In Luke 19, we have the account of Jesus and Zacchaeus. Yes,
the wee little man was he guy. That climbed up in a sycamore tree and all that
jazz. We have heard the story before. Jesus calls out to this man, this sinful
tax collector who is very much hated by probably almost everyone. And yet
Jesus invites himself over to Zacchaeus’ home for lunch and socializes with
someone that his fans and crowds of followers were repulsed by. Verse 7 says, “All the people saw this and began to mutter,
“He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”
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| People muttering- :) |
This is not the way that the crowds expected Jesus to act.
They expected such a great man to interact with other great men, people of
prominence, at least people who are upright and quality human beings right?
Surely Jesus would not associate himself with such scum! Well guess what, he
did. Jesus did something radical in the eyes of the people. He did something weird
and crazy. He started hanging out with the rejects and outcasts, one of whom
was Zacchaeus.
And how did they respond? They saw it and began to mutter. They
began to mutter and gossip and speak under their breath about Jesus and what he
was doing. What if we too acted in such a way? What if we too would behave so
contrarily to what people expect of us? What if we were to push through the
crowd of normal, acceptable, cool people in order to embrace the broken, the
rejected, and the outcasts? Are we willing to be muttered about?
Make them mutter with your actions. Do the opposite of what
they expect. Jesus came to seek and save the lost, not to seek and save the
cool and the normal. He came for sinners and for outcasts. Live your life in such a
way that people begin to mutter about you. Make choices to associate yourself
with the people that no one else wants anything to do with. Act in such a way
that people begin question what you are doing and why you are doing it. Make
them mutter by loving people like Zacchaeus. Make them mutter by loving people like Jesus
did.
