The Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost. - Luke 19:10

The gospel talks about Zaccheus. A tax collector and a rich man. The Jews considered the tax collectors as "sinners" because tax collectors became rich by getting more money from people than they were supposed to. Zaccheus heard that Jesus was coming so Zaccheus was very eager to see Jesus. But he had a problem... he was a short man. Because of this, Zaccheus cannot see Jesus passing because of the crowd who was also waiting to see Jesus. What he did was he climbed a sycamore tree. When Jesus reached the place where Zaccheus was, He asked him to come down because Jesus will stay in his house. People who heard Jesus grumbled and said "Jesus is going with a sinner." Zaccheus has seen Jesus' kindness so he decided to make things right in his life. He told Jesus that he would give half of everything he owned yo the poor and he would pay back by giving 4 times the amount he had taken. Jesus replied, "Salvation has come to this house today, because this man too is a descendant of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.

This tells us how merciful God is. Even though Zaccheus has done bad things in his life before, Jesus did not hesitate to forgive and save him. Human as we are, we commit a lot of sins. There are times that we already know that it is bad, we still continue doing it. Yung "Sige lang gud. Mag sorry lang ko kay Lord." And there are also times that we don't know what we are doing is already a sin. Jesus is asking us to learn from Zaccheus to realize our weaknesses and sins. He wants us to find remedies for them. Let us learn from our mistakes. Let us not wait for the time na ma "tagam" tayo. Yes, after we commit a sin, we feel guilty and ashamed. We often think that we are unworthy of Christ's forgiveness. Our guilt and shame serves as our block that made us unable to see Christ. But Jesus reminds us that no matter how big or how bad the sin we made, He will still accept us as His child when we repent.Zaccheus felt pain in climbing the sycamore tree just to see Jesus. So we too must be determined to take the pain of giving up earthly things so that we may see Jesus clearly. Giving up something is hard but here, giving up our desires brings us something better in return. Let us open our doors for Jesus. Let us leave our feelings of guilt and shame for He will come and save what was lost.

"I love the Lord, for He heard my voice; He heard my cry for mercy. Because He turned His ear to me, I will call on Him as long as I live." Psalms 116:1-2

- Erika Paragoso

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