I was around 13 years old when I started adding weight noticeably and with that came a lot of insecurities, especially as a teenager dealing with the onset of attraction to the opposite gender. I did not really consider my weight a problem but I experienced enough side talks and insults to know it was something that made people consider me a person they could laugh at or ridicule. My insecurity then started to develop not from my own perception of my body but from my internalization of people’s perception of my body and how they judged who I was based on what I looked like. Although, I like to think of myself then as someone who did not care too much about what people really thought about me but I knew I was deliberately avoiding certain places, gatherings or situations because I was thinking about what people would think of my body.

I don’t know when I finally decided I was going to exercise my power to perceive myself as I see fit and not as others do and to stop allowing what others may think about me to stop me from doing things I wanted to, but I know the story of Zaccheaus is one that keeps teaching me about making the best of what may be considered a stigma.

Zaccheaus is reported in the Bible as a tax collector who met Jesus after he decided to climb the sycamore tree in order to see Jesus and then Jesus came to dine with Him and bring salvation to his home, which caused people to murmur against Jesus for dining with someone they considered a sinner. The story of Zaccheaus is usually referenced in church or at home as one that shows nobody was too sinful for Jesus to meet, eat with and save.

However, the day Zaccheaus was going to make a difference to me, was the day I read his story through the lens of seeing how a short man did not allow his height stop him from getting what he wanted. I imagined that there must have been a great crowd wanting to see Jesus and here comes short man Zaccheaus who also wanted to see Jesus but is probably in a position where he cannot even get to the heads of the people around him, so stretching his neck or seeing above their heads was not even an option for him. I believe he must have asked himself what he could do to ensure he achieved his goal despite his height, so off he went to climb a tree.

When I was thinking about the scenario, I was wondering how funny Zaccheaus might have looked trying to climb the tree, how his short legs would go branch by branch till he got to the height where he would see Jesus. Was it possible that people around him were laughing at him because he had to climb the tree? I don’t know, but I do know that whenever a person has something considered a form of stigma, there will always be people ready to laugh at them or make snide or hurtful remarks.

The story of Zaccheaus showed me the determination of a man who was not going to let his physical condition detract from him achieving his goal. I wonder if Zaccheaus was the only short man in the crowd who could not see Jesus, but did the other short men do something about it? Or did they accept that it was their fate not to see Jesus because they were too short or worse did they have entitlement mentality, were they expecting that people would allow them go to the front, since they were short or were they expecting that someone would give them a stool or something to climb on to see Jesus.

Is this not how we as people think when it comes to conditions or impairments that have some sort of stigma attached to them? Are we not so bothered about what people think about us or worse have we told ourselves we cannot achieve or do something because of that condition? Is this mindset not what prevents us from being confident about what we can achieve or become creative enough about our situation to think of or look for a “sycamore tree” to climb?

The beauty of Zaccheaus story to me is not just his determination or his resourcefulness in achieving his aim of seeing Jesus but that because of what he did,

Jesus saw him!!!

It is amazing to me when I think about how the condition that should have kept him hidden and lost in the crowd was what caused him to make a radical choice which then caused him to attract the attention of Jesus. This attention led to such great honor that Jesus chose his house to dine. Of course, this blessing and honor attracted comments from people, like why him? He is a publican, a tax collector, a thief, a sinner but they failed to acknowledge his determination and actions that caused Jesus to see him.
Is this not the same thing we experience from people today? They look at your life or what you are doing and say why him? why her? (S)he’s fat, (s)he’s ugly, (s)he’s short, (s)he’s deaf, (s)he cannot speak well, his/her accent is too thick, (s)he’s not qualified, his/her pedigree is not right and all other opinions they have that makes them think your achievements or blessing is unjustified and if we allow ourselves to internalize this, is it not easy for us to start thinking of ourselves as less than or not deserving of our achievements or the honor or blessing we have received, which can then have an indirect effect of us subconsciously aiming too low or avoiding things that can put us in the spotlight.

This is not a campaign for ignoring conditions that can impact your health, instead it is recognizing that there are lots of conditions, impairments, backgrounds, situations etc that cannot be fixed and even the ones that can be might require a process that make the way you define yourself and your abilities become skewed. Rather, this is a call to say why not be a (wo)man like Zaccheaus, instead of letting whatever it is define you or cause you to shy away from achieving your goals, instead of letting it work against you, why not work with it as you improve what you can, why not let it propel you to look for sycamore tree type of solutions that can end up setting you apart from the rest.