requirements of the Law of God.  This is an intriguing point.  The Law of God didn’t require Zacchaeus to do what he promised to do.  The Gospel of Jesus made Zacchaeus eager to do it!

Nothing will make you thankful and generous like the Gospel.  It is when salvation comes to a man’s house, when the lost has been found and saved by Jesus, that the heart is truly set free.  It is Jesus’ love for us that sets us free from being hoarders of the things the Lord has given us.  It is Jesus’ love that frees and motivates us to make right what we have made wrong with our neighbor.  At the risk of making a very bad comparison, I think of that part in the well-known How the Grinch Stole Christmas:  “And what happened then? Well, in Whoville they say, the Grinch’s small heart, grew three sizes that day.”

In Jericho, it was Zacchaeus’ heart that grew that day.  Because it was stretched, inflated, by Jesus’ love.  It was stretched with gratitude that overflowed even to his neighbors in Jericho.  So may our hearts this year, and every year, be stretched and balloon and overflow with thanks…and with giving.

Amen.