Sunday
10/30/16 Freeville/Homer Avenue UMC’s
Sermon Title: “What if Zacchaeus ran for President?”
Old Testament
Scripture: Psalm 119:137-144
New Testament
Scripture: 2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12
Gospel Lesson:
Luke 19:1-10
My sisters and brothers, my friends, welcome once again on
this the Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, and this our Reformation Sunday.
Twenty-Four Sundays after the Holy Spirit moved on the day of Pentecost, and
the Christian Church was born.
By most accounts the early Christian Church was loving, was
caring, and it did its best to take care of the poor, the sick, and the
vulnerable. At different times in the history of the Christian Church though, some
church leaders have become corrupt. What is one to do then, if a pastor, or a
priest, or a lay person is corrupting the Christian Church? The answer to this for
many of the great church leaders throughout history has been to seek reform and
changes within the Christian Church. This is why we call this Sunday
Reformation Sunday. We are talking about reformers.
These church reformers are many, and they have existed
since the beginning of the Christian Church. These men and women loved Jesus, and
they wanted the Christian Church to reflect the beliefs and the teachings of
Jesus Christ.
In the modern day, when we read of pastors that are
stealing money, living lavish lifestyles, or doing other corrupt things, it
often causes us to recoil from the Christian Church, as we know that is not
what Jesus Christ taught us.
Of all of the great church reformers, probably the most
famous of all the reformers, was a young Roman Catholic priest named Martin
Luther. Martin Luther lived in the Fifteen-Hundreds in Germany, and during his
lifetime he saw a Christian Church that was selling for the forgiveness of sins,
for various sums of money. Luther, being a good Roman Catholic priest was
disgusted by this, as well as other practices that were going on within the
church hierarchy. Luther called for reforms with his famous 95-Thesis, and was
eventually kicked out or excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church. His
large band of followers that numbered in the thousands, became known as
Lutherans. Luther wasn’t perfect, but God used him to effectively begin to
reform corruption in the Christian Church.
Around this time in the Fifteen-Hundreds, the then king of
England, King Henry VIII decided to take England out of the Roman Catholic
Church. The new church that formed in England was called the Church of England,
and King Henry was in charge of it, instead of the Pope. Today in the United
States, we refer to the Church of England here, as the Episcopal Church, or the
Anglican Church.
In the 1700’s, a young Church of England or Anglican priest
named John Wesley saw a church in England that had become wealthy, corrupt,
self-serving, and elitist. As a result, Wesley was determined to have the
church once again serve the poor, the lesser-thans, and to bring the gospel of
Jesus to all persons. The movement that John Wesley began was called the
Methodist movement. The present day United Methodist Church is the continuation
of John Wesley’s movement.
If we were to study many other non-Roman Catholic and
non-Orthodox churches, we would soon discover that many of those churches were founded
by other great Christian Church reformers to.
Reformation
Sunday then, isn’t a day to celebrate the Christian Church fracturing and
breaking into pieces, but rather today, to me, is a day to celebrate the many Christian
reformers who sought to make the Christian Church into what Jesus Christ designed
it to be. Today we honor these reformers, including the great reformer Martin
Luther, as well as the many other church reformers like John Wesley. Today we
honor our traditions, and our Christians denominations.
With that said, you may have noticed that the title of my
sermon for this morning is “What if Zacchaeus ran for president?” Now I don’t
know if you know this or not, but we have a president election coming up next Tuesday,
November 8th. I am sure that this comes as a shock for many of you! How many of
us will be glad when this election is over?
For me, I don’t know about you, I am really let down by how
politics in this country have continued to get uglier and more sinister. It
seems to me, that in every election cycle many of us are asking, “Can the mudslinging
get any worse?” Yet it always seems to get even worse! All across television
and on every other media source we are inundated with commercial after commercial
telling us to vote for him or her, and how their opponents are the incarnation
of Satan. All of the candidates seem to talk as if they have all the answers
and know just what this county, this state, or this country needs.
In addition to all of this, many candidates for political
office make a variety of promises to us the voters, of what they will do if and
when they win. I can’t tell you how many commercials I have seen over the years
that say “vote for so and so, as they are going to clean up Washington!” We
have been told “read my lips, no more new taxes”. We have candidates that change
their positions, their views, and sometimes even change their political parties.
Yet when they are campaigning we are told that we should vote for them, as they
know what is best for us.
Not only this, in this election cycle hundreds of millions,
and even billions of dollars are and have been spent. In the great state of New
York, we have as many as twenty-million people. Yet I heard on a recent radio
report that about 2.5 million New Yorkers regularly visit food pantries and food
banks for food, yet billions are spent on ads, commercials, and etc. Anyone
just sick of politics? Sick of all of the promises? The constant barrage on
television, the newspapers, and the internet? I know that I am. I wish we would
spend all of this money on feeding the poor.
We live in a democracy though, and since this is true, we
get to vote for our leaders. Not all countries on the earth today have that
luxury. We in the United States though, we get to vote for all of our elected
officials.
With this presidential election coming up, I have heard
more reporters, more commentators, and more opinions than I have ever heard
about most things in my life time. Yet, I we to vote for our leaders.
We have two main political candidates running for president,
along with two or more other candidates. Many of us next Tuesday, November 8th
will go and cast our votes for president, and perhaps many other elected
positions. For many of us, we will vote in part based upon what we think that the
various political candidates can do for us, and for our country.
Some folks might also vote based upon other interests that
they have, such as what their job is, there values, their religious beliefs, or
perhaps some always vote a strict party line.
I guess that I couldn’t allow a president election season
to occur though, and not preach at least one sermon about it. Next Sunday is
All Saint’s Sunday, so next Sunday wouldn’t work well for this sermon, so I
decided to talk about the election this Sunday.
In the gospels, much like many politicians do to us,
different people made different promises to Jesus, to God. Some of these
promises we know were fulfilled, yet some of these promises were not fulfilled,
or we don’t know if they were fulfilled. Since many of us might think that many
politicians make big promises to us, I called this morning’s sermon, “What if
Zacchaeus ran for president?”
Well depending on who you are, you might be asking yourself
one of two things right now. One question you might be asking yourself is, “Who
is Zacchaeus?” Or you might be saying to yourself, “Pastor Paul, I have
followed this election closely, I have seen Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Gary
Johnson, and Jill Stein, but I haven’t seen Zacchaeus”! If you are saying the
second thing to yourself, you are right, as Zacchaeus is the subject of this
morning’s gospel reading. Zacchaeus is not on the ballot for next Tuesday,
November 8th.
This morning, like many politicians do to us, a man named
Zacchaeus makes promises to Jesus Christ. The interesting thing about the
promises that Zacchaeus makes, is we don’t know if he ever made good on them,
as the bible doesn’t tell us this. Let’s look at the gospel reading from this
morning again. Here is what it says speaking of Jesus:
“He
entered Jericho and was passing through it. A man was there named Zacchaeus; he
was a chief tax collector and was rich. He was trying to see who Jesus was, but
on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. So he
ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass
that way” (Lk. 19:1-4, NRSV).
The gospel then says:
“When
Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and
come down; for I must stay at your house today.” So he hurried down and was
happy to welcome him. All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to
be the guest of one who is a sinner” (Lk. 19:5-7, NRSV).
The gospel then ends by saying:
“Zacchaeus
stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will
give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back
four times as much.” Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this
house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out
and to save the lost” (Lk. 19:8-10).
So in this gospel story for this morning, a Jewish man
named Zacchaeus has grown quite wealthy working as a tax collector for the Roman
Empire. Remember that the Romans occupied what is today Israel, and the Jewish
people and many others were living under oppressive Roman rule. Yet Zacchaeus
is tax collector working for the Romans, and he has grown quite rich off the
backs of his own people.
So in review, Jesus come to Jericho where Zacchaeus lives,
and Zacchaeus feels like that he just has to meet this Jesus. Since Zacchaeus
is on the shorter side, he climbs up a sycamore tree, so that he will be able
to see Jesus coming.
Jesus then does in fact come by the tree, and as he passes,
he stops, looks up at the tree, and tells Zacchaeus that he wants to stay in
his house today. Zacchaeus might be wondering at this point, “How did Jesus
know my name?”
Zacchaeus then hurries down the sycamore tree, and then promptly
tells Jesus that he will give away half of his possessions to the poor, and that
he will pay back to anyone he has defrauded four-times what he took from them.
Jesus then praises him, and tells him that he and his house
now has salvation, and one day will see heaven.
I suppose that since Jesus said these words to Zacchaeus,
we can assume that Zacchaeus did in fact do what he promised Jesus he would do.
Yet right after Jesus tells Zacchaeus that salvation has come to him and his
house, Jesus then immediately goes right into telling the parable or story of
the ten pounds or ten minas. After telling this parable or story, Jesus then
heads right to Jerusalem. As a result, we technically don’t know if Zacchaeus made
good on his promises to Jesus.
What we do know, is that Zacchaeus was a corrupt person, and
a person who was getting rich off of harming his own people. We also know that
Zacchaeus’ own people didn’t like him for doing this, and that they even
regarded him as a sinner.
So Zacchaeus tells Jesus he has changed, that he will be
different, and that he will give away much of his wealth. We can assume that
Zacchaeus did this, but as I said, we just don’t know for sure.
So like the promises that Zacchaeus made to Jesus Christ
this morning, do we believe in the promises that the people running for elected
office are making? Further, if Zacchaeus was alive today, would you vote for
him? What if Zacchaeus ran for president?
My brothers and sisters, as I said, this is probably the
roughest and the most sinister election cycle that I have even seen in my
lifetime. So what do we do?
I believe that we should be praying for our current leaders,
for our candidates to be leaders, for our people, for our country, and for our
world. I also believe that democracy is a great gift, and I would encourage us
all to vote next Tuesday on November 8th. May we all pray, may we
all trust, and me we all do our best to strengthen this experiment in democracy
that we call the United States of America. May we vote the way that we feel God
calling us to vote. Amen.
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