You may have noticed that of all the gospel writers, Luke is the one who tends to pay attention to the details, and this story is a classic example. Zacchaeus is a tax collector. Most gospels might stop there, but Luke tells us he's the head honcho of tax collectors, and he's rich, and he's short.

Good Jews just didn't associate with tax collectors; they despised them for several good reasons:

• Tax collectors worked for the Roman oppressors by essentially buying up contracts for tax collection, and then skimming their profits from the top.

• This made them ceremonially unclean and therefore unfit to enter a synagogue or participate in the great temple festivals.

• In the pursuit of tax money they were brutal and selfish, digging every penny they could from the poor and demanding big profits from the rich.

Once again a large crowd follows Jesus, offering a chance for the well-known chief tax collector to get a look at this man who was becoming a sensation. But because Zacchaeus was so short, he couldn't get a good look at Jesus. Risking ridicule and even violence, Zacchaeus climbed a tree to get a look.

Was it mere curiosity? No, something about Jesus had struck a deep chord in Zacchaeus's heart. Perhaps he was profoundly unhappy and lonely. Perhaps he had heard that Jesus talked to other tax collectors, and even accepted dinner invitations to their homes. It must have been hard to endure such hatred and ridicule, no matter how rich he had become.

So, as Jesus passes by, Zacchaeus sits perched in a tree, heart pounding. He doesn't dare to do or say anything. Then Jesus stops right there under that tree, looks up at Zacchaeus, and says something unimaginable. Jesus invites himself over to Zacchaeus's house for dinner---no, he demands it! "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." As the crowd mutters about Jesus' bad behavior, Jesus and his disciples head off to Zacchaeus's house for dinner.

In the middle of the dinner, Zacchaeus stood up, as if to offer a toast. Instead he makes a vow: "Here and now I give half my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount." It's interesting that Zacchaeus doesn't stop being a tax collector (somebody's got to do it, after all), but he commits himself to doing it honestly from now on.

Jesus honors him by declaring, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." In the face of rejection by his fellow Jews, who placed him outside the covenant, Jesus declares Zacchaeus to be one of them, a fellow heir of God's covenant with Abraham.

Notice that Zacchaeus's salvation involves two things: he believes in Jesus, and he turns away from his cheating practices. He commits himself to right belief and right living at the same time. Salvation is a change of heart and a change of life.