the place where Zacchaeus was hiding in
the branches, he stopped, looked up, and saw him. He knew who this man
was. Jesus called out:

"Hurry and come down out of that tree, Zacchaeus. I am coming to stay
at your house today!"

[Illustration]

Surprised but happy, Zacchaeus scrambled down the tree and led Jesus
to his house. The other people also were surprised, but not so happy.
They muttered to themselves, as many people had done before. They
said,

"He's gone to be the guest of that miserable, cheating traitor of a
taxgatherer!"

But Zacchaeus became a changed man that day. He said to Jesus:

"I am going to give half my money to the poor. And if I have cheated
anybody I shall give back four times as much as I took."

Then Jesus was glad that he had called Zacchaeus down from the tree.

"You have been saved from your sins today, Zacchaeus," he said.

Jesus was glad that he had found at least one rich man who did not
love his money more than he loved God. Zacchaeus had not been a good
man. He was not like the rich young man who had kept all God's
commandments since he was a boy. But when he heard Jesus speak to him,
he knew that he had been in the wrong. He was ready to do what he
could to show that he knew how he had sinned.

"This is what I came for," Jesus said, "to look for sinners like this
man and to save them."

When Jesus got to Jerusalem, it was going to cost him a great deal to
help men find a new life. But whatever it might cost him, it would be
worth the price.

11. Nearing the City

[Illustration]

Passover time had almost come, so Jesus had to be on his way. Jericho
was left behind, and Jesus and the disciples pushed across the hills
and desert land that lay east of Jerusalem.

This was the country Jesus had crossed the first time he went to the
Passover feast. That was twenty years ago, when he was a boy of
twelve, and Joseph and Mary had taken him to the feast in the great
city. The stones were just as hard now as they had been then. The land
was as dreary to see as it had ever been, and the desert as dry. And
yet there were just as many pilgrims from all parts of Palestine
traveling up to Jerusalem, going, as their fathers did before them,
to keep the Passover in the holy city of the Jews. In a little while a
shout would go up, and many a party would burst into song. They would
sing:

[Illustration]

"'I was glad when they said unto me,
Let us go into the house