At the beginning of the 19th chapter of Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is passing through Jericho. It’s not his destination and he senses that his hour is near. No time to stop now. The slow, steady ascent to Jerusalem still lies ahead. 

The chief tax collector for the area, wealthy and despised, is a little man named Zacchaeus. He has a very comfortable life, in terms of having things, thanks to his collaboration with the Roman oppressors. It’s a job. Somebody will do it. So why not him? 

Zacchaeus, who needs to be up on all the news, hears that this “Jesus”  and his entourage is in town. This is a spectacle that Zacchaeus does not want to miss. He’s heard all kinds of differing reports – even this far south of Galilee – so that he just has to see Jesus for himself. 

The crowd is too big and Zacchaeus too small. He cannot see. He knows the town and runs ahead on the route Jesus must take and climbs a sycamore tree. 

Jesus, and the crowd with him, stops. Jesus looks up, sees Zacchaeus out on a limb and calls to him,”Zacchaeus, come down. I need to stay with you today.” Zacchaeus looks into Jesus’ eyes and sees himself reflected there in a whole new way. Is this who he truly is?

Zacchaeus, overjoyed, quickly climbs down and wholeheartedly welcomes Jesus into his home. The crowd reacts, murmuring angrily that this holy “prophet” would consent to receive hospitality from a public sinner. Zacchaeus, standing tall, responds by offering half of what he owns to the poor and to repay any he has cheated fourfold. What has happened?

Jesus saw what was in Zacchaeus’s heart and knew that the way in was to ask him for help. This request coming from need opened Zacchaeus to healing and liberation. Zacchaeus did see Jesus. Jesus interrupted his urgent journey. Zacchaeus received a new sense of himself and of his life.

What are we willing to do to see Jesus?  How does the crowd obscure our vision of what is true and good? What do we need to let go of in order to welcome Jesus into the intimacy of our heart?

Jesus is looking over Jerusalem. His hour is at hand. Yet at this moment he is feeling no excitement, no anxiety, no dread. Jesus’ heart is aching. He weeps.

You came to offer us a new, a different way of seeing, of living, of treating one another – an alternative to the painfully inadequate well-worn paths we habitually tend to follow. You lay before us shalom – an all-encompassing, all-inclusive peace – and we prefer to put on another layer of armor.This one more technologically advanced than the last, bolstering our illusion of security. After all. it’s us against them. We do not recognize, nor can we read, the signs of the times.

You warn us. Yet we go about our business as usual, convincing ourselves that we are happy in our denial. The kind of response you propose, the kind of change you ask of us is too much, opening the way to terrible suffering for many: devastation, destruction, death.

For you, the consequences of our refusal to radically change are all too clear. Today the whole world is Jerusalem. You look over it. You weep.

There’s urgency. Jesus is moving quickly south along the Jordan Valley on his way to his destiny in Jerusalem-whatever that may be. He continues to teach as he journeys, stopping only as necessary. A crowd accompanies him, anticipating a showdown and the beginning of a new era with Jesus as king. 

The end of the 18th chapter of the Gospel of Luke has Jesus approaching Jericho, an oasis and the junction with the main road westward to Jerusalem. On the outskirts of the town a blind man sits, begging from the bustling traffic that passes by. Having relied on his sense of hearing for some time he recognizes the noise of a larger than usual crowd and asks what’s going on. “It’s Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth,” he is told. The blind man cries out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” The crowd tries to silence him. He calls even louder, “Son of David, have mercy!” Jesus hears, stops and asks that the man be brought to him. 

With great delicacy, Jesus, unassuming, asks the man, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man answers, “Lord, let me see.”

This is a prayer that requires great courage. “Lord, let me see.” Do we really want to see? Seeing, truly, might very likely challenge us to change-the way we do things, the way we treat others, our selves, creation: the way we live. Maybe it’s a prayer we need to return to often. Once we see, we are responsible. We can no longer sit on the side of the road.

The first person the blind man sees is Jesus. And he chooses on the spot to follow Jesus on his way up to Jerusalem.

“Lord, let me see.”