Finding a Gateway to the Outside

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This post was originally posted at my short-lived website, Faith Working. I am not sure I currently agree with everything herein, but thought I’d repost here anyways — I’ll post new stuff as it comes up.

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It’s interesting that, when we recount the story of Zacchaeus in Luke 19:1-10, we often emphasize either the part about everyone hating him or the fact that he was short. More than just these surface details, though, the story of Zacchaeus represents a compelling example of how Jesus interacts with someone’s work life.

Old Bushel-Britches

As chief tax collector, Zacchaeus occupied a firmly entrenched work culture, with boundaries reinforced both by his actions and by the surrounding society. The character of the tax collector remains with us today: penny-pincher, thief, corrupt, bribeable, and many similar epithets continue to affix themselves to our idea of the “tax-man”. Zacchaeus wasn’t just a victim of negative optics, though; he really leaned into and embraced this identity.

In Jesus’ day, the tax collector was often hated partly because he was seen as both an agent of Rome, yet also Jewish, and therefore a traitor implicated in the oppression. As Kyle Pope notes, the taxation system that would have been in place at the time of Jesus had a long history, instituted over 300 years earlier. Tax-farmers would contract with the Roman government, paying taxes in advance and then collecting from the people afterwards. Tax collectors in the first century were also often viewed as unsavoury because of their notoriety for the abuses they committed. This could include intimidation and violence in addition to a standard practice of collecting more than was actually needed. (It’s impossible not to imagine the Sheriff of Nottingham from Robin Hood [“old bushel-britches” in the 1973 Disney version]).

Identity is forged from within and without. Zacchaeus appears to have fully embraced his identity as a sinner. For example, he admits to having cheated people in the course of his work. Thought a villain by his community, he does not rise to the occasion to prove them wrong. (We can imagine lots of similar examples today of professions and identities that are inscribed from without, making alternative ways of being difficult). Given all this, it is amazing how quickly Jesus rejects these social narratives others create. He cuts through all of it and instead speaks to Zacchaeus — the man — directly, with love and acceptance.

Breaching the Boundary

In this series’ previous post, I described the encounter with meaning as the “discovery of an outside.” If our workplaces are often enclosed cultures that set their own terms for what is valuable and the norm, then a meaningful experience at work is something which breaches these boundaries, levelling a question against the status quo and offering the opportunity for difference or extension. The story of Zacchaeus and Jesus describes exactly such a breach.

Zacchaeus, acting in a manner fully appropriate to his role as social pariah, cannot see through the crowd, so climbs a tree to get a better view of Jesus. He doesn’t care what people think and will do what he wants to accomplish his ends. The crowd is also playing its role without question. Who’s going to let that greedy sinner, Zacchaeus, through? Not me!

Jesus changes all of that, though, when he invites himself over to stay at Zacchaeus’s place. With his words of welcome, the outside breaks through the wall of habit and culture on a number of fronts. Against Zacchaeus’s habits of selfishness, Jesus invites him to show hospitality. Against Zacchaeus’s experiences of being excluded, Jesus invites him not only to be included, but to become one who includes.

As he steps into the breach that Jesus has made for him, Zacchaeus does not abandon his position as tax collector. Nevertheless, this encounter with Jesus — who always presents us with an “outside” to what we are familiar with — changes everything for him. Whereas before he was in the practice of reinforcing the stereotype of the rich, greedy, cheating “tax-collector,” Jesus has stirred something in him that he does not want to go away. In response to Jesus’ great love, Zacchaeus begins to build into his work culture a more permanent gateway to the outside.

This gateway represents a threshold in time in which he looks both to the past — promising to repay fourfold those whom he had cheated — and to the future — giving away half of his possessions to the poor. More than simply vowing to mend his ways and “be good,” Zacchaeus’s very relationship to possessions and wealth is transformed. In fact, he is well on his way to becoming a socio-cultural oxymoron: the impoverished taxman! But Zacchaeus has encountered Jesus and cannot remain the same as he was before.

Takeaway

In our work environments, how often do we unwittingly conform to practices and habits that are set by that culture — the work culture itself and/or society’s expectations about our type of work — rather than by God? It is worth reflecting on just what are those so-called “norms.”

Perhaps the default response of our profession is to think less of another profession. (Think of the friction between some “professions” and closely related “trades”). Perhaps there is a kind of deceit practiced in your line of work that is so common that it does not feel like a lie. Perhaps the normal tendency of your coworkers is to spare no expense on possessions and the display of wealth.

In many ways, it is understandable for us to fall into the groove of what has been set for us by our work and surrounding cultures. In very few cases is a work culture entirely wilfully shaped; instead, these values emerge organically as a result of the people, resources, and the intersection of your work culture with other cultures.

Nevertheless, the outside awaits — and God created us for more. This is at the heart of why God calls us out as the church (ekklesia). To be a light and to be salt: a sign of contradiction that reminds the world and the church and us that this is not all there is.

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