‘What do I want? What do I need?’
A question I seem to ask myself often. Even in the midst of my job, status, and the collection of things I have managed to obtain. A question I can’t seem to figure out the answer to. What else could I want or need aside from what I already have? There is nothing else to offer me? Is there?
Word caught up to me that a man who could heal the sick and turn water into wine was going to be passing by. My heart leaped. My head began to spin, who is this Man they speak of?!
Before my thoughts could catch up my feet were rushing off, one after the other, left right left right left right.
‘What do I want? What do I need?’
It echoed in my head, like it was bouncing off the sides of the inner walls of my mind.
Heads upon heads and shoulders I could not see over were a blockade to me and this man that my heart and body had sprinted off to meet. I heard the cheers and the crowd began to speak of Him. He must be passing by, How could it come to this moment and I miss it?
There it stood: A tree, stretching up into the sky, towering above the sea of people. It was the only way.
‘What do I want? What do I need?’
Climbing up the branches I sat out upon one of the limbs just as He was coming.
Suddenly this miracle man was gazing my way, intently setting His eyes into mine. Do I look away? Even if I wanted to I can’t seem to.
“Come down Zacchaeus because I have to spend time with you today!”
My thoughts rushing, spinning around. He was demanding, insisting on time in my presence? Did he just say that to me? Why me?
And again those questions:
What do I want? What do I need?
And suddenly I knew.
I want to know Him. I need to know Him
He was the answer to that repeating question I had been hearing all along.
As we journeyed down the pathway leading to my home my steps felt lighter. How does just being around this Man change me? What does He carry that can catch fire in my heart in an instant?
For hours we sat around the table, talking about life in its every detail: “who are you Zacchaeus?”, “what makes you feel alive?”, “what do you want?” , “what do you need?”
How did he know the questions I had been asking myself all along? Before I could think too long, I blurted out from the deepest parts in me, “half of my belongings I give to those that need them much more than I, and Lord, if I have done any wrong against any friend or foe I intend to give it back fourfold, what ever the cost!”
‘Did I just say that? I think I did like my heart had spoke before my mind could give answer.”
Immediately, He said, “today salvation has come to this house.”
And in a moment I was free. In just one moment my heart felt free like a caged bird set free from all the walls keeping it barred in. This was what I wanted and with no shadow of doubt in my mind, the very thing I needed.
He was, he is, and always will be the Man that can catch fire to my heart and ignite me, keeping me burning for all my days, to a life that is freedom, to a life that is full of love.
I know Him. He knows me. We know each other.
He was the answer to the repeating questions that spun around and around in my head for so long.
(A personal take on the first perspective of Zacchaeus in Luke 19:1-10)
