Two moths and a sycamore tree. Luke 19

One night, two moths were sleeping in a bush, when one of them though he’d seen a light coming. Waking up his friend, they both flew up into a nearby sycamore tree to get a better view. The light was coming closer with more brilliance, and each of the moths began to dance and flitter about in their own inimical way.

In the tree was a wattle bird fast asleep, and when the moths come over, the wattle bird woke up rather annoyed.  Why are you two moths disturbing my sleep, the wattle bird demanded. We can’t help ourselves, said the moths. It’s the light. We’ve just got to be in it. And the more the light drew closer to the sycamore tree, the more the wattle bird reached across to draw his blackout curtain so he could go back to sleep. Whereas the two moths became ever more excited and alive. They wanted the light and they weren’t going to be disappointed.

Zacchaeus was like the moth sleeping in the bush, he just had to climb the tree and get a better look at the light that was coming by. For whatever reason, he couldn’t help himself. There was something about his growing interior life that was proving irresistible to the light of the passing Christ. What was it?

Now, before I suggest an answer to that, we need to look at some verses which are keys to Luke’s point in the story.

Jesus looked up and said, Zacchaeus, hurry down for today it is necessary for me to stay in your house. Jesus addresses Zacchaeus personally. It’s not, hey you in the tree get down now. It’s, Zacchaeus, friend and brother son of Abraham, make haste and do not delay – today is the day – now is your time. I must stay in your house and fellowship with you. For this is why I came, to seek and to restore.

Zacchaeus undoubtedly realised his material wealth did not satisfy. He was one seeking a connection, and so when one day God himself walked past and said I must stay in your house tonight, Zacchaeus hurried down and welcomed God gladly into the house of his heart, and would have sat Jesus down in the front room as an welcomed guest with food on the table, a bowl of water for washing a weary foot, and an ear to listen to whatever was going to be said in the ensuing conversation. That’s why Jesus exclaimed that today salvation had come to Zacchaeus’ house.

Zacchaeus had three things going for him that made him a person seeking a connection: a listening ear, an open mind, and a receptive, repentant heart. And when these three come together, that’s when Jesus invites you into fellowship with him. Today is your day. So rejoice and be glad in it.

Now, back to what proved irresistible for Zacchaeus to want to demean himself by scrambling up a tree like some street urchin, and not the rich man in fine clothes that he was. For Zacchaeus to do that, especially in the cultural context of his day, he wouldn’t have been simply curious. He could have just pushed his way to the front. There would have been a more fundamental need to be met in him. And I want to suggest to you this morning that it was the awakening of his fundamental need for God. All of us have something within that longs to be free of worldly anxiety, and to experience the silence and peace of the divine presence.

Some weeks ago in her sermon, our vicar showed us Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs. I noticed one missing: man’s basic need for God, which should be right at the base level of foundational needs. It comes even before bread and shelter. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

Our basic need for God is borne out of ourselves being created in God’s image. It’s a need expressed often in the psalms, which give us words to the effect of our souls thirsting for the Lord. Even one of our contemporary songs goes, ‘as the deer pants for water so my soul longs after you’. Jesus talked about himself being living water for thirsty souls. And does not our poor drought ridden country know all about water of life for thirsty creatures? It’s the same idea with Jesus being living water for thirsty souls.

Mr Maslow and his world of the psychologists seems to think mankind can do without God. Who needs him anyway? Well, when you push God out the door, what comes in through the windows but the ghosts of worry, anxiety, stress, drudgery and the like.

Human beings will fill the god shaped hole within them with anything but an encounter with the divine, and it never satisfies. Contemporary life so often reviews an endless parade of experiences to be consumed. The next, and then the next, and then the next. Not so with God. When you find yourself in a relationship with God, you don’t need to keep consuming the next experience. Your life with and in Christ is all fulfilling. You don’t consume it; you savour it. Come to me all you who are burdened and heavy laden, and you will find rest for your souls, said Jesus. He didn’t point his hearers elsewhere for fulfilment and the true rest of one’s soul; he pointed to himself.

Now this morning we have two little girls who are going to be baptised. I won’t say too much about baptism itself because you’ll hear all about that during the ceremony. Suffice to say here that baptism, as one of the two sacraments instituted by our Lord himself, is an outward and visible sign of something real and effective that God does for the interior life. It’s a witness, if you like, to the relationship of promise that the God, by his grace, is entering into with the girls. The outward and visible sign is the use of water and the signing of the cross using holy oil on the forehead. The something real and effective that God does for the interior life is the seal of his promise of eternal life for those who have come to him in faith and trust.

In baptism, the interior life becomes not just renewed, but re-birthed ‘in Christ’, that wonderful and mysterious way that the old interior life dies to sin and rises again to a new beginning. No one can know God without Christ; no one can know God expect by being in Christ. So when water is poured into the font, it not only represents the washing away of the sins of human nature, it also represents the quenching of the thirst for the soul that has come to God. And that is why salvation comes to the house of the baptised now – today.

The church welcomes the baptised person into fellowship with it; the baptised person gladly welcomes God into her life; and God welcomes the baptised into fellowship with him and into his house. That’s how it all comes together.

So, today salvation through baptism has come to the house of these two little girls, because they too are now daughters of Abraham – or they soon will be in few moments. And may they be nurtured and guarded in the faith so that in the fullness of time they will ask of the bishop for confirmation in the Holy Spirit.

Philip Starks
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