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YOU
ARE IMPORTANT
Years
ago, there was a TV show called Kojak.
It starred Telly Savalas as a lollipop-sucking detective who
always went around saying, “Who loves ya, Baby?”
I
think that is the one thing all humans need more than anything else;
to know we are loved. Without
love, we feel worthless and unimportant and useless.
And humans need to feel useful and worthwhile.
That is one reason we always tend to compare ourselves with
other people. Sometimes
we consider ourselves better than them, and sometimes we wish we
were as good as they are.
We
base our level of importance on:
Do
I look good enough? Have
I done enough? What
will others think of me? Am
I important enough or powerful enough?
And
every one of these areas is based primarily upon one thing; where we
rate ourselves in comparison to other people.
We need to be loved; we need to be accepted; and we need to
feel self-worth.
The
problem with these four standards is that none of them are stable.
They will all change depending on moment-to-moment
circumstances. Appearances
change with time. There
will always be somebody who can do more than us and do it better
than we can; how well others like you can change in the blink of an
eye; and your affluence can change with one bad choice.
The
trouble with letting things like these dictate your self-worth is
that your self-worth will always be changing and you will never know
from one moment to the next where you stand.
And, what do you think your self-worth will be when those
things change?
A
gem dealer was strolling through a gem & mineral show in Tucson,
Arizona when he noticed a large bluish colored stone the size of a
potato. He looked it
over, and asked the vendor how much he wanted for it.
The man said he was trying to get $15.00 for it, but since it
wasn’t that pretty, he let it go for $10.00.
The
stone has since been certified as a 1,905-carat natural star
sapphire. It is larger than any stone of its kind.
And, it is appraised at $2.28 million.
It
took a lover of stones to recognize the sapphire’s worth.
It took the Lover of Souls to recognize the true value of
people like you and me. If
you want to build your self-image, build it on something that will
last; build it on what God think of you, not on what the world
thinks of you. When we
understand what God thinks of us, it changes the way we see
ourselves, and that starts changing our hearts to be Christ-like.
There
is a very good example of that in the New Testament.
It involves a man named Zacchaeus, and we are going to talk
about him this morning.
Zacchaeus
was a man who lived in the city of Jericho. One day Jesus came to Jericho and Zacchaeus had an encounter
with Jesus that changed his life.
LUKE
19:1-4 tells us about that encounter.
“Jesus
entered Jericho and made His way through the town.
There was a man there named Zacchaeus.
He was one of the most influential Jews in the Roman tax
collecting business; and he had become very rich.
He tried to get a look at Jesus, but he was too short to see
over the crowds. So, he
ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree beside the road, so he could
watch from there.”
Zacchaeus
was hoping to see this Jesus; the man everyone was talking about.
He didn’t know this, but he needed Jesus in the worst of
ways. If there was ever
a man who needed a stronger sense of self worth, it was Zacchaeus,
because in the four ways we evaluate ourselves, he struck out in the
first three.
His
appearance was not the most beautiful to look at because of his very
short stature; the only real achievements he ever had was
overcharging people and cheating them for his own financial gain;
and his approval rating was in the sewer because he collected taxes
from the Jews and gave them to the Roman government.
But, he was wealthy.
First
of all, to become a tax collector you had to bribe an official.
Secondly, Rome told you how much to collect, and if you were
able to collect more, you could keep the extra.
Similar to what it seems like the IRS does to us today.
Zacchaeus was pretty good at gouging his fellow Jews, so he
ended up being quite wealthy.
For
a Jewish man to become a Roman tax collector was unthinkable.
This was high treason. It
was like going over to Iraq and joining the terrorists who are
fighting against us today. You would be hated for being a traitor. If you became a Roman tax collector as a Jew it meant three
things.
-
your
family would disown you
-
you
would never be allowed to worship in the synagogue
-
and
you’d be looked at as bad as a murderer
As
a result, Zacchaeus was miserable on the inside. How do I know that? It’s
very simple. I know
because you can’t have a guilty conscious and feel good about
yourself at the same time. He
knew that he was ripping people off, and that would have caused him
to lose most of his self-respect over a period of time.
What we have here is a guy who has a lot of money but
doesn’t like himself. But
one day, a brief encounter with Jesus, changed his life.
Why? Because he
learned how much he mattered to God.
If
you are feeling a little down or a little empty today, you came to
the right place because this is a place of hope.
This is a place of Jesus Christ.
This is the place God wants you to be right now; His house.
How
do we know we can have hope even when things are going wrong?
Because we know that we matter to God.
The
story about Zacchaeus illustrates three truths. If you will remember these, you’ll never again have
problems with how you feel about your self worth.
1.
JESUS NOTICES YOU!
No
matter how badly I feel when nobody else seems to notice me; I know
that Jesus Christ notices me.
Zacchaeus
wanted to get a glimpse but he was so short he couldn’t see above
the crowd. So Zacchaeus
did two things that no wealthy Middle Eastern man would do.
He ran through a crowd, and he climbed a tree. These were things little boys might do in crowds but not
well-known businessmen.
That
was shocking but what Jesus did was even more shocking.
Jesus walks straight through the city, past thousands of
people and walks right up to that tree where Zacchaeus was and
stops. Notice what
happens.
LUKE
19:5
“When
Jesus came by, He looked up at Zacchaeus and called him by name. “
Zacchaeus!” he said. “Quick,
come down! For I must be a guest in your home today.”
Why
do you think Jesus did that? I
think it was because Jesus knew Zacchaeus’ heart, just like He
knows your heart today.
You
might be up a tree today, or maybe even out on a limb.
And you may think God has forgotten you, but in reality,
there’s never been a time when God took His eyes off you.
He’s seen every breath you’ve ever taken, He’s felt
every thought you ever had, and He’s seen every thing you’ve
ever done. God has
always had His loving eyes upon your life – because God really
does care about you.
We
have a hard time imagining God paying that much attention to us
because we don’t pay that much attention to God.
We may not be looking toward God every second of every day,
but He sure is looking at us every second of every day.
You
might feel that others think you are worthless, but you matter so
much to Him that He let His Son die for you.
In
LUKE 12:7, Jesus said
“And
the very hairs on your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to Him than a
whole flock of sparrows.”
Just
imagine; God thinks we are so valuable He knows the number of hairs
on our head! Of course,
with some of us, that would not be that difficult.
The
deepest expression of love is attention.
When you give somebody your attention you’re giving them
your love. When you
don’t pay attention to your husband or wife or kids you are
actually being unloving. God is always paying attention to us. It may not seem like it to us because we really are not all
that focused on Him, but again, He is always focused on us.
Little
children do something they want to be noticed for, such as riding a
bike with no hands, and they will always yell out, “Watch me,
Daddy!” “Watch me,
Mommy!”
Adults
want to be noticed, too. And,
just like children, we yell out, but we don’t necessarily do it
with words. We act in
such a way as to get other people’s attention, or we dress with
the goal of capturing other people’s attention.
But, what we are really doing is yelling, “Please watch me,
somebody!”
For
our own well being, it is vital that we remember to stop depending
on other people to feel worthy, and start depending on God.
2.
JESUS LIFTS YOU UP
All
of his life Zacchaeus had been ridiculed and rejected. We know that because the word used in LUKE for
“short” actually means, “a child’s body that has not fully
grown.”
And
it would be safe to assume that he was the target of ridicule all of
his life. And, this may
have something to do with the fact that he was corrupt and didn’t
care if he collected from the Jews and gave it to the Romans.
Jesus
looked up at Zacchaeus in front of this huge crowd and called him by
name, which shocked everybody because Jesus knew the name of the
biggest scoundrel in town. But,
in spite of Zacchaeus’ sin, Jesus lifts him up while everybody
else is putting him down.
In
EPHESIANS 2:10 we find out that we are God’s masterpiece.
There are two types of artwork.
There are prints, which are mass-produced on a large scale,
all being identical, and there are masterpieces where it may have
taken months for an artist to complete.
We
are not mass-produced by God, to be just like other people.
By His own Word, we are masterpieces; made unique and made
for good purposes - God’s purposes.
I
have heard people say that God loves us so much, that if He had a
wallet, He would carry our pictures in it.
In
ISAIAH 49:16 God says
“See,
I have written your name on My hand….”
When
Jesus Christ looks at the scars in His hands He sees your hand.
God doesn’t need to carry our pictures, because He has each
one of our names written in the scars of His hands.
There
are people who have had some very bad things said to them and done
to them over the years. They
have been told they are not worth anything, or that they are stupid,
or ugly or all sorts of unkind things.
And,
as much as they hurt us, we keep carrying them around.
We need to get rid of these things so we can live and focus
on God rather than to keep living and focusing on our past hurts.
The
only way you can get over these things is by realizing that you are
so special to Jesus, that He makes you a joint heir to the kingdom
of God with Him.
Where
we say, "I can’t see my value because of all that has
happened to me.", God says, “I can see all your value in
spite of all that’s happened to you.”
When
this world trips you up, it is only Jesus who lifts you up.
3.
JESUS WANTS YOU
I
think the hardest thing for us to understand is that no matter what
we have ever done in our lives, God still wants to have a personal
relationship with us because he loves us.
People
made Zacchaeus feel their hatred because he was a cheat and they
hated him. So Jesus
Christ did something. He
didn’t just walk up to the tree and look up and notice him.
And He didn’t just call him by name and affirm him in front
of those who hated him. He
invited Himself to Zacchaeus’ home for dinner.
Verse
7 says,
“But
the crowds were displeased” they said, “He has gone to be the
guest of a notorious sinner,” they grumbled."
The
truth is we are a lot like Zacchaeus was.
We have all done things that have hurt others. But Jesus is far more interested in changing us than He is in
condemning us. So He
looks at you and He says, “I know you, I love you and I want you
in spite of all that you’ve done.
And I want you to love Me and have a relationship with Me.”
You
remember the story about the Prodigal Son.
A father has two boys and one of the boys is impatient and
tells his father that he wants his inheritance now instead of
waiting for the father to die.
His
father gives it to him and he goes to the bar scene in the city and
he invests all his money in wine, women and song (and we’re not
talking hymns, either).
He
ends up dirt broke on the street all tapped out. He ends up having to get a job feeding pigs in a pigsty.
He
finally wakes up and goes home.
He plans on telling his dad that he is unworthy to be a son,
and he plans on begging his dad to hire him to be a servant.
The boy has a very bad self-image, doesn’t he? He thinks he is not worth anything. But what does his father do?
His
father sees him coming down the road and runs out to meet the boy,
giving him a hug. He
did not lecture him and tell him how bad he was or how stupid he
was. He told him how
loved he was.
Some
people think that if they go to Christ with all the dirt in their
lives, Jesus will either lecture them or downright deny them.
And, the devil likes people to think that.
There
is a story that says God and the devil were talking and God told the
devil that He was going to take some things away from him.
God
said He was going to take sickness, poverty and many other things
away from the devil, and the devil said no problem.
Then, finally, God said He was going to take discouragement
away from the devil, and the devil came unglued!
The
devil told God that was the best weapon he had. He said when everything else fails, all he had to do was
throw a little discouragement in front of somebody and they would
always fall for it and lose focus of the truth.
The
devil uses the discouragement in our lives to keep us from having a
healthy and loving relationship with Jesus, too.
And, the said part is we always seem to fall for it.
No
matter what has ever happened in your life, no matter how badly you
have ever been hurt, or how badly you have hurt others, Jesus wants
to love you and have you love Him.
If
I held up a fifty-dollar bill, and asked who wanted it, how many of
you would say, "I do?” Now,
If I crumbled it up, stepped on it, got it all dirty and wrinkled,
how many would want the $50.00?
Raise your hands.
See,
no matter what it has gone through, it has not lost its original
value. That is a rather
loose comparison, but you see what I mean, don’t you? No matter what you have gone through before today, God still
loves and wants you, because He knows you have not lost your
original value to Him.
Jesus
says, "Those the Father has given Me, will come to Me, and I
will never, ever reject them.”
God
notices everything in your life, His eyes of love are constantly
watching you, and He knows your value no matter what anyone else
around you is saying about you.
He knows the truth, they don’t.
God
has a plan and purpose for your life, He made you and He wants you
in spite of the fact that you’ve rejected Him in the past. How should you respond to that kind of God?
The way Zacchaeus did.
Verse
6 says,
“Zacchaeus
quickly climbed down and took Jesus to his house with great
excitement and joy.”
With
a God that offers us so much love and eternal happiness, I think we
should react in the same way as Zacchaeus did - with great
excitement and joy! I
cannot comprehend why anyone would refuse God when He is standing
there with His arms open.
Zacchaeus
took Jesus up on His offer for a relationship, and he was changed
instantly. There was no
waiting for the slow change to take place either; it was
instantaneous.
Verses
8-9 say,
“Meanwhile,
Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, ‘I will give half my
wealth to the poor, Lord, and if I have overcharged people on their
taxes, I will give them back four times as much.”
Jesus responded, “Salvation has come to this home today,
for this man has shown himself to be a son of Abraham.”
Something
had happened in his heart because the most selfish man in the city
all of a sudden became the most generous man in the city.
What
happened? Jesus Christ
and the love of God changed him - that’s what happened.
How
do you know if you’ve really met Jesus Christ? Your attitudes change. You
become a more generous person.
All of a sudden you start thinking about other people.
You realize how much you’ve been given and you want to give
back.
Too
many people forget that everything they have is from God and they
want to hold onto everything they have.
But, when Jesus touches them, they start thinking about what
they can do to help others.
We
were made in God’s image, and when we receive Jesus, we start
changing to reflect that image.
It’s an image of true love.
Zacchaeus
publicly demonstrated his change of heart. He said he was going to give all the money he had overcharged
back to the people. That
was the first way he started showing the love he received from
Christ Jesus to others. And
it is that love we receive through Jesus that makes up for all the
hurts we have received before.
Jesus
knows you have been terribly hurt in the past. He knows that hurt is still with you even today.
And He wants you to know that He loves you enough to take
that hurt away. He
loves you enough to set you free from it.
There
was a little girl whose mother was going to take her shopping.
The father couldn’t go, so he gave his daughter $5.00 to
buy whatever she wanted. In
one of the stores, she was a necklace. It looked like real pearls, so she bought it.
For
the next week, she wore those pearls everywhere, even when she took
a bath. And she would
tell everyone it was the necklace her daddy bought because he loved
her.
After
that first week, her daddy would come in and tuck her into bed every
night. He would tell
her he loved her and she would tell him she loved him.
Then he would ask if she would give him the necklace.
Each night she would say, “No.”
This
went on for several nights, and then one night as he told her he
loved her, she said she loved him too, but this time when he asked
her if she would give him the necklace, she said, “I love that
necklace, Daddy, but I love you more.”
And she gave him the necklace.
Then
he reached into his shirt pocket and brought out a little box and
gave it to her. When
she opened it, she found a real pearl necklace.
He had wanted to give her that gift, but had to wait until
she loved him and trusted him enough to give him the fake necklace.
God
is like that. When we
give him all the focus we have been giving to the world, He will
give us something of far greater value in return.
When we love Him enough to give Him all the hurts we have
bundled up inside our hearts, He will replace it with His uplifting
and grace-filled love; the love that soothes our souls.
Do
you love Him enough to give Him all of your hurts and
disappointments? Do you
trust him enough to open your heart to Him this morning?
It does not matter whether you have ever responded to an
invitation before. Jesus
wants so desperately for you to respond to His invitation today.
Will you do that for Him?
INVITATION
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