This is Aunt Frenita and I have a wonderful story for you called "Too Short To See"

Today's memory verse is from Luke 19:10. It says "“Jesus came to seek and to save what was lost.”

The message for today's story is: Jesus wants everyone to be in His family.

Do you know someone that other people don’t like?

Do you think Jesus likes that person?

What would you do if you knew no one liked you?

People did not like Zacchaeus.

Why didn’t people like Zacchaeus?

Because of his job.

Zacchaeus was a tax collector.

He took extra money from poor people to make himself rich.

That is stealing

And people didn’t like it.

One day Zacchaeus heard that Jesus loved everybody.

I wonder if Jesus loves me, he thought to himself.

No, Jesus couldn't love me.

I took people’s money.

Did you think Jesus loved Zacchaeus?

Of course He did, because Jesus loves everybody!

Zacchaeus decided that he would not cheat people anymore.

He wanted to be like Jesus.

He said he was sorry to the people and started to give back the money that he had wrongly taken.

But the people still didn’t like Zacchaeus!

They didn’t believe him.

They wouldn’t even let him come to church!

Zacchaeus was sad and discouraged.

One day Zacchaeus heard that Jesus was coming to Jericho.

That was his town!

Oh, he just had to see Jesus!

Jesus had changed his heart!

Jesus would understand how Zacchaeus felt.

He was a short man, so he couldn’t see over the tops of the people’s heads.

He was going to miss seeing Jesus!

He turned and quickly climbed up into a nearby tree.

Higher and higher he climbed so that he could see better.

Then he saw Jesus coming!

Suddenly Jesus stopped right under that tree!

He looked up at Zacchaeus and said,

“Zacchaeus, hurry and come down! I must stay at your house today.”

The people were so surprised!

They couldn’t believe that Jesus would want to go to Zacchaeus’s house—to the house of a cheater!

Zacchaeus hopped out of that tree and took Jesus home with him.

Now he knew that he was forgiven.

He knew that Jesus loved him.

Jesus told Zacchaeus’s whole family how much He loved them

And wanted them to be part of His family.

Jesus told them that He had come to earth to save everyone, including them.

Zacchaeus wanted to do things the way Jesus did.

He looked at Jesus and said,

“I want to give half of my money to the poor."

"To the people that I’ve cheated, I want to give back four times as much as I took."

"I want to love everybody the way You do."

Jesus was happy that Zacchaeus felt that He was a part of God’s family.

Jesus wants us to feel a part of God’s family too.