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S. Pentecost 21.25 Luke 19:1-10

‘For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the utterly destroyed’

In last week’s episode—if you’re new to the channel or missed that one—Jesus told us about a Lutheran seminary prez… er, Pharisee who was so enamored and assured of his own saintliness—so doctrinally, liturgically, and morally pure he was, he could live entirely for others, devoting all his time to seeking and to saving lost sinners like the hedge fund man… er, tax collector who was praying in the seminary chapel after the “Growing Churches 2025” conference: ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner,’ because he was utterly destroyed by his sins—bound for hell and at the end of his rope, his own problems being way too daunting to be fixing other people’s, he begged God shamelessly for mercy.

And today, I believe, we meet that very hedge fund man… er, tax collector, and we learn his name: Zacchaeus. Because those who call on God for mercy are ever surely found by him. Being selfish like that (but not self-centered—the two things are actually importantly different as C.S. Lewis well sees and describes) has a bad reputation in the world and in most of the church, but it actually gets you somewhere, with Jesus 😉

BTW, I have to confess I based my hedge fund manager from last week’s episode entirely on Jon Hamm’s character “Coop” from the Apple TV series “Your Friends and Neighbors” in which Hamm plays a disgraced hedge fund manager who’s lost his wife, job, friends, and family and instead of stealing from rich people indirectly, he just starts breaking into their houses personally, taking their cash, Patek Phillipes, and Francis Bacon paintings and fencing ‘em to pay his bills.

Good artists borrow, great artists… steal. 🙂

I should probably warn you that unless you also identify as a sinner, you might find “Your Friends and Neighbors” triggering, probably too raunchy and low-brow for your more elevated taste. I was completely and utterly delighted by it. 😉

I’ll lay my homiletical cards on the table early and openly today because—though I much prefer to hide them for a big and surprising reveal at the end (what my friend Barry calls “3 Card Monte” preaching) I caught a lot of flack for last week’s homily from someone who thought it was showy and self-indulgent and hard to understand, partly because I talked too low and fast, staying in character throughout 😉

So; here’s the thing I was trying to get at last week for “Reformation” and today for “All Saints”: we naturally identify with the good people in the bible—the religious people, the holy rollers and honest citizens who live for others (and we think saintly) and not with the rotters: the hedge fund managers, crooks, hookers, and thieves who are incorrigibly selfish (and we think totally depraved—but anyone who believes in total depravity can’t be all bad, right? 😉

Because, see: the saints are all found in the selfish sinner group, not in the holy-rolling ‘live for others’ group (!) This, BTW, is also the reason most of you don’t understand most of the holy scriptures, most of the time. You read a few chapters thinking it will be filled with good advice to help you make your good life better, but quickly tire of it and put it away finding it difficult to understand.

And that’s why you don’t get it! Because it’s not a self-help book at all! It’s a loosely organized non-fiction novel about a good GOD who finds his world filled with bad people and takes on our sorry flesh, dies and is damned for it to pay the price for our awfulness, gratuitously declaring the worst of sinners his most holy saints. And it’s only the real sickos—sick to death of their sinful selves—who go home justified and are Jesus’ particular favorites whom he wants to hang with forever. Because the Church is simply a Sinners Anonymous Group, meeting weekly, here 😉

So, my goal in every homily is to trick you into identifying with the bad, selfish rotters, not the good altruistic guys, because it’s the bad ones who end up justified in Jesus’ book at the End.

OK? Good talk. ‘And away we go…’

Today we find Coop, er Zacchaeus, hunting high and low for Jesus. We heard last week only that Coop left the chapel justified but we’re not told how that justification took place, exactly. Today, we find out…

Zacchaeus, er, Coop has heard of Jesus, a friend of sinners and possibly the Almighty God come in our flesh? So Coop drops everything, stops robbing his friends and neighbors at least for this episode 😉 He wants to see Jesus and learns Jesus is passing through his own neighborhood, Greenwich er, Jericho!

Crowds follow Jesus, everywhere. Coop can’t get through the crowd to get even a glimpse of him, because he’s small in ηλικια in Greek which is literally “a time in life”. Euphemistically it’s “stature” and I’m pretty sure that here as elsewhere we’re not talking about literal height or literal age, but about your stature as in your standing in life (because Jon Hamm who is Coop who is Zacchaeus is like over 6 feet tall!, so it can’t be literal height 😉

See, as a hedge fund man… er tax collector, Coop falls short in his standing in the eyes of his fellow Christians, who won’t let him get close to a holy teacher like Jesus.

So Coop, being athletic (he’s getting lots of exercise breaking into houses Cary Grant cat-burglar style) goes sprinting down the road to where Jesus is coming, climbs a tree where he can get a clear view of Jesus—and yet remain hidden, he thinks, from sight…

Jesus sees him and says “Coop! Hurry down from there, for I must stay at your house today.”

Everyone grumbles, knowing Coop is a crook (and probably killed Paul!). But Coop says to Jesus: “See, half of my goods I give to the poor and whatever I’ve stolen from anyone I restore fourfold”. Because, as long as I’m hanging with Jesus, I don’t need nuthin’ else!

And Jesus says, “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham”—who is the father of faith not of human good works! 😉

I heard a sermon at our District Convention in which our Synod prez says when we see Jesus, we’ll all rush to grab hold of him. And I thought, “Really? That’s your first move?” I’m probably more fear than love—when it comes to Jesus!”

I figure I’ll be with Coop, er Zacchaeus, up in the tree, chagrined if Jesus sees and calls me out… 😉

Jesus proclaims: “The Son of Man came to seek and to save…” not the lost, but the απολωλος—in Greek, the “utterly destroyed”. It’s only when we see, with Coop, that our sins have utterly destroyed us and all our hurry-scurrying working only makes it worser, that we see ourselves as we are and Jesus as he is… the Holy-Making God, Raiser of the Dead.

And that’s the Beatific Vision that alone makes saints—now and always, bestowing Peace, surpassing all understanding, guarding our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.