Reading for Today–April 18
Joshua 16:1-18:28
Luke 19:1-27
Psalm 87:1-7
Proverbs 13:11

Zacchaeus is described as very rich in the text and the crowd says he is a notorious sinner. When Jesus invites himself over for lunch, the wee little man replies, “I will give half my wealth to the poor, Lord, and if I have overcharged people in their taxes, I will give them back four times as much.”

What is not in the text? An outright admission of guilt. He says, if I have overcharged. I suppose you have two interpretive choices here. One is to assume that of course he is guilty and his use of the word if is to dissimulate just a bit. He says if but of course he and Jesus and the crowd knows there is no if to it. The second choice is Zacchaeus was not knowingly guilty. Maybe he was the one guiltless tax collector in the region who had been terribly misjudged by the populace?

Either way, his life was changed by Jesus.