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Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Pastoral Ponderings ~ Choosing Love For the Trouble it May Cause

          I’ve been thinking a lot about Zacchaeus this morning. If you recall, when Zacchaeus heard that Jesus was heading into his town, he was unable to get a look at this famous teacher because he was too short to see above everyone else who had gathered. He solved the problem by climbing a Sycamore tree and getting one of the best views in the whole crowd.[1]
          And then, his whole life changed. Jesus called him down from the tree, invited himself over for dinner, and transformed his world. A man the crowd called “a sinner” (unlike themselves, of course), Jesus called “a son of Abraham”.
          Why did Jesus give Zacchaeus this designation? After all, Zacchaeus was a tax collector and had defrauded his community of their hard-earned money. The people were right that Zacchaeus had sinned. They knew that his wealth was at their expense. They could not see anything good about a man climbing a tree and receiving special attention from Jesus.
          Zacchaeus did not deserve Jesus’ declaration that he was a son of Abraham as though he was a good man. Rather, it was because his response to Jesus entering his town showed that Jesus had also entered his heart. Zacchaeus understood the transforming power of Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the promised One. With a change of heart that only comes through the gospel, Zacchaeus showed what he would do to make things right in the relationships that surrounded him.
          What stood out was the trouble it would cause Zacchaeus to identify himself with Jesus. No sooner had the town’s folk announced to Jesus that Zacchaeus was a sinner (Jesus kinda knew this already), but Zacchaeus announced in return, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold.”[2]
          Zacchaeus came down from the tree and received Jesus joyfully[3]in spite of what it was about to cost him. Receiving Jesus was the pearl of great price, the treasure hidden in the field,[4] and this man was willing to give up what he had gained through sin in order to gain the one who forgives sin. Receiving Jesus was worth the trouble it would cause him to live in his community with love and righteousness fixed in his heart by faith.
          However, this is not only about Zacchaeus receiving Jesus into his heart and home in spite of what it would cost him. It is also about Jesus calling a sinful man down from a Sycamore tree in spite of the trouble he would go through to have this man as his brother.[5]
          The change that came to Zacchaeus’s life the day he climbed a Sycamore tree was because of the tree Jesus would climb not far down the road. While it would appear that Jesus was forced onto that tree by the demands of a sinful crowd, and the hard-heartedness of a Roman government, the truth was that Jesus deliberately and willfully laid down his life for his sheep.[6]
          In fact, for his friends.
          Jesus was in Zacchaeus’s home, winning this man’s heart over to the life of his Father in heaven, because of the love that lays down its life for his friends.[7] This was the love that chose creation in spite of the trouble it would cause. This was the love that formed dirt into a creature in the image and likeness of God in spite of the trouble it would cause to finally have a family of children in God’s own image and likeness.[8]
          In other words, sinners come to such faith, hope, and love in response to Jesus Christ that we consider him worth the trouble of following him. Saul who hated Christians so intensely that he approved of their murders, put them in prison, and tried his utmost to stamp out this despised “sect”, became the apostle Paul who continues to bless our lives today because of the suffering he was willing to endure for his Savior, and for us.[9]
          The Christian knows that following Jesus in this world means suffering now, and glory later. As brother Paul spoke for our edification, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”[10] Point being that what we have in Jesus, and the glory yet to be revealed, make suffering worth it. As strange as it may seem for the clay to say this of the potter, Jesus is worth the trouble we get into because of him. Jesus is worth the difficult choices we must make because we now follow him.
          My morning did not begin with a consideration of Zacchaeus and the trouble it caused him to receive Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. It began with a middle-of-the-night battle with decisions that were simple to make, but not even close to easy to perform. I wouldn’t say that it came close to Jacob’s wrestling-encounter with an angel, but it did make me sympathetic to that experience of long ago.[11]
          My later consideration of Zacchaeus was not primarily to address the wonder of God’s love that would go through so much trouble to have me as one of his people in his own image and likeness. Rather, it was God revealing his glory to me in the way I needed to see it to join him in doing the good and loving thing no matter what trouble it may cause. Trouble seems to go hand in hand with love.
          Okay, so that just reminded me of a precious little child who sometimes shows up at our house wearing a shirt that says, “Here comes trouble”. That is basically what I would have looked like in God’s mind before he began creating the world. He knew I would be trouble, the worst kind of trouble, the kind of trouble that sin feels like to a holy God.
          Before God created the world, he already had in mind that he would send his Son into the world to become sin for us,[12] to become the curse of sin who would take away the curse of sin.[13] When Jesus began forming dirt into a man’s form, he already knew the trouble this man would cause him. When he formed a woman from the side of the man, he already knew what trouble this woman would cause him. He knew he would one day become Eve’s offspring in order to save Adam’s offspring.
          If, metaphorically speaking, my shirt declared me to be the “trouble” God knew he would have to deal with, God’s shirt would bear the simple and powerful announcement of “Love”. God chose us in love; he predestined us to adoption in love; he sent his Son into the world in love; he planned all this before time began because he is love. When God and I walk together it is Love and Trouble walking hand in hand. I like the picture.
          However, it brings me back to Zacchaeus. And me. God loves his children knowing the trouble it causes him to do so. To love as he loves causes us trouble. Some of that trouble is the way we are treated simply because we are servants of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Some of the trouble is because we must make simple choices that are not so easy to put into effect.
          It is simple to decide to stand for Jesus no matter what the cost, but it is not easy to face the suffering that comes for doing so. It is simple to acknowledge the gospel of Jesus Christ that calls for the complete surrender of our lives to the gracious and loving care of God. It is not so easy to pay back four times what was stolen while we were still living in sin. Entering into the love that considered us worth the trouble causes us to have a love that considers righteousness to be worth the trouble.
          Today there will likely be situations where the choice of love is simple, straightforward, even obvious, but the actions required of that choice will not be easy. Choose the thing that fits this picture of love that chose us in spite of the trouble it would cause. Receive Zacchaeus’s example of receiving Jesus with joy in spite of the cost of doing so. Let the cross of Jesus Christ remind you of the trouble God went through to have you; and do the righteous, loving thing that is the expression of the righteous, loving things Jesus has done for you.
          Love, and the beloved, are worth the trouble.

© 2014 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.)

         





[1] Luke 19:1-10
[2] Luke 19:8
[3] Luke 19:6
[4] Matthew 13:44-45
[5] Romans 8:29 speaks of believers as Jesus’ brothers; and Galatians 3:26-29 shows that all believers are sons of God, the offspring of Abraham.
[6] John 10:11
[7] John 15:12-15
[8] Genesis 1:26-27
[9] Acts 9:16
[10] Romans 8:18
[11] Genesis 32:22-32
[12] II Corinthians 5:21
[13] Galatians 3:13

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