#SundayCoffee Some heretical thoughts on Zacchaeus and “salvation” — Sunday’s Gospel reading.
One of the major events that occurs in a post-evangelical’s reconstruction of faith is deciding what to do with the Bible. For most of their lives, evangelicals are told and believe that the Bible is Holy Scripture, the inspired, inerrant and infallible “Word of God.” Perhaps it’s something that never gets resolved. As in my case, figuring it out may be an ongoing issue. Having said that, I’ve found a position that I’m currently comfortable with: namely, that the Bible is a collection of texts written by humans across the centuries who encountered God and wrote, with some degree of inspiration, their impressions of those encounters.
That means that those texts, those stories, parables, sayings, histories, theologizings, are all still important. I don’t need to accept them as absolute or carved in stone. But the texts can still speak to us if we have receptive ears to hear them.
And this [past] Sunday’s Gospel reading about Zacchaeus’s encounter with Jesus is one of them. In short, it’s about a corrupt government official who got rich off fining his fellow citizens. This man, described as short (perhaps morally as well as physically), wants to see Jesus. So in order to see above the crowds, he climbs a tree, and as Jesus passes by, Jesus stops at his tree and invites himself to stay as a guest at Z’s house — a scandalous act for a rabbi to do with such a sinner. But Z’s heart has been touched, and he offers to repay anyone he’s defrauded. He’s a changed man. Then comes Jesus’s famous reply, “Today salvation has come to this house … For the Son of Man came to seek and save what was lost” (Luke 19:1-10).
The short passage is full of great themes: repentance, changed hearts, use of wealth as a marker of one’s spiritual condition, Jesus’s embrace of the socially and religiously outcast. And, importantly, it answers a question posed in Luke’s gospel just a few verses earlier, “Who then can be saved?” (Luke 18:26). The answer: any repentant sinner. All good themes for evangelicals.
But that’s not what struck me as I read the passage today.
I was struck immediately by the initial description: Zacchaeus was seeking. He wanted to see Jesus. And he was willing to make the extra effort to achieve his spiritual quest, and even to look foolish in the process.
Perhaps all text interpretation is auto-biographical. Perhaps this says more about me and my own spiritual journey. But to me this is a short story about spiritual seekers, those who are willing to step outside the religious boxes we inherited. And sometimes we DO look foolish. (Can’t tell you the number of times I’ve shaken my head at some the ideas coming from fellow-travelers. Eh, who am I to judge? Who can claim to possess the absolute right answers about the Infinite? But yeah, sometimes we can look a bit crazy.)
But here’s the lesson that struck me: you don’t find answers, you don’t tap into life-changing revelation, new ideas, new perspective, a revitalizing spirituality, if you’re not looking. “Seek and ye shall find,” Jesus said. “Knock, and the door will be opened.” And for too long, we evangelicals and former evangelicals have been SO stinkin’ comfortable in our answers. We KNOW all the right answers, we’re not even looking. We’re not hungry. And the reality is, if you’re not hungry, you don’t get fed. If you’re not continuing to seek, you’re likely not gonna find anything fresh or new. And what you do already have is likely stale and not very life-giving.
The second thing: Jesus’s comment. “Today, salvation has come to this house.” This is a radical statement. Evangelicals, please note that Jesus did NOT say Zacchaeus was saved because he confessed Jesus as Lord. The text does not say Z asked Jesus into his heart. It doesn’t even actually say that he “repented” or asked for forgiveness. Zacchaeus changed his lifestyle, gave up defrauding, and offered restitution. He made amends. There was physical evidence that something had happened internally. He was ready. He was seeking. And when the opportunity presented itself, he acted.
I’m gonna propose that Zacchaeus indeed found God. His heart was struck, his mind was cleared as if by some new insight. And his life was changed.
And … I gotta add this: the text clearly states that Z was “happy” to welcome him. I have heard this from so many who have left the rigid circles of their former faith and found new life in their newly reconstructed spirituality: they rediscovered joy.
The lesson is clear. In answer to the question Jesus’s disciples asked earlier when the rich young lawyer sadly walked away from Jesus, walked away from “eternal life,” because he was rich — “Who then can be saved?” — here a rich man joyfully finds eternal life, finds salvation, because he was seeking AND he changed the way he treated people and money in the process.
“Salvation,” then, is not some judicial contract we sign to secure us a place in the next life. It’s a revitalizing, life-altering, joyful impact in the here and now — available only to those who are seeking.
Based on this story, I’m gonna say (with apologies to some verses in John’s gospel) that salvation is not simply about a right confession or correct belief. It is a spiritual awakening in THIS reality that has the power to change your life.
And that “salvation” belongs to the seekers. That may be a bit radical and a very “post-evangelical” reading of Scripture. But I’d rather end up like Zacchaeus than like that earlier rich, young lawyer with all the right answers who walked away empty.