Luke 19:1-10 And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.… The experience of Zaccheus, in his efforts "to see Jesus," is a striking illustration of a universal fact in human history. Men are constantly opposed and thwarted, in their efforts to do right, by obstacles and enemies which they never produced. Satan, for instance, is the persistent opposer of all who seek "to see Jesus Christ." But man had no hand in producing Satan; he was here before man came, and, for aught I know, here because he saw man coming. You may start out to see Huxley, or Tyndall, or any of the great philosophers or scientists, and Satan will pay no attention to you; but if you start out "to see Jesus Christ" he will instantly summon his resources, and form a "press" against you. How persistently he follows the young Christian with the fascinations of the world on the one hand, and the "press" of discouragements on the other. Then the laws of heredity come in and raise up obstacles, the full power of which our limited knowledge does not enable us to compute. We all take on hereditary damage, of one kind or another, from our ancestry. This, of course, is soon rendered vastly more serious by our own moral behaviour, and the result is a dwarfed, squattish spiritual stature. So that the ordinary "press" of the world's cares and attractions is quite sufficient to shut us out from God and a saving view of Jesus Christ. So Zaccheus found himself defeated. "Could not." Mark the descriptive words here: "Chief," "Rich," "Could not." Then chieftancy and riches cannot do everything for a man. Official position and wealth go only a little way in removing the distressing and annoying phases of life. Human power, however commanding and extensive, soon reaches the solid masonry of the impossible, upon which the only thing it can scribble is the little words, "Could not." Let us add another descriptive word, and we shall see how it was that Zaccheus failed. "He was little." The words "little" and "could not" are closely related in human affairs. Every man is "little " somewhere — "little" in spots. No man is fully hemisphered on both sides of his nature. (T. Kelly.) Parallel Verses KJV: And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho. |
    |