CHAPTER 6 To Seek and Save the Lost

There is no more glorious truth in the Bible than the words of Luke 19:10: “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” That verse sums up the work of Christ on earth. From the human viewpoint, it may represent the single most important truth ever recorded in Scripture.

Jesus’ sermons were not manifestos for social reform or political revolution. The essence of His message was always the gospel of salvation. He said of His own mission, “I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:32). The apostle Paul said in 1 Timothy 1:15, “It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.”

Search and Rescue

The nature of God is to seek and to save sinners. From the opening pages of human history, it was God who sought the fallen couple in the Garden. In Ezekiel 34:16 God says, “I will seek the lost, bring back the scattered, bind up the broken and strengthen the sick.” The Almighty was portrayed as a Savior throughout the Old Testament (Ps. 106:21; Isa. 43:11; Hos. 13:4), so it is appropriate that when Christ entered the world of human beings as God in human flesh, He was known first of all as a Savior.

Even Jesus’ name was divinely chosen to be the name of a Savior. An angel told Joseph in a dream, “You shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). The very heart of all redemptive teaching is that Jesus entered this world on a search and rescue mission for sinners. That truth is what characterizes the gospel as good news.

But it is good news only for those who perceive themselves as sinners. The unequivocal teaching of Jesus is that those who will not acknowledge and repent of their sin are beyond the reach of saving grace. All are sinners, but not all are willing to admit their depravity. If they do, Jesus becomes their friend (cf. Matt. 11:19). If they will not, they will know Him only as Judge (cf. Matt. 7:22).

Again, Jesus’ parable in Luke 18:10-13 underscores this truth. He directed these words at “some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt” (v. 9):

Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself, “God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.” But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, the sinner!”

Our Lord’s assessment of those two men must have bewildered and infuriated His audience of self-righteous Pharisees: “I tell you, this man [the tax collector] went to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted” (v. 14).

Humble repentance is the only acceptable response to the gospel. Those who fail to confess their sin He turns away. But He reaches out in grace to those who, like Matthew and the Samaritan woman, admit their sinfulness and seek deliverance. The worse the sinner, the more marvelously His grace and glory are revealed through that sinner’s redemption.

Multitudes of repentant sinners responded during Jesus’ earthly ministry. He continually ministered to tax collectors and other outcasts. Luke 15:1 indicates that a constant stream of such people approached Him. In fact, the Pharisees’ worst complaint about His ministry was, “This man receives sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). They set themselves in contrast and were condemned by their own comparison. They had no heart for the outcast, no love for the sinner, no compassion for the lost. Worse, they had no sense of their own sinfulness. Christ could do nothing for them.

The Setting for a Miracle

Like Matthew, Zaccheus was a tax-gatherer whose heart was divinely prepared to receive and follow Christ. His encounter with Jesus took place in Jericho, as the Lord was passing through on His way to Jerusalem to die. Jesus had for some time been ministering in Galilee. His hometown, Nazareth, was there. He was now headed to Jerusalem for the final Passover, in which He would be the Paschal Lamb, giving His life on the cross for sinners. And as if to show exactly why He had to die, He paused in Jericho to reach out to a wretched tax-gatherer.

Along the journey the Lord had collected an entourage of pilgrims going to celebrate Passover in Jerusalem. His fame had spread throughout Palestine. Not long before this, He had raised Lazarus from the dead. That happened in Bethany, not far from Jericho. Word had spread, and people were curious about Jesus. Everyone in Jericho who could move lined the streets in preparation for His passing through. The city was buzzing. Was He the Messiah? Was He coming to take over? Was He coming to defeat the Romans and set up His kingdom?

Jericho is east and a little north of Jerusalem. It was an international crossroads, located where the main routes north, south, east, and west all came together. The customs house there, where taxes were collected, was a busy place, and Zaccheus was the publican in charge there.

Seeking the Savior

Zaccheus was despised by the whole community. Luke 19:7 says that everyone called him a sinner. Not only was he a tax-gatherer and a traitor to the nation, but this designation “sinner” probably meant that his personal character was debauched as well. That was the case with most publicans.

The Lord Jesus had a special love for tax collectors. Luke especially focuses on the numerous times Jesus encountered them. Luke’s theme is the love of the Savior for the lost, and he repeatedly portrays Jesus reaching out to the riffraff of society. Every time Luke mentions a tax collector (3:12; 5:27; 7:29; 15:1; 18:10-13; 19:2), it is in a positive sense. These were the outcasts of a religious society-flagrant public sinners -the very kind Jesus had come to save.

It might appear that Zaccheus was seeking Jesus on his own initiative, but the truth is that if Jesus had not first sought him, he never would have come to the Savior. Sinners never seek God on their own (Rom. 3:11). In our natural, fallen state we are dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1), excluded from the life of God (4:18), and therefore totally unable and unwilling to seek God. Only when we are touched by the sovereign, convicting power of God do we move toward Him (John 6:44, 65). And thus it is not until God begins to pursue a soul that the soul responds by seeking Him. An anonymous hymn writer penned these words:

I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew
He moved my soul to seek Him, seeking me;
It was not I that found, O Savior true;
No, I was found of Thee.

Whenever someone seeks God, you can be certain it is a response to the prompting of a seeking God. We would not love Him if He had not first loved us (cf. 1 John 4:19).

Nevertheless, God invites sinners to seek. Isaiah 55:6 says, “Seek the while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near.” Jeremiah 29:13 says, “You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.” God says in Amos 5:4, “Seek Me that you may live.” Jesus said, “Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness” (Matt. 6:33) and, “Seek, and you will find” (Matt. 7:7).

Being sought by God, Zaccheus was seeking. He had heard of Jesus but apparently had never seen Him. Luke 19:3 says, “Zaccheus was trying to see who Jesus was.” The verb tense implies that he was continually making an effort to see Jesus. Why? Curiosity? Probably. Conscience? Surely. Desire for freedom from guilt? That could be. But beyond all those factors, the reality that he was ultimately saved demonstrates that the central force driving him to Christ was the irresistible convicting power of the Holy Spirit. It is apparent that the Spirit of God had begun in the heart of Zaccheus the process of drawing him to Christ. Zaccheus was not seeking God on his own initiative, but the Spirit of God was moving his heart. In response he made an effort to see Jesus.

Here was an outcast, a hated man, a man whose hands were filled with money he had taken at the expense of poor people. He was a man with tremendous guilt. Yet instead of running and hiding, he desperately wanted to see Jesus. To do this, he overcame a number of obstacles. One was the crowd. The residents of Jericho were already lining the streets. Add to that his small stature. Zaccheus probably judiciously avoided crowds. A short man would have a problem in a crowd to start with. But a short man who was the chief tax commissioner risked getting a well-placed elbow in the jaw, a heavy boot on the big toe, or even a knife in the back.

On this day, Zaccheus was not concerned with such fears. He was not even concerned with his dignity. He was so determined to see Jesus that he ran ahead of the crowd and climbed up into a sycamore tree to await the Savior (Luke 19:4). The sycamore was a short, fat tree with spreading branches. A little person could scurry up the trunk, get out on a limb, and hang over the road. And that is what Zaccheus did. The tree offered a perfect seat for the parade. It was not a dignified place for a man to be, but that was not important to him at this point. Zaccheus only wanted to see Jesus.

The Seeking Savior

What happened next must have staggered Zaccheus. Although Jesus had never met him before, He stopped in the middle of thousands of people, looked up in the tree, and said, “Zaccheus, hurry and come down, for today I must stay at your house” (Luke 19:5). That is known as the direct approach to evangelism! Nothing about Jesus’ approach was subtle.

Our Lord had a divinely ordained appointment with the man. “Today I must stay at your house” suggests a mandate, not a request. He was not asking; he was saying, “I’m coming-I must come.” Zaccheus’s heart was prepared according to the divine timetable.

Zaccheus wanted to see Jesus, but he had no idea Jesus wanted to see him. “He hurried and came down and received Him gladly” (v. 6). We might suppose that such a despicable sinner would be distressed to hear the perfect, sinless Son of God say, “I’m coming to your house,” but he was glad. His heart was prepared.

The reaction of the crowd was predictable. Both the religious elite and the common people looked down on Zaccheus. “When they saw it, they all began to grumble, saying, ‘He has gone to be the guest of a man who is a sinner’” (v. 7). They believed, as we have seen, that to go into the house of an outcast was to make oneself unclean. To eat with someone like Zaccheus was the worst possible defilement. They placed no value on Zaccheus’s soul. They had no concern for his spiritual welfare. Their self-righteous eyes could see only his sin. They could not understand and would not see in their blind pride that Jesus had come to seek and to save sinners, and they condemned Him for it. In doing so, they condemned themselves.

We are never told what happened at Zaccheus’s house. Scripture doesn’t say what he served for dinner or how long Jesus stayed or what they talked about. Nor do we know what Jesus said to Zaccheus in bringing him to salvation. As we have seen in other accounts where Jesus evangelized, the methodology He used is not the point. Conversion is a divine miracle, and there are no formulas that can bring it about or explain it. There is no four- or five-step plan to salvation or any prefabricated prayer that can guarantee the salvation of a soul.

We can assume that Jesus dealt with the issue of Zaccheus’s sin. No doubt Zaccheus already realized what a great sinner he was. Certainly Christ revealed to Zaccheus who He really was-God in the flesh. Whatever He said, He found in Zaccheus an open heart.

The Fruit of Salvation

The curtain seems to rise near the end of their conversation in Luke 19: “Zaccheus stopped and said to the Lord, ‘Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much.’ And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham’” (vv. 8-9).

Notice that Zaccheus addressed Jesus as Lord. That term can mean simply “sir” or “teacher.” But here it certainly means more. In verse 9, Jesus said Zaccheus was saved. If so, he must have acknowledged Jesus as Lord God, confessing Him as his own sovereign master. That is an affirmation he could not have made before Christ worked in his life, and he could not have denied it afterward (cf. 1 Cor. 12:3).

Here is a radically changed man. Deciding to give half his possessions to the poor was a complete reversal. It is clear evidence his heart was transformed. The taker had become a giver. The extortioner had become a philanthropist. He would repay those he had defrauded, giving back four times as much. His mind was changed, his heart was changed, and his clear intention was to change his behavior also. It was not so much that his heart had changed toward people, although that surely had happened. But first his heart had changed toward God. Now he wanted to obey God by doing what was just and righteous.

It was not necessary for Zaccheus to repay four times as much. Numbers 5:7 required a penalty of one-fifth as restitution for a wrong. But Zaccheus’s generosity showed a transformed soul. It is a response typical of a newly redeemed person, the blessed fruit of redemption. He did not say, “Salvation is wonderful, but don’t place any demands on my life.” There is something in the heart of every newborn believer that wants to obey. It is a heart of eager, generous obedience, a changed mind, and changed behavior.

All the evidence indicated that Zaccheus was a genuine believer. Jesus saw it and recognized a heart of faith. Look again at Luke 19:9: “He, too, is a son of Abraham.” That was a statement about his faith.

Zaccheus was a son of Abraham not because he was Jewish, but because he believed. Romans 2:28 says, “He is not a Jew who is one outwardly.” Then what makes a true Jew? Romans 4:11 says Abraham is the father of all who believe. Galatians 3:7 says, “It is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham.” All who trust in Christ are Abraham’s offspring. Thus a true son of Abraham is the same as a believer.

Salvation did not come to Zaccheus because he gave his money away, but because he became a true son of Abraham; that is, a believer. He was saved by faith, not by works. But the works were important evidence that his faith was real. Second Corinthians 5:17 says, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away, behold, new things have come.” Genuine saving faith changes behavior, transforms thinking, and puts within a person a new heart (Ezek. 36:26). Implicit in that change of heart is a new set of desires-a desire to please God, to obey, and to reflect His righteousness. If such a change does not occur, there is no reason to think genuine salvation has taken place. If, as in the case of Zaccheus, there is evidence of faith that desires to obey, that is the mark of a true son of Abraham.