Word of Salvation – Vol. 14 No.31 – August 1968
The Camel Through The Needle’s Eye
Sermon by Rev. A. I. De Graaf, B.D. on Luke 19: 5b, 6
(Preparation for Lord’s Supper)
SCRIPTURE READINGS: Luke 18:18-27; 19:1-10
PSALTER HYMNAL: 225:1,5; After Law: 383:1,2,3 (Tune 100)
384:3; 358:3; 354 (Tune 27)
Brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ our Lord!
This is the story of a camel going through a needle’s eye. A rich man being saved. This is the story of what is impossible with men, but possible with God! A story that according to bishop Ryle a Christian should often study, because it tells of a Saviour for sinners; it tells, like few others in the Word of God, of what Jesus came to do. And what He CAN do, for you, too.
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If you are a child of God, knowing this Lord Jesus yourself, and having experienced how in YOUR life He made everything new, you will rejoice hearing it again, as we prepare to go to this Lord’s holy table; you will all the more know what Gospel this is, that you may take to other people as His messenger.
And if you are not a child of God; if you came here into this church as one still in need of that newness of life, then know and hear, that nothing is too difficult, and no one is too bad to be MADE, by this Lord Jesus, another person, joyful, purposeful, peaceful!
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I. A frustrated life.
II. An urgent call.
III. An immediate answer.
I. A FRUSTRATED LIFE.
Now most of us, when thinking of this little man, Zacchaeus, think of him worse than he really is, according to normal human standards.
O, indeed, he was a quisling (traitor). A man who collaborated with the enemy of the Jewish people, and made a good, too good, a living out of that. And he was a man who cheated his fellow men.
That was very easy for a tax collector in those days, for no exact tax laws were put down on paper in the language of the people. Let us put it this way: It was just as easy to cheat in those days as a tax collector, as it is nowadays, to cheat as a tax PAYER. And as we say this, we straightaway get a different view on Zacchaeus. He isn’t that far away from us anymore, or is he? This man whose main trouble was: money. He always had thought that money was to give him the joy of life. That money was to open the doors for him; doors, to everything worth while. As long as I have that! I’ll be right! As soon as I have more, more, more of that! And perhaps with little bits and tiny handfuls of petty cash, it had started. At his mother’s home when he was the small boy, laughed at by his comrades because he was so small, trying to seek satisfaction in his hard life… in money. Money that can make nobody into somebody. Money that means power.
But…. did it really work? Fulfil? Satisfy?
The little man, mocked, perhaps utterly disappointed in people because people always laughed when seeing him, started to HATE these people, and when he got the chance to grab this job that could make him rich, and powerful, that could make the feared other people creep before him, and humbly go to his office to pay their dues – he held on to it. He was now a self-made man. At least there was SOMETHING he could boast about. He became rich. And the CHIEF of H.M. Customs in Jericho. The little nobody became a somebody… or… did he?
On the day our text tells of, we find Zacchaeus going along the street, moving among the people, SEEKING. Seeking for something he lacks. Seeking, still seeking. His nice house, his lots of money, his executive position, his booming business: it did not fill the NEED in this life. It left him… frustrated. It left him cold and lonely, cut off from his people, and, above all: far from God. He had gained perhaps a whole world, but his soul, his soul….! Not all the money in the world could fill his heart with peace, could give him the thrill, after all, now he had reached his destination. He was NOT HOME. And so, on the day that Jesus is coming along, he seeks, seeks…!
Is this man a stranger among us? Really?
We said, a while ago, that for him it was as easy to cheat as a tax collector, as it is for many of us to cheat, as a tax-payer. How many of us do this, when the financial year ends? How many of us really do expect of MONEY that it can fill the gaps? That it can buy us the house to live in, and it can give us respect from other people, and that it can give us a proper amount of luxury; yes, that it can make us SOMEBODY in the world? We really can feel small and unimportant, but we do not LIKE to be that, and we expect from MONEY, or from OUR POSITION, from things we HAVE, that it will give us the place we look for. And, to that end, many people cheat: cheat with their tax, or cheat with rent, or cheat with time sheets at work, or with the money that rightfully belongs to the LORD and HIS service. But they don’t give it.
And then there are the folks whose trouble might NOT be money, but still they expect the joy of their life from what CAN’T give it. They expect it from what makes them SOMEBODY in their own eyes, and especially in the view of others. Even work in the CHURCH can be used for that. We rush to be SOMEBODY, and where do we get? Frustrated lives, with no unity, no purpose, no peace. You can have that even in the church. Zacchaeus was a church member. An Israelite. You can have that as an elder, as a deacon, as an active Bible class attender or Sunday School teacher. Lives – so that they want to be something, but they are nothing. Because you want to be SOMEONE, and YOU work for it, run for it, cheat for it, if necessary. Your life is YOURS and you don’t know exactly what to do with it. Your life isn’t really God’s. Not all….!
One question: are you then SEEKING? Are you AWARE that you’ll get NOWHERE as long as you race on THIS way? No matter what others say: THAT’S what one must do! THAT’S what Zacchaeus did! HE WAS SEEKING TO SEE JESUS! Why? What did he know of Jesus? It might have been very little. He had no experience with Jesus, not yet, anyway. But he was on the lookout. He SOUGHT TO SEE. He went out of his way to find. And while no doubt the big crowd was roaring with laughter because of that hated little man who now was a silly little man, there was only one thing in Zacchaeus’ mind: I MUST SEE HIM, I MUST SEE HIM! For that’s the word used here in Greek: not just seeking a bit, but seeking with all your power; as father seeks a doctor for his dying child, as an unemployed man seeks for work, frantically, passionately, definitely: I MUST FIND. I can’t go on like this. Let them laugh, let them cheer, Jesus, Jesus! Where are you! Who are you?
And there he sits, in the sycamore tree. And Jesus comes… passes right underneath… Passes… passes?? No! He stops! He stops, because whoever seeks Him, shall find. And surely, they shall find MORE than they THOUGHT to find really!
II. AN URGENT CALL.
Jesus stops and calls his name. ZACCHAEUS!
He calls him by his name. Jesus KNOWS that name. Jesus knows that this name means: “the pure one, the clear one”. That’s what Zacchaeus means. No doubt that’s what Zacchaeus’ father and mother had been hoping and praying for when he was just born. That he would become a true and pure Israelite, a child of Abraham, and thus: a child of God. How many parents have been hoping, at cradles of children, hoping and praying. And how many children have gone easy when growing up, because life was like that….!
Jesus knows all that. And He calls. He calls by name. He now calls Y O U. He knows you! He is God. He knows all that has happened with you. And He calls: It’s no use pretending to HIM. He knows too well. It’s no use hiding anything. He calls! And His call is an urgent one.
ZACCHAEUS, HURRY, COME DOWN QUICKLY, TO-DAY I AM TO STAY IN YOUR HOUSE.
You hear that, brother? It is not a matter of “to-morrow will be early enough”. In the Bible we find that God’s kingdom has HASTE. Zechariah 8:21 says: “let us go SPEEDILY TO PRAY BEFORE THE LORD”, and Luke 14:21 says: “go QUICKLY into the streets and lanes and COMPEL them to come in!” And as God is going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, it isn’t said to Lot that next month will do him, as we say, and as the devil wants us to believe. No, Genesis 19:22 tells us that the angels say: HASTE THEE, ESCAPE!
At the Passover meal (Exodus 12:11) we see how the children of Israel had to eat it “IN HASTE”, loins girded, ready to march. And the Lord Jesus doesn’t like it when in Matthew 8:21 somebody says, “I surely will follow you, but allow me FIRST to bury my father”. No, NOW OR NEVER, He says.
And we hear in the Bible what happens if this is not heeded: The Athens scholars said to Paul, (Acts 17:32) “We’ll hear you again later…” but it never happened, and they were lost. Felix, the governor, said to Paul: “In a convenient season I’ll call you again”, but he never did, and was lost (Acts.24:25).
It is tragically possible what Jeremiah 8:20 tells us: “The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are NOT saved.”
And the bridesmaids, coming at the door TOO LATE, hear the bridegroom say, “You get away, I have never known you…!”
Hebrews 12:17 tells of Esau, that, while at first he couldn’t care less, later on he was seeking for repentance, but then it didn’t work, God’s time was over. Yes, that is possible. Time and again the Word of God uses the word: HASTE, and the word TODAY. NOW is the time of salvation, NOW is the acceptable time! And that is the word heard by Zacchaeus, the URGENT call of the Saviour: Come down NOW, QUICKLY, for NOW I am coming to your house.
Such is the call of our Lord. The call to obey, quickly, today. The call to receive Him, in your house, in your heart. O, that house of Zacchaeus! It wasn’t in order, of course. It wasn’t much good. But it was not yet as judge that Jesus was coming in, but as Saviour, to make clean, to take for Himself, to breathe through it with His Spirit! Right into Zacchaeus’ HOUSE Jesus wanted to come. If He shall come, He wants to come IN. INTO where I live my life… INTO where my desires are… my thoughts… my feelings…. my will….!
Now that the Lord’s Supper again is waiting, and now that we are going to prepare, let us understand that we cannot keep the Lord Jesus in a sort of a waiting room, or only take Him with us to the Church, or to a nice chapel we built for Him, as an attachment to our life. He wants to come into our HOUSE, right in. What shall He see there but our failure, our poverty? What shall He find there but that frustrated life of ours, wherewith we dare not come before Him? What shall He observe there but that frantic bid of ours, to be SOMEBODY? But the question holds, today, next week we hope: the question we had better not put off: MAY HE COME IN? And we hear the word of the Gospel, the pleading of God to you: So we are ambassadors of Christ as if Christ were asking you through us, we plead with you in the stead of Christ: BE YE RECONCILED WITH GOD!
God knocks at your door. God is here to make peace. God’s Table calls you to open the doors to Him, to let Him in. For as I live, says this Lord – (Ezek.4:33:11) – I do not desire the death of a sinner, but rather that he return to God, and live! Oh, if even you are to be a Christian, a child of God, then Jesus must enter RIGHT IN. All of that bare and barren life of yours must be laid in His hands. You just ask Him: Lord, please, come right in.
Lord, make me clean; Lord, make me yours! He calls, He knocks at YOUR door. He still can come in. He is so willing, He is so able!
III. AN IMMEDIATE ANSWER.
And about this Zacchaeus we read, that IMMEDIATELY he gets down and goes home and opens the door for Jesus. What it was all going to mean, perhaps, was not clear to him yet. But Jesus was in, and… to stay. And Zacchaeus was GLAD. For the first time in his life. This little man, despised by the people. But the Son of Man was pleased to come under HIS roof, and his heart was filled with joyful wonder. And in that attitude he was becoming a child of God, forever. In that attitude we are expected at that table next week. In that attitude we can evangelize, for then the message is one that we lived through ourselves, “Lord, come in!” “Lord, forgive, it doesn’t look nice. But nonetheless, come in. How great that You WILL come!” Come to me, and you know what my life is like. Lord, I am glad, so glad. It is a gladness that makes me cry, too. For I did not deserve, I am not worthy. But I will not hold back, Lord.
Many false gods I served. Many ways, away from God, I tried out. I have found, they led nowhere. Lord Jesus, I will accept you. In my house, in my heart. Please come in, and nevermore go away. Please, Lord, MAKE me worthy, MAKE me a child of God, MAKE me right to come, next week. YOU CAN, Lord!
Zacchaeus called Jesus in. He knew: there are things now to go OUT. To get Jesus in is not just an easy thing. For He is going to make other guests impossible. Mammon has to go, and many a desire, many a SELF-vindication. NO MORE I, but Christ in me! Paul writes. As Jesus comes in, He is to USE me. My house is no longer MY house, but His. My children are no longer MY children, but His. My business no longer mine, but His. My time is to be His, and that whole word “I”, and “MY” is to disappear somehow.
But isn’t that glorious?
NO longer to be in that frantic fight to be SOMEBODY in the eyes of people, but… to be made one with HIM! To be able to lay life in His hands, and become COMPLETELY AND ABSOLUTELY PASSIVE, laying EVERYTHING before Him in prayer; and then THAT way, completely ACTIVE, doing His will, in a new spirit and a new mind.
Our being Christians, if it is ever to MEAN anything to God and to others, is NOT to be anything less. JOY then may flood my heart, my house. And yours.
Then in God’s wonderful way, that NAME, Zacchaeus, the Clean One, is going to hold good again. Then the Blood will have done its cleansing work, and the Holy Spirit will fill us with new life.
Why not TRUST in this Lord INDEFINITELY and ABSOLUTELY, and… let Him start TODAY?
Amen.