Chris' prayer: Matt Maher's "Flesh and Bone"

People climbing trees to catch sight of You

Perhaps I already blogged about this when it happened, but tonight's song reminded me of it, so I'm going to blog about it again.

This line of the song refers to the story of Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus was a tax collector in Jericho, a position that afforded him much importance and wealth. It did not afford him any additional height, however, as Zacchaeus was a short man. Despite his own importance and wealth, when Zacchaeus heard that Jesus would be passing through the town, he made it a point to see him. In order to do so, Zacchaeus climbed a tree hoping just to get a glimpse of a man he'd heard of, but not seen. When Jesus walked by, He called out to Zacchaeus by name, telling him to come down and eat with Him.

I'd heard this story many times before, but I heard it in a new way one Sunday morning when I woke up earlier than I usually do. Not able to fall back asleep, I turned on the television and stumbled upon preacher Joel Osteen's show. He was telling the story of Zacchaeus that morning. Osteen took careful consideration to mention that Zacchaeus probably didn't like how short he was, and perhaps was even ridiculed for it. He would much rather have not had to climb that tree just to see Jesus, and was probably pushed around before he thought to do so.

But what most would see as a negative was something that was ultimately used to honor Jesus and to lift a simple man up. If Zacchaeus was taller, he would have been on the ground like everyone else. But Jesus didn't choose to dine with anyone on the ground. He chose to dine with the person standing in the tree. It was because of Zacchaeus' shortcoming (no pun intended) that he was chosen.

The moral of the story is that we ultimately don't know what it is about us that will glorify God. It might be the things we are good at and take pride in, but there is just as good a chance that God works through the things we aren't so proud of. God has made us just as He wanted us, so that we might glorify Him, and when we hide who we are (or parts of who we are), we do a disservice to the One who created and formed us in a very particular way.


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