When Our Disadvantages Become Advantages

When Our Disadvantages Become Advantages

Luke 19:1-9

            Poor Zacchaeus!  He was short—so short that he was at a real disadvantage in a crowd.  Of course, Zacchaeus wasn’t really poor—not poor at all.  He was a tax collector for the Romans—and a Jew.  The Romans loved to get hold of citizens in conquered territories and have them do the dirty work.  This way they didn’t have to enforce the tax code and other noxious parts of their law.  The turncoats did it for them.  The Roman officials didn’t particularly like those they corrupted.  They used them.

            The Jews didn’t like these people either.  They hated Zacchaeus and his kind.  They saw them for what they were:  countrymen who made a profit at their fellow citizens’ expense.  This would have been particularly troubling for Zacchaeus.  In a crowd, someone could give him an elbow, or step on his toe, or find other ways to get back at him for all he had taken from them.  Remember, tax collectors could take more from people than they had to give to the Roman officials in taxes.  That’s how they made their living, and how they earned the hatred of those who had to pay whatever was demanded of them.

            Then one day, Jesus came to Jericho, Zacchaeus’ home town.  Huge crowds turned out to get a look at the prophet they had heard so much about.  Their excitement was heightened by the possibility that Jesus might work some miracles while he was in town.  They had heard of his healing powers.  Perhaps they had heard the story of his changing water to wine.  This was going to be a banner day for the city, and no one wanted to miss it.

            But Zacchaeus was missing it.  He couldn’t see over the heads of those in front of him.  Quite likely he was taking his usual bumps and bruises from those who tried to get even with him—perhaps even more so, since the crowds would have been larger than usual.  What could he do?  No one would give him a break.  When he tried to work his way to the front he faced an impenetrable wall of people who wanted to cause him as much distress as possible.

            Then he had an idea.  Running ahead along the route Jesus would be taking, he found a sycamore tree that was climbable.  Quickly he scampered up the tree until he had a bird’s eye view of the action.  There was Jesus, and Zacchaeus could see him clearly—and Jesus stopped, and looked up, and looking straight at Zacchaeus perched as high in that tree as he could get, he said, “Zacchaeus, get down here.  I’m going to be your guest today.”

            We know the rest of the story, how Jesus’ presence in that house transformed Zacchaeus from a miserable little collaborator to a follower of the Lord. What a thrill it must have been for him when Jesus said, “Today salvation has come to this house!”

            I remember attending a conference on educating the handicapped where a very wise speaker told us that everyone is handicapped in some way.  Zacchaeus’ handicap was his height—or lack of it—but he found a way to turn that disadvantage into an advantage.  He went from being invisible in the crowd to being visible in that tree because he was determined to see Jesus, and it resulted in his salvation.

            We all have disadvantages.  Each of us has strengths, but also weaknesses, areas in which we do not have the ability to succeed.  We can dwell on our disadvantages, and tell ourselves that they make it impossible to do God’s work.  We can get lost in the crowd, suffering the bumps and bruises that others give us, or we can rise above our disadvantages, perhaps turning them into advantages, as Zacchaeus did.  By rising above the crowd, Zacchaeus found what he needed:  salvation from God and respectability among his fellow citizens. 

            God is waiting to turn our disadvantages into advantages if we’ll only allow it.