Must He?

Must He?

(No. 2755)

A SERMON INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, DECEMBER 1, 1901.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING, JULY
27, 1879.

"And when Jesus came to the place, He looked up, and saw him, and said
unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for today I must stay
at your house." Luke 19:5.

I THINK this is the only instance in which our Lord invited Himself to
anybody's house. He often went when He was invited, but this time, if I
may use the expression, He did the inviting Himself! Usually we must
seek the Lord if we want to find Him. To the eye, at any rate, the
apparent work of Grace goes on in this way–a man begins to cry for
mercy, as the blind man who heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing
by, cried to Him, "You Son of David, have mercy on me." But God is so
rich in Grace that He does not restrict Himself to this usual method!
Generally, He is found of them that seek Him, but, sometimes, He is
found of them that seek Him not. Yes, if I tell the whole Truth of
God–if you go down to the bedrock of actual fact–it is always God who
seeks sinners. He always calls them a people who are not a people and
the first movement between God and the sinner is never on the sinner's
part, but on God's part. Still, apparently, men begin to pray to God
and begin to seek the Lord–and this is the usual order in which
salvation comes to them. The prodigal said, "I will arise and go to my
father," and he arose and came to his father." The blind man cried,
"Jesus, you Son of David, have mercy on me."

Our text, however, describes a case which shows the freeness of Divine
Mercy, for, although Zacchaeus did not invite Christ to his house,
Christ invited Himself. Though there was no asking Him to be a guest,
much less any pressing entreaty on the part of Zacchaeus, Christ
pressed Himself upon him and said to him, "Make haste, and come down;
for today I must stay at your house." I reckon that there are some here
who are on an errand something like that of Zacchaeus. They want,
perhaps, to see the preacher–which is not nearly as good a thing as
wanting to see the preacher's Master. Still, that curiosity has brought
them into the place where Jesus of Nazareth is known to come and I do
pray that He may find many to whom He will say, "Make haste, and come
and receive Me; for I must stay, this very night, with you and dwell in
your house and heart at this time and forever."

I. The first thing I am going to talk about is THE DIVINE NECESSITY
WHICH PRESSED UPON THE SAVIOR. He says, "I must." "Today I must stay at
your house."

I do not think of this so much as a necessity upon Zacchaeus as upon
Christ. You know that He felt this "must" at other times. In John 4:4,
we read, "He must needs go through Samaria." There was a sacred
necessity that He should go that way. The most notable instance of all
was when "Jesus began to show unto His disciples how that He must go
unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests
and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day." In this
case, the "must" was of another kind–He must stay in the house of
Zacchaeus. What necessity was this which pressed so urgently upon our
blessed Master? There were many other houses in Jericho beside that of
the tax gatherer. I daresay there were other persons who would,
apparently, have been more suitable hosts for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Yet it was not really so. There was a mighty pressure upon Him, who is
the Omnipotent Lord of all! Necessity was laid upon Him who is "the
blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords." He
was His own Master, yet He must do something to which He was
constrained by an urgent necessity–He must go and lodge that night
nowhere else but at the house of Zacchaeus. What did this "must" mean?

I answer, first, it was a necessity of love. Our Lord Jesus needed to
bless somebody. He had seen Zacchaeus and He knew what his occupation
was and what his sin was–and He felt that He must bless him. As He
looked at him, He felt as a mother does concerning her child when it is
ill and she must nurse it. Or as you might feel concerning a starving
man, whom you saw to be ready to expire with hunger, and you felt that
you must feed him. Or as some men have felt when

they have seen a fellow creature drowning, and they have plunged in to
save him. They did not stop to think. They dared to do the brave deed
without a thought, for they felt that they "must" do it. The
compulsions of charity, the necessities of benevolence–these urgent
things laid violent hands upon them, so they must do it. Thus Jesus
felt–only in a much higher sense–that He must bless Zacchaeus. He
must go to his house, that He might enter his heart, to stay there and
to make Zacchaeus holy and happy henceforth and forever! And He is the
same Christ, now, that He was then–He is not less loving, He is the
same gracious Savior and He feels the same necessity, the same hunger
after souls, the same thirst of love to bless the sons of men and I,
therefore, hopefully expect that there will be, even in this place and,
I hope, in many other parts of the world, some of whom it will be true
that the Lord Jesus Christ must come to their house and heart! So, this
was a necessity arising out of our Savior's Divine benevolence and
love.

Next, I think it was a necessity of His Sovereignty. ' 'I must stay at
your house." Here were scribes, Pharisees and all sorts of people
around Him who were saying, "He i s a Prophet! He has opened a blind
man's eyes and He must, therefore, as a Prophet, be entertained by some
notable Pharisee! Some very respectable person must find Him a lodging
tonight." But our Lord Jesus Christ seems to say, "I cannot be bound. I
will not be fettered. I must exert My own will. I must display My
Sovereignty and though these people will all murmur, I cannot help
that. Zacchaeus, I will come and stay with you, just to show them that
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion
on whom I will have compassion!"

You see, this man smelled bad! We are not very fond of tax gatherers
here, but in the East, they like them still less than we do! And among
the Jews, a tax gatherer, if he was a Jew who came to collect an
obnoxious impost by a foreign power upon a people who thought that they
were the people of God and ought to be free, was a man who was
intensely hated for having stooped to become one of the farmers of
taxes! And if he was the chief contractor of customs, as Zacchaeus was,
he had a very bad name, indeed! People did not cultivate his
acquaintance. They seldom dropped in to tea at his house and, as a
general rule, they spoke very evilly of him. When they mentioned
sinners, they always reckoned that Zacchaeus, who had made a fine thing
out of the business they specially loathed, and was reputed to be very
rich, was one of the very worst–nobody thought much of him. I think,
too, that he had been excommunicated by a law of the Sanhedrim, for the
publicans were generally regarded as excommunicated persons–shut out,
certainly, from the society of more respectable people.

Besides, to my mind, Zacchaeus was an eccentric sort of person. That
running of his was a very strange action for such a man! Wealthy men,
even though they happen to be short of stature, do not generally take
to running through the streets and climbing trees! I should think
Zacchaeus was the sort of man who kept to himself and who, when he
meant to do a thing, would do it–and if it was to climb a tree, as a
boy might–he did not mind that, for he had got beyond caring for
public opinion! He was an oddity–he may have been a very good sort of
fellow in some respects, but it is quite clear that he was an odd sort
of person. So our Lord Jesus Christ seemed to say, "I will show these
people that when I save men, it is not because they stand well in
society, or because they enjoy an excellent reputation, or because
there are some beautiful points in their character. I will save this
odd man, this Zacchaeus, this despised tax gatherer. I must have him–
he is just the sort of man in whom I can best display the Sovereignty
of My Grace." To this day, men cannot bear that Doctrine! Free will
suits them very well, but Free Grace does not! They would not let
Christ choose His own wife–I say it with the utmost reverence. I mean
they would not let Him have the choice of His own bride, His Church,
but say that must be left to the will of men! But Christ will have His
way, whatever they may say. He has a sacred determination in His
blessed heart, that He will do as He pleases and so, for that reason,
He says to Zacchaeus, "I must s tay at your house."

Our Lord Jesus was also under another necessity, He needed someone in
whom He could display the great power of His Grace. He needed a sinner,
to begin with. That was to be the raw material out of which He was
going to make a saint and a saint of a very special character. Is there
a Christian in this place who comes up to the standard of Zacchaeus
after he was converted? I do not wish to be censorious, but I doubt if
there is one. Is there anybody here who gives away half his income to
the poor? I think that was going a long way in Grace in the matter of
almsgiving. And then remember that he was but a babe in Grace when he
did that–so what he did when he grew older, I do not know. But the
first day he was born to Christ, he was a saint of that kind! What kind
of a saint he grew to be, by-and-by, I can scarcely imagine! Lord, out
of what material did You make such a generous soul as this? What? Out
of a grasping, grinding tax gatherer, who sought to grab all he could
lay his hands on, the mighty Grace of God, better than a magic wand,
opened his closed heart and made it gush forth like a fountain flowing
in a thousand generous streams! Jesus seems to say, "I must have
Zacchaeus so that the men of the world may see what I can make out of
the most unlikely material–how I can take coarse pebbles from the
brook and transmute them into diamonds! How I can bedeck my crown with
jewels of the first water, which were originally but as the common
stones of the street."

I wonder whether there is anybody here who feels that he has not
anything at all in him that is any good whatever? If so, the Lord could
say, "I will make something of that man that will cause all who know
him to marvel. I will make his wife wonder what has changed him. I will
make all his children say, 'What has come over Father?' I will make the
whole parish say, 'What a miracle! What a miracle!'" This was the kind
of "must" that was laid upon our Savior and I hope such a "must"'s laid
upon Him now!

There was one more "must"upon Him, namely, He must stay in the house of
Zacchaeus because Zacchaeus was to be His host at Jericho. Even the
Savior must be lodged somewhere and, in most places, His Father had
appointed some gracious spirit to entertain Him–and Zacchaeus was to
be His host that day. And if He ever came that way again, I feel
certain that He would go to His old quarters. Blessed be my Master's
dear name, He still has some hosts left where the guest chamber is
always ready for Him! In every town, village and hamlet, there is some
house where there is a Prophet's chamber, and if you were to ask, "Is
there anybody here who will entertain the Lord Jesus Christ?" You would
soon find people who would be glad to have His company! Perhaps there
is a large upper room, furnished and prepared, where they might break
bread together. Or a little room where two or three might meet with
Jesus–a place that never seems so bright as when there are a few
praying people met together in it! The Lord must be entertained in this
world and Zacchaeus was to be the man to entertain Him in Jericho!

Who is the one here now who will take Jesus in? A stranger from the
country, perhaps? There is no preaching place in your village, the
Gospel is not often proclaimed within miles of the place where you live
and few people go to hear it when it is preached. That is all the more
reason why Jesus must come to your house, for He means to have your
best room, or that old shed of yours, or that big barn–that the Gospel
may be preached there! There is a Divine necessity laid upon Him to
have your heart for Himself so that He may come and dwell with you, and
make your house His headquarters, where His disciples may go forth to
attack the enemy where you live and that all in your region may know
that the true Salvation Army has come there–and that the Captain of
our salvation has Himself come to make His abode in your house and your
heart!

There is plenty of room for enlargement upon this point, but we must go
on to the next one.

II. So, secondly, LET US ENQUIRE WHETHER THERE IS SUCH A NECESSITY IN
REFERENCE TO OURSELVES. Has the Lord Jesus Christ any necessity to come
and stay at your house, to come and abide in your heart? I can answer
that question best by putting a few enquiries to you.

First, are you willing to receive Christ at once?Then, there is a
necessity laid upon Him to come to you, for He never sent the will into
a man without also sending His Grace with the will! Indeed, the
willingness to receive Him is the proof of the working of His Grace! Do
you long and sigh that Christ might be yours? Then you shall surely
have Him! Are you earnestly anxious to be reconciled to God by Jesus
Christ? Then you may have that great blessing at once! Are you
thirsting after righteousness? Then you shall be filled, for what say
the Scriptures? "Let him who is thirsty, come." And lest anybody should
say, "Oh, but there is some preparation implied in that word, thirst,
and I am afraid that I do not thirst enough." What does the Scripture
further say? "And whoever will–whoever will–let him take the water of
life freely."

Next, will you heartily receive Jesus? Zacchaeus "received Him
joyfully" and if you will do the same, then He must stay at your house!
I think I hear somebody say, "Receive Him joyfully? Ah, that I would if
He would but come to me. I would give all I have to have Christ as my
Savior, to have the new life implanted within me and to have Jesus
dwelling in my heart. I would be willing to live, or willing be die if
I might but have Him as mine." So you will receive Him joyfully, will
you? Ah, then He is bound to come to you! When the door of your heart
is opened, Jesus will not be long before He enters. He will stand and
knock even at a closed door–therefore I am sure that He will enter an
open one! It is written of Lydia, "whose heart the Lord opened," and
her heart was not long open before the Lord entered it. And if yours is
open to Christ, that is a proof that you are one of those in whom He
must stay at this time!

Let me ask you another question. Will you receive Christ, whatever the
murmurers may say? Suppose He comes to you and they begin to murmur, as
they did when He went to be the guest of Zacchaeus? I do not know where
you live, but those around you will be sure to find fault both with you
and with your Lord, too. "They all murmured, saying that He was going
to be guest with a man that is a sinner." So, you see, they were
murmuring at Zacchaeus as well as at Christ, and you will have the same
sort of treatment when you receive Christ. Those who used to say, "You
are a fine fellow," when they find that you have become a Christian,
will call you a mean spirited wretch! As long as you give them
something to drink, they will say what a jolly dog you are! But as soon
as you have done with their ways, you will be literally like a dog to
them and they will have nothing for you but kicks and curses!

In more respectable society you know how they give a Christian the cold
shoulder. Nothing is actually said, but there is a very clear
intimation that your absence is preferred to your company when you once
become a Christian. Can you

bear that? Can you dare that? Because if Christ comes to your house and
heart, you must expect that He will bring His Cross with Him. Are you
willing to have Christ, Cross and all, and to say, "Let the murmurers
say what they will and do what they will, my mind is made up, Christ
for me, Christ for me! I cannot give Him up"?

Further, will you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord? Zacchaeus did so,
for he said, "Behold, Lord." Now, are you willing to give up all to
Christ and to let Him be Lord over you? Are you willing to do what He
bids you, as He bids you, when He bids you and simply becauseHe bids
you? For, verily, I say unto you, you cannot have Christ for your
Savior unless you also have Him as your Lord! He must rule over us as
well as forgive us! As one of our poets says–

"Yet know, nor of the terns complain, Where Jesus comes, He comes to
reign! To reign and with no partial sway– Thoughts must be slain that
disobey." Sins must be given up, evil practices must be forsaken. You
must follow after holiness and endeavor in all things to imitate your
Savior who has left you an example that you should follow His steps.
Are you ready for that? Because if you are, then Christ is ready to
stay at your house and to dwell in your heart!

Once more, will you be prepared to defend Him?f Jesus comes to a
house, it becomes the duty of the host to defend Him. So Zacchaeus, not
in boasting, but as a kind of answer to the sneers of the murmurers,
when they said that Christ had gone to dwell with a sinner, seemed to
say, "But I am no longer a sinner, as I used to be. If I have wronged
anybody, I will restore it fourfold and, henceforth, the half of my
income shall be given in alms to the poor." That was the best defense
he could give and Christ must be defended by the changed lives of His
disciples. You must live so that when men attempt to attack the Savior,
they may be compelled to say, "Well, after all, that man is the better
for being a Christian." Your children may rail at religion, but they
will be compelled to say, "We could speak against Christ and Christians
generally, but when we think of how our mother lived and how she died,
our tongues are silenced. Then, there is our old nurse who feared the
Lord–many a joke did we crack about her religion! But, ah, there was
something about her that was so heavenly that we were obliged to
believe in the reality of it whether we would or not."

Yes, dear Friends, if the Lord Jesus Christ should come to your house,
you must say, "It shall be my heart's ambition, as long as I live, to
defend His cause by the holiness of the character which I trust His
Holy Spirit will work in me." If this is the case with any of you, then
He must stay at your house tonight. God grant that He may do so!

III. Now I must close by reminding you of WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF CHRIST
COMES TO STAY IN YOUR

HOUSE.

First, you must be ready to meet objections at home. You who say that
you are willing to receive my Master, are you quite sure that you know
what that reception involves? Christ says that He wishes to stay at
your house and that He must do so, and you say, "Yes, my Lord, I gladly
welcome You to my heart and my home." But wait a moment, my Friend!
Have you asked your wife about that matter? You know that you must not
bring strangers home–she will be down upon you if you do. Have you
counted the cost of your decision? And, my good woman, you say, "I want
to bring Christ home with me." Have you asked your husband about it?
Sometimes a dear child says, "Jesus Christ shall abide with me." But
what will Father say? For, alas, often, the father is at enmity against
God. If that is the case in your home, are you prepared to endure
persecution for Christ's sake? Our Lord Himself said, "A man's foes
shall be they of his own household." And it is often so. David said to
Jonathan, "What if your father answers you roughly?" Suppose that is
your experience–can you keep true to Christ under such circumstances?
Can you say, "I love my wife. I love my child, I love my father, but I
love Jesus more than all of them and I must have Christ in my heart,
and in my house, even if it brings war there"? Ah, then, He will come
to your house if that is your resolve. But if not, He will not come to
take the second place. He will not come there if you turn coward at the
first jest that is made against you, or the first hard thing that is
spoken against your Lord. But He will come to your house if, despite
all rebuffs and rebukes, you are determined that He shall make His
abode with you.

But, next, is your house fit for Him to enter, and abide there? I know
some houses where my Lord could not lodge for a single night! The
table, the talk, the whole surroundings would be so uncongenial to Him.
Are you prepared, then, to put away everything that would displease Him
and to have your house cleansed of all that is evil? You cannot expect
the Lord Jesus to come into your house if you invite the devil to come,
too! Christ would not remain in the same Heaven with the devil–as soon
as Satan sinned, He hurled him out of the holy place. He could not
endure to have a sinful spirit, the spirit of evil, there, and He will
not come and live in your house if you make provision for the lusts of
the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, and all those
evil things that He abhors. Are you prepared, by His Grace, to make a
clean sweep of these things? He will not come to you on any other
terms.

Further, we must admit none who would grieve our Guest It is hard to
lodge with some people because their children are so badly behaved. My
Lord loves not to dwell in families where Eli is at the head of the
household and where the children and young people live as they like. If
He comes to your house, He will want you to be like Abraham, of whom He
said, "I know him, that he will command his children and his household
after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord." If He comes to
your house, you must ask Him to come in the same way that He came to
the house of the jailor at Philippi. How was that? I have often heard
half of that passage quoted without the context–"Sirs, what must I do
to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you
shall be saved, and your house."Many leave out those last three words,
"and your house." But what a mercy it is when all in the house, as well
as the head of the family, have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ! Do you
not wish that it may be so in your house? Do you not ardently desire
it? I trust that you do.

Once more, when the Lord Jesus Christ comes into your house, you must
entertain Him. He needs no riches at your hands, yet He wants the best
that you have. What is the best that you have? Why, your heart, your
soul! Give Him your heart, give Him your life, give Him your very self!
If you had to entertain the Queen–if she had promised to come and
spend an evening with you–I will guarantee that you would be fidgeting
and worrying for weeks about what you should get for such an occasion!
And if you have but little means, you would try to get the very best
that you could. I frequently used to go and preach in a country place
where I stayed at a farm–and the dear old man who lived there used to
have about a hundred pounds of beef, at the very least, on his table!
And when, year after year, I noticed such enormous joints, I said to
him, one day, "You must have a very curious idea of my appetite–it is
not possible that I should ever get through these masses of meat that
you put on your table." "Oh," he replied, "we get through it all very
easily after you are gone, for there are plenty of poor people and
plenty of farm laborers round about, and they soon clear it up." "But,"
I enquired, "why do you have so much when I come?" "Bless you, Sir," he
answered, "I would give you a piece as big as a house if I could get
it–I would, indeed–just to show you how welcome you are at my home."
I understood what he meant and appreciated his kindness and, in a far
higher sense, let us all do as much as we possibly can to show the Lord
Jesus how welcome He is to our heart and our home!

How welcome He ought always to be when He comes, as our blessed Savior,
to put away our sin and change our nature, and honor us with His royal
company, and keep and preserve us even to the end that He may take us
up and our children, too, to dwell at His right hand forever! Oh, there
ought to be grand entertainment for such a Guest as He is! Where is the
man who is going to ask Him home tonight? Here stands my Master and in
His name I ask–who will take Him home tonight? With whom shall Jesus
lodge tonight? "Oh," says one, "if He would but come to me, I would be
glad enough to welcome Him." He is glad enough to come, for He delights
to be entertained in human hearts. O you soldiers over there, with the
red coats on–I am always glad to see you here–shall Jesus Christ
abide with you tonight? And you others, in black coats, or in colored
dresses, shall Jesus Christ abide with you tonight? You good friends
who are up from the country, if you have not taken Christ into your
hearts, will you not take Him in now? I cannot hear what you say, but
He can, and if this is the reply, "God be merciful to me a sinner, and
come and lodge with me tonight," it shall be done, and His shall be the
praise!

Now the time has gone, but I must say just these few words more. I
remember that when I was crying to God for mercy and I could get no
answer to my supplication, so that I feared I must really give up
prayer as hopeless, the thought which kept me praying was this, "Well,
if I do not get salvation, I shall perish." I seemed to fancy that the
Lord had kept me waiting–that was only my foolish way of thinking and
it was not true–but I said to myself, "If the Lord keeps me waiting, I
also kept Him waiting a long while. Was I not for many years resisting
Him and refusing Him? So if He makes me wait for salvation, I must not
complain." Then I thought, "Well, now, if I were to keep on praying and
I did not find Christ for 20 years, yet, if I found Him at last, the
blessing would be well worth having and worth waiting for, so I will
never leave off praying for it." And then I thought, "Why should I
expect that I must be heard the moment I choose to come to the Mercy
Seat, when I would not hear God's call when He so often spoke to me?"
So I still persevered in prayer, yet with this thought–what else can I
do?–like a whip always upon my back. I felt that this must be my
resolve–

"I can but perish if I go.

I am resolved to try!

For if I stay away,

I know I must forever die."

I like that plan which I have known to be followed by some who have
gone to their room and shut the door, determined not to go out till
they had found the Savior. They have read the Word, especially such
passages as these, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be
saved." "He that believes on the Son has everlasting life." And they
have gone

down on their knees and have said, "Lord, this is Your promise. Help me
now to believe in Jesus and give me salvation for His sake, for I will
not leave this place without Your blessing!" Such vehemence, such
importunity is sure to prevail! How dare anyone of you continue to live
unsaved? How dare you, Sir, again close your eyes in sleep while you
are unreconciled to God? What if, instead of waking up in that bedroom
of yours, you should lift up your eyes and say, "Where am I? What is
this dreadful place? Where are the things I once loved? Where are the
things I lived for? Where am I? Where is Christ! Where is the Gospel?
Where are Sabbath days? Where are the warning words I used to despise?
Where is the power to pray? Is all this gone forever? And where am I?
In dark, dark, dire despair–an enemy to You, O God, and an enemy to
You forever! Horror and dismay have taken hold upon me."

The very attempt to depict that awful scene makes me feel as though
dread would stop my tongue. Oh, I pray you, go not there! There are
some who deny the eternity of future punishment, but, for my part, I
would not risk such suffering for an hour even if it should end then.
What woe it would be to be only an hour in Hell! Oh, how you would then
wish that you had sought the Savior and had found Him! But, alas, there
is no such thing as an hour in Hell! Once lost, you are lost forever!
Therefore seek the Lord now! Cry with Jeremiah, "O Lord our God, we
will wait upon You!" You cannot fight it out! You cannot escape from
everlasting wrath unless you trust in Jesus, so let this be your cry–

"You, O Christ, are all I need

More than all in You I find!

Other refuge have I none,

Hangs myhelpless soul on You!" So, Christ of God, we cast ourselves
into Your arms! Save us, save us, save us for Your sweet mercy's sake!
Amen.

EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: LUKE18:36-43; 19:1-10.

Luke 18:35-38. And it came to pass, that as He was come near unto
Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the wayside begging. And hearing
the multitude pass by, he asked what it meant And they told him, that
Jesus of Nazareth passes by. And he cried, saying, Jesus, You son of
David, have mercy on me! He did not need to be told twice who was
passing by, nor did he need any exhortation to seek Christ's help. It
was enough for him that Jesus of Nazareth was near him, so he would cry
to Him for the help He alone could give. Oh, that we were half as
sensible! Oh, that the blindness did not get into men's hearts! If it
were not so, every blind soul would at once begin to cry to God for
mercy! There is not one poor sinner here who knows that Jesus often
passes this way, who would not begin at once to cry, "You Son of David,
have mercy on me."

39. And they which went before rebuked him. ' 'Be quiet!" they cried.

39. That he should hold his peace. "Do not interrupt the flow of those
marvelous words, or break the thread of that matchless discourse."

39. But he cried so much the more, You son of David, have mercy on
me!They could not quench the fire that burned within his breast! They
did but increase its intensity by all their efforts to put it out. The
blind man was so earnest to get his eyes opened that his voice could
not be silenced. This was a proof of his commonsense and true wisdom.
It is remarkable how clearly the blind people mentioned in the
Scriptures could see! Oh, that those who think they can see could
really see as plainly as this blind man could, and would act as wisely
as he did! "He cried so much the more, You Son of David, have mercy on
me!" This was his only hope–perhaps his last opportunity–so he
availed himself of it to the fullest.

40, 41. And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be brought to Him:
and when he was come near, He asked him, saying, What will you that I
shall do unto you? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight There
was no waste of words. He said what he meant and he meant what he said,
and he knew what he needed. It is a great thing, in prayer, to know
what we really need–a very important thing to be sensible enough not
to multiply words, but to cry to the Lord with a definite objective, as
this blind man said, "Lord, that I may receive my sight."

42, 43. And Jesus said unto him, Receive your sight; your faith has
saved you. And immediately he received his sight and followed Him,
glorifying God: and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise unto
God. That was a blessed Praise Meeting, brought about by the healing of
that one man! Now that his eyes were opened, he showed that his mouth
was not closed. He proved that he could pray well. Now he proves that
he can also praise well! He prayed when they tried to stop him, but now
nobody shall stop him from praise! And he so praised the great
Physician that, with the flaming firebrand of his gratitude–and he set
all other hearts ablaze–"All the people, when they saw it, gave praise
unto God."

Luke 19:1. And Jesus entered. That is, He entered at one end of the
town–

1. And passed through Jericho. And so came out at the other end of it.

2. And, behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief
among the publicans, and he was rich. I t was an important station for
the collection of customs–there was a good deal of produce at Jericho
upon which there was a tax, so Zacchaeus had a good post. He was rich.

3-7. Andhe sought to see Jesus who He was; and couldnot for thepress,
because he was little of stature. Andhe ran before, and climbed up into
a sycamore tree to see Him: for He was to pass that way. And when Jesus
came to the place, He looked up, and saw him, and said unto him,
Zacchaeus, make haste and come down; for today I must stay at your
house. Andhe made haste and came down and received Him joyfully, And
when they saw it, they all murmured. Some of the very people, I
suppose, who had just before given praise to God. So fickle are the
judgments of men that we need not be elated when all of them speak well
of us. It only needs that the wind should veer just half a point and
they will all speak ill of us! The cry of men, even when it is most
clear and strong, is not to be depended on. They shout "Hosanna,"
today, but, before the week is out, they cry, "Crucify Him! Crucify
Him." So here, "They murmured."

8. Saying, That He was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner I
do not know where else He could have gone, for they were all sinners!
But they meant that this tax gatherer was "a sinner." By public
reputation, he was an excommunicated person who was regarded by
everybody as "a sinner" in a very special sense.

8. And Zacchaeus stood and said unto the Lord, Behold, Lord, the half
of my goods I give to the poor "Henceforth, one half of my income shall
go in almsgiving."

8. And if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I
restore him fourfold.' 'I will not give to the poor or to God that
which is not lawfully mine. I will not steal a sheep and give the feet
to the poor, but I will give back, four times over, anything that I may
have taken wrongfully and still the half of my future income shall go
to the poor."

9, 10. And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this
house, because he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man is come
to seek and to save that which was lost