“I hate running late above everything else, as it just isn’t fair to my employers, to who is throwing a gathering, and especially church. It’s easy to just waltz in when we want for a lot of people, especially Dodger games, but not me. I would rather leave early and get where I need to be Thirty minutes early, than be late. It is something that I just never understood; that people have time to go to the gym, Starbucks, or anywhere else, and yet they walk in late to work or church and say, “well I just couldn’t get up on time?” All the rules of being late also apply to anyone, the red lights we hit, the traffic being crazy, you get a flat tire, or anything else that could go wrong. I see Murphy’s Law everywhere. Being late shouldn’t be a way of life, it should be the exception.
Zacchaeus was a man who heard Jesus was passing through Jericho, and he wanted to see who this Jesus was. Now Zacchaeus was a tax collector; who in those times were not popular, as they would overcharge the people, so they were hated by everyone. He, it says in Luke, was also a very rich man and small in stature, that he couldn’t see over the crowds. Now Zacchaeus could have thought, let me go get a coffee, or go workout, or go and do some tax collecting, I’ll catch Jesus later or when the crowds die away. But Luke Nineteen says,
“He ran ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see Him, for He was going to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, He looked up and saw him and said to him, “Zacchaeus, make haste and come down, for today I must stay at your house.” so he made haste and came down, and received Him joyfully.” (NKJV)
Imagine if Zacchaeus would have been running late, and or stopped to do something else, or the herds of traffic and people would have stopped him or disheartened him? He would have missed the blessing and the reward of not only seeing Jesus, but of eating and fellowshipping with God incarnate. How many times have we lost out on the blessings and missed the opportunity of seeing Jesus, and being blessed because of life or our own “Lateness”?
Luke ends with, “And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham; for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (NKJV)
James the half brother of Jesus, and who didn’t believe in Him growing up, quotes Proverbs Twenty seven one, in chapter four,
“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”” (ESV)
God desires for all to come to repentance, but too many are late, busy, not willing to climb a tree to see above the crowds, because to them, life is okay. We can run in circles for all of our days, but your life would be more at peace, if you ran to Jesus.
So my question is today what is making you late, or worried about other things in the world? My prayer is that we are like Zacchaeus and run to Jesus and allow Him to give you peace and a hope that this world will never give you! Paul reminds us to not be anxious, not that we always will be happy, but when we give it to Jesus, a peace the world will never understand, comes from Jesus. Philippians four says,
“do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (ESV)
Jesus came to seek the lost of which we all fall under. “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now I am found, I was blind, but now I see!”
Jose Barajas
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