Who is Your Zacchaeus? You Need a Reject 11 Indispensable Relationships You Can’t Be Without! Tuesday, March 29, 2011 Rev. Taft Q. Heatley Ray of Hope Christian Church

Luke 19:1-9

Do any thugs, harlots, hookers or criminals have your business card or address?

Zacchaeus was the chief tax collector – one of the most despised profession under Roman occupation.

“If tax collectors were bad, the chief tax collector was the baddest of the bad, the chief of sinners, the sinner supreme, the ultimate social outcast”

Jesus’ lineage was full of skeletons  Noah – Genesis 9:21  Abraham – Genesis 12:10-16  Jacob – Genesis 27  Rahab – Joshua 2:1  Ruth the Moabitess – Ruth

“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance” - George Bernard Shaw

Jesus was known as a friend of sinners  Peter  Mary Magdalene  Samaritan Woman at the well in John 4  The Thief on the Cross

Most of all the 11 (indispensable relationships) have something to give you; Zacchaeus requires something from you.

Five (5) Aspects of Zacchaeus that Invite Your Response-Ability: 1. Remember that a Zacchaeus is someone who is “up a tree” a. Misplaced, disgraced, isolated and ashamed either socially, mentally, physically or economically b. They are people you would not normally want around c. We are all messed up and mess up d. Romans 6:23; Romans 7:14-23

“Jesus didn’t relate to men as men and women as women, or to rejects as rejects, but to everyone he encountered as a person in need of love.”

“ With Jesus there are no ‘outsiders’ because no one is outside the reach of God…The one another connection cannot be broken, only denied. We’re all up the tree, in the creek, out to lunch, and looking for love”

Is your name Zacchaeus?

Five (5) Aspects of Zacchaeus that Invite Your Response-Ability: 2. Don’t forget that a Zacchaeus is a one- of-a-kind iconoclast

Iconoclast is a person who destroys religious images or opposes their veneration; a person who attacks settled beliefs or institutions.

In a world full of the “me-too” and “mini- me” mentalities, one-of- a-kind people—those who break mass habits are of thinking—are rare.

We are programmed to be types following preordained circuits.

A Zacchaeus breaks the mold and teaches us to be authentic.

Every community needs a few good fools.

“A copycat Christianity filled with quivering knee-jerk, butt-kissing, sound-the-same look- alikes is the exact opposite of authentic discipleship.”

Five (5) Aspects of Zacchaeus that Invite Your Response-Ability: 3. Be mindful that Zacchaeus is “out there”

We have to go looking for Zacchaeus…because they normally do not fit in a church culture (they are in a smoking sections (cipher), bar, or gutter…)

Do walls make Christians? –late fourth century philosopher Caius Marius Victorinus

The Christian church is too much ‘in here’ and not enough ‘out there.’

“There is no contact with Zacchaues and the other ‘outsiders’ unless you’re ‘out there’ and start ‘living out’ not ‘living in’ the faith.”

We need to have “acts” of worship and not “sits” of worship.

Five (5) Aspects of Zacchaeus that Invite Your Response-Ability: 4. Be aware that a Zacchaeus is Trouble!

A test of whether or not you have a Zacchaeus is whether you are now taking criticism for making room in your life for one of these unperfumed personalities.

The truth is a Zacchaeus doesn’t just disturb you others, they rub you the wrong way too sometimes…they are unpredictable.

Do you have any trouble makers in your life?

You can’t have too many Barnabases, but you can have too many Zacchaeuses!

Five (5) Aspects of Zacchaeus that Invite Your Response-Ability: 5. Don’t overlook the reality that a Zacchaeus is inefficient. But his/her inefficiency can reshape you in the image of Christ.

You need a person who is mocked by others, but to whom you stretch a healing, helping hand partly because only their hand can deliver you from worshipping at the foot of the god of efficiency.

They make you uncomfortable and force you to trust God…because they are often unpredictable.

For Jesus it wasn’t a sacrifice to do this— it was passion. Even a pleasure!

To the downtrodden, looked over, tossed aside, ridiculed, forgotten, rejected…we must always ask the question have they heard the good news about Jesus Christ.