My name is Zaccheus, and I'm a tax collector. That is why hardly anybody likes me. Most tax collectors are not honest people. We can collect any amount we want and keep most of it if we want to. Yes, I have done it, too.

Not only do I stand out because I'm a tax collector, but I'm also short. I'm always the shortest person wherever I go. At home, I even have to stand on a chair to reach things on the top shelf.

One day as I was walking around Jericho, where I live, I heard someone say that Jesus was coming. I had heard about this man and wanted to see him, but I knew I didn't have a chance since there was always a big crowd around Him.

I watched which way the crowd was moving, then ran on ahead and climbed a sycamore tree and waited. It wasn't very long 'til the crowd reached where I was and Jesus walked right in front of me. That is just the way I had planned it.

When Jesus got to the tree, He stopped and looked right at me. I must have looked kind of funny, a grown man sitting in a tree. Then Jesus said, "Zaccheus." How did He know my name? "Zaccheus, come down out of that tree, because I'm coming to your house for supper tonight."

It didn't take me long to get down. In fact I was so surprised, I almost fell out of the tree. "Why, yes, I'd love to have you come to my house to eat," I told Him. I invited all my tax collector friends, too. They were the only ones who would come to my house.

I was so happy to have Jesus in my house that I said, "Lord, half of everything I have I will give to the poor people, and if I have taken anything that wasn't right, I will pay back four times as much as I took."

This made Jesus very happy, because that's just what He wants everyone to do. When we give to others, we show them that we love them, and that we love Jesus, too.

Copyright Ó Larry Platt - Used by permission

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Page updated 05/29/99.