Luke 19:1-18

Jesus was going through the city of Jericho. A man was there named Zacchaeus, who was a very important tax collector, and he was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but he was not able because he was too short to see above the crowd. He ran ahead to a place where Jesus would come, and he climbed a sycamore tree so he could see him. When Jesus came to that place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down! I must stay at your house today.” Zacchaeus came down quickly and welcomed him gladly. All the people saw this and began to complain, “Jesus is staying with a sinner!” But Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, “I will give half of my possessions to the poor. And if I have cheated anyone, I will pay back four times more.” Jesus said to him, “Salvation has come to this house today, because this man also belongs to the family of Abraham. The Son of Man came to find lost people and save them.” As the people were listening to this, Jesus told them a story because he was near Jerusalem and they thought God’s kingdom would appear immediately. He said: “A very important man went to a country far away to be made a king and then to return home. So he called ten of his servants and gave a coin to each servant. He said, ‘Do business with this money until I get back.’ But the people in the kingdom hated the man. So they sent a group to follow him and say, ‘We don’t want this man to be our king.’ “But the man became king. When he returned home, he said, ‘Call those servants who have my money so I can know how much they earned with it.’ “The first servant came and said, ‘Sir, I earned ten coins with the one you gave me.’ The king said to the servant, ‘Excellent! You are a good servant. Since I can trust you with small things, I will let you rule over ten of my cities.’ “The second servant said, ‘Sir, I earned five coins with your one.’