Would every sentence I say or think, every action I complete, bring glory to Jesus? Sadly, no. We’d all feel hopeless if it weren’t for the encouragement and grace rained down on us in Scripture. There we find one person after another who, despite multiple failures, was called and welcomed by the Lord.
Zacchaeus would be one of those. A tax collector (and the chief one at that!), he was wealthy and had not come by it honestly. As Jesus passed by the short man gaining a view from up in a tree, He did a most amazing thing: He called Zacchaeus by name. Well, of course, you say. Since Jesus was also God, He knows every name! But more stunningly, He called Zacchaeus by his name which means “clean, pure, righteous one.” As He was making His kingdom of righteousness known, turning peoples’ conception of it upside down, Jesus called the cheating, scheming Zacchaeus “righteous one.”
Just as Jesus called him what He’d already made him to be, Jesus calls us by name, making us even now His chosen precious ones who live for His namesake.