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• Zacchaeus climbed into a tree to get a good view of Jesus.
• Illustration: Palmer tells of how, despite being short, he managed to get through a crowd to be close to the late Indian statesman Jawaharlal Nehru.

• Tax collecting was vicious institution in the first century.
• When the corrupt tax collector repented, Jesus said "salvation" (shalom) had come—health, restoration, wholeness
• The incident holds four surprises. - Jesus noticed one person in a crowd.
  - Jesus accepted hospitality from a hated person.
  - A man so hardhearted became repentant and generous.
  - A man who did so much harm is restored as a son of Abraham.
  

• John the Baptist preached that the Messiah would burn the chaff.
• When John said of Jesus, "Behold the Lamb!" he was referring not to Isaiah 53 but to Malachi 4, the calf who will trample evildoers.

• Jesus defeated evil by taking it upon himself and identifying with a sinner.

• Jesus absorbed in himself all the tragedy of Zacchaeus's life.