“Look! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends. Revelation 3:20
As hard as I tried, I just couldn’t take my little five-year-old eyes off the bowl of peanut brittle. My mouth watered and all I could think about was how good it would taste, so I asked the nice lady if I could have some. She graciously obliged and I thoroughly enjoyed, but what followed was one of my first lessons in etiquette.
When my cousin and I got back to her house, she told her mom that I had asked for some peanut brittle and my aunt very kindly and lovingly told me “I wasn’t supposed to ask for things like that” and that I was to “wait to be invited or asked first.” Aunt Syble was right and I’m grateful she broke it down for me that day. Yet if Jesus followed our kind of etiquette, Zacchaeus would have never experienced his life-changing lunch with the Lord.
Jesus wasn’t a “rule breaker” just for the sake of breaking the rules, but He did what was necessary to reach the people who needed Him the most. Zacchaeus knew as well as anyone that his reputation as a “notorious sinner” was warranted, but by accepting Jesus’ reverse invitation for lunch one day his life was forever changed.
You may feel at times you are the “least deserving” to have Jesus over. But if you will open the door and let Him in you’ll realize that, like Zacchaeus, one encounter with Him will change everything.