Read this first: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2019%3A1-10&version=NIV
A friend led a devotional thought today that focused on these well known verses. First it leads to my favorite youth group ice breaker question- what if you meet Jesus and He’s everything you’ve always known but he’s 4 feet tall. How thrown would you be?
Maybe this story encourages that not to be true as Jesus is clearly taller than the wee little man. But perceptions are funny things. Jesus would be no less Savior at any height. The wee man in this story is of course Zaccheus, a man who wants to see Jesus. A man Jesus wants to see and so he says- I’m going to your house today! And Zaccheus responds with joy! Would you do the same? Would I do the same? To be honest my first reaction isn’t joy. My first reaction is well Jesus give me an hour or two to clean first. I want to make things right for you. I suppose that’s the Martha in me. Mary would just sit at Jesus feet. Jesus does this with others. He’s always inviting himself into people’s homes and hearts. It’s not the other way around. Jesus never says- come over to my place! I’ve got a meal for you. No he says- what you got? Even if it’s not much- he will take it and make that better. Why? Perhaps because too often what we think we have and our isn’t enough. And God says- nope I’m going to use you- even in your sin- even in your weakness- even when you think you’re awful- I’m going to use you. Even one kid’s lunch of tiny loaves and fish- mattered why wouldn’t you matter?
I was also reading the story of Jesus and the woman at the well- it’s a long convoluted story and so often forgotten is the part at the end- Jesus stays in town and talks with the woman and her friends for two days following. He doesn’t just swoop in and swoop out. No Jesus is a God who stays.
It’s no work to go over to someone else’s house and stay or have a meal. It’s another to have someone stay at your house and cook for them. That’s work- that requires hospitality.
As a Lutheran Christians I think too often I focus more on heaven- going to God’s house and he will just take care of us someday- then in Jesus wants to be in my house now- in fact he already is.
My house could be cleaned up of all the sin I bring in- it could be so much better. Yet I don’t really care that much about my house. If I stay at someone else’s house to take care of their place while on vacation or even to visit- I’m ridiculously careful and clean with it. Same when someone else comes over to my house. But for some reason when it’s just myself- I get apathetic and I don’t care.
I think the same is true of my spiritual life-too often I just don’t care. A lie here, a week without prayer there, 6 months without typing up much of a devotion online here, because it doesn’t really matter- Jesus loves me anyway. That’s cheap grace. I’m good at cheap grace. Sure God still gives it regardless, but I’m missing out on Jesus in my home. Jesus in my daily walk. Jesus in the ordinary every moment of every meal- not Jesus off in the distance. The relationship with Jesus isn’t something that starts after death- it’s now. Jesus wants to be in my home and in my heart. I pray that he changes me and becomes more and more apart of my life and home and yours too.
God bless.
Marking It Up 