The book of wisdom reminds us that God is our creator and therefore He is the one who has all the power, which He manifests with bondage and mercy from His deep Trinitarian love embracing everything He has created for His children; even when we frequently sin. This God is neither oppressive nor rancorous and forgives without seeing how small or big the sin is. He is a God who not only forgives but corrects and offers Himself as a holy and living sacrifice as a friend of life.
On the other hand, Saint Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians, invites the faithful community and us today to unite in prayer asking God that from His infinite mercy and through His great power bless and make us worthy of the vocation to which He has called us.
In today’s gospel, Luke is presenting us a rich man named Zacchaeus who wanted to know Jesus. This episode clearly shows us what God’s plans are. This rich man was not called to be a robber, neither to be oppressive, he was called to be converted. Consequently, Jesus gives Zacchaeus a Christian identity and a mission in order to recognize God, Himself and the others. The good Zacchaeus created by God, is a man who after his conversion declared to give half of his goods to the poor.
Then, we have to allow our creator to take us to a truthful destiny because we alone cannot build our own destiny and therefore, we have to trust his divine will. While the rest of the people were seeing Zacchaeus as a sinful man, Jesus saw him as a person. The happiness of the rich man was to thank the Lord who gave him human treatment through His mercy. Even though Zacchaeus continued being a rich man, he grew in solidarity and social justice. Therefore, he gave up his goods because he learned that conversion was unveiled before God, before himself and before others.