This is the fifth of seven core characteristics of Jesus we’ve been called to imitate and thus disciple our kids toward using the ACT Bible Study Method. Learn more about this family discipleship method here.
TLDR: Jesus loves and values all people and wants to be in relationship with everyone. There is no “in” crowd and “out” crowd for him, and neither should there be for our kids. We want to disciple our kids to pursue genuine friendships with all others.
Hospitality is about acceptance. It’s about welcoming someone, recognizing her worth, and calling that person “friend.” It’s not about ignoring differences, but rather, it’s about not allowing those differences to be barriers. It’s about seeing others as valued image-bearers and treating them accordingly. Nobody has done this better than Jesus. Luke gives us a powerful snapshot of Jesus’ hospitality in Christ’s encounter with Zacchaeus in Jericho (Luke 19:1–10).
Zacchaeus wasn’t just a tax collector; he was a chief tax collector—most likely an upper-level administrator who organized the tax collecting efforts of his subordinates and accumulated his wealth by taking a percentage of their income. Tax collectors were outcasts in Jewish society. They were seen as greedy, self-serving, and religiously and morally compromised. They were encouraged to take as much in taxes as they wanted, as long as they covered what was owed to the government. The rest, they could keep. It’s not surprising, then, that tax collectors were known for their extortion. But that’s just the start of it. Tax collectors also handled Gentile money, making them ceremonially unclean. Then there is the whole issue of Rome. Many of these tax collectors worked to take money from the people of Israel to give to the emperor of Rome. Basically, these tax collectors were helping feed and equip the very army that occupied their land. It’s not hard to see why people despised tax collectors. They were traitors, making their own fortunes off the backs of the common citizens and keeping Rome in business as the neighborhood bully and oppressor. Consequently, tax collectors were disqualified as witnesses in court, excommunicated from the synagogue, and considered disgraces by their families. This was the kind of person Zacchaeus was—a leader of these people nonetheless.
A Powerful Man Humbled
When Zacchaeus hears that Jesus is passing through town, he wants to “get a look at Jesus” (v. 3). The problem was that Zacchaeus was a “short man.”1 His physical status hinted at his social status. Although wealthy—or perhaps because of how he accumulated that wealth—Zacchaeus was afforded low status by his neighbors. All his wealth, influence, and power can’t even buy or earn him a clear line of sight to see Jesus. The crowds can’t even muster the courtesy to move aside so Zacchaeus can catch a glimpse. Or, perhaps, they found delight in spitefully not moving aside. Regardless, Zacchaeus finds a solution, although an inelegant and undignified one: he climbs a tree.
A Humbled Man Welcomed
While Zacchaeus had hoped to see Jesus, something better happens: Jesus sees him (v. 5). No outsider is beyond Jesus’ sight. But Jesus doesn’t just see Zacchaeus, nor does he just acknowledge him. Rather, Jesus calls out an emphatic request to him—he “must” stay at his house. This went beyond sharing a meal—although that alone would have been an amazing gesture of acceptance of this outcast. In the Near Eastern culture of the day, eating with someone connoted intimacy, identification, and acceptance—almost as if you accepted one another as brothers and sisters. For Jesus to accept Zacchaeus on this level would have been scandalous, but Jesus has even more in mind. He invites himself to stay with Zacchaeus. And in doing so, he invites Zacchaeus to become his friend. The man no one would step aside for and offer the most basic of courtesies to is singled out by Jesus and offered the most beautiful of opportunities—to become friends with his Creator. This is the power of hospitality. Hospitality makes strangers friends and enemies family.
A Welcomed Man Accepted
This wasn’t a rare act for Jesus either. He was known for his hospitality. The Pharisees noticed that Jesus ate with sinners so often that they accused him of being “a glutton and a drunk, a friend of tax collectors and sinners” (Matt. 11:19). We know Jesus was not a glutton or a drunk, but this tells us that he wasn’t a prude or wallflower either. It might feel off to say this, but it shouldn’t: Jesus enjoyed a good party. Jesus loved and valued people. All people. He had no boundaries of who was “in” and who was “out.” All deserved to be out, but Jesus extended hospitality to all and invited them all to be in. I love how Luke ends one of the accounts of Jesus addressing this criticism of being a friend of sinners (Luke 7:18–36):
Now one of the Pharisees asked Jesus to have dinner with him, so he went into the Pharisee’s house and took his place at the table.
Luke 7:36 (NET)
Jesus went into the home of a Pharisee and ate with him, which, as we have noted, connotes acceptance. One of those who were complaining loudest about Jesus’ indiscriminate acceptance was accepted by him. Don’t we have a great Savior?
This is the hospitality we want to disciple our kids to imitate. We want to help them see value in all people, to love all people, to welcome all people, and to accept all people. That doesn’t mean they are to accept what all people do, but it is to see everyone as an image-bearer of God deserving of respect.
NEXT: The Forgiveness of Jesus
- If you grew up in the church a few decades ago like I did, I almost guarantee you are singing “Zacchaeus was a wee little man, and a wee little man was he…” right now. And if you weren’t before, you definitely are now. You’re welcome for that earworm. ↩︎
brian dembowczyk 