On the way home from church last Wednesday night, little nine-year-old Corrie Coleman, daughter of Scott and Kristi Coleman and granddaughter of Tom and Helen Coleman, was explaining her perspective on the way things work at Cliff Temple to her younger brother, Ben. Her evaluation went something like this. “First, you go to missions. In fourth grade, you start Bible Drill, and then go to youth. And when you retire, you join the choir and then you go to heaven.” Couldn’t have scripted that one better! I might add that Corrie and our own Jamie Burchfiel won State in Bible Drill this past week, which is truly remarkable! Do you think that one reason Jesus kept children around was because they helped him keep his perspective? That’s not easy to do.

We find ourselves this morning in the last chapter of the Gospel of John, in what should be the afterglow of the resurrection. Assuming John wrote this gospel, from his perspective, this encounter between Jesus and Peter was so significant it was worth using as the conclusion of his gospel diary and thereby giving us his last resurrection perspective of life. This is the same gospel that started out with this grand panoramic, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God . . . and the Word became flesh and lived among us” (John 1:1, 14). It seems that if John started out the Gospel of John on that grand and glorious note, he would have also ended it on something of a similar note, especially considering the fact that the event we’ve read about this morning occurred upon the occasion of Jesus’ third appearance to the disciples after his resurrection.

Instead, what we’re given as the last note of resurrection perspective is an almost everyday kind of occurrence. Jesus meets up with the disciples; they have a seaside breakfast of roasted fish and then take a stroll on the beach. Maybe they’d taken off their sandals and were letting the lips of the dying waves wash the sand from between their toes.

During the stroll, Jesus puts Peter through something of a test of integrity by questioning the depth of his love, a three-part test actually. It hurt Peter’s feelings. Then Jesus gives Peter some perspective about how his own life will be, specifically because he has chosen to be a follower of his. It’s not a pretty picture. “I tell you,” Jesus says to Peter, “when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.”

We’re not sure exactly what Jesus meant by those words. There has always been a little bit of mystery there. They at least mean this much. In following Jesus, Peter will live long enough to know what it’s like to lose his personal freedom and the dignity that goes with it, even the simple freedom of just making everyday choices for himself. Many of you have watched and walked with your parents and other loved ones as they suffered that same kind of indignity. When you have to take away the car keys. Or they become bedridden, totally dependent on the care of other people for even the most basic of life’s daily functions. That’s all Jesus implied Peter had to anticipate. Then, after this grilling and this unsolicited fortune telling, Peter wants to change the subject. Wouldn’t you? As John cruises by, Peter asks Jesus, changing the subject, “What about him?”

Nothing that I know of can cause a loss of resurrection perspective more than losing focus on the risen Christ who is with you while, at the very same moment, being consumed with what is happening in someone else’s life. Peter just couldn’t enjoy the fact that Jesus was walking with him and talking with him and telling him that he was his own. The joy that Peter and Jesus could have shared as they tarried there was shattered by Peter’s childlike preoccupation with what might happen to John. Whatever chance Peter had to just revel in the moment of the presence of Christ in his life was totally lost because his perspective was distorted. He was viewing the value of his own life, and even his own experience with Christ, through the prism of comparison to someone else’s. Anyone here had that problem this week? Looking at your own situation in life and asking God, “Well, what about . . . ? Why do they . . . ? How come . . . ?”

Scott Peck in his wonderful book from three decades ago, The Road Less Traveled, said that the decision to step from childhood to adulthood is the single most difficult decision any human being ever makes. And he’s actually echoing something Paul also wrote. “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I put an end to childish ways” (1 Corinthians 13:11).

If you really get into 1 Corinthians and listen to it and wrestle with it, you will discover that Paul does not describe the decision to move from childhood to adulthood as a next natural step but as a disciplined choice to be a person who loves God and himself and others completely. In fact, if you go on to read the rest of 1 Corinthians, you will discover that this step from childhood to adulthood was taken specifically because Paul was urging his readers to see all of life from the perspective of being lost in love and the opportunity to love other people.

One of the single greatest evidences that we have made the decision to grow up is that we have stopped determining the value of our lives by comparing them to what we perceive to be the value of anyone else’s. We’ve stopped asking of God, “How come . . . ?” And “What about . . . ?”

This next Sunday morning, we are coming to our annual Spring Thank Offering. As always, we all ask ourselves, “How do we get people to not just give money but to give out of a spirit of gratitude?” I’d like to suggest this morning that kind of giving will come out of a brutally honest reflection of our own value in the presence of the living Christ. It will not come from comparing the need of this church to our resources. The fact is that the largest percentage of charitable giving in the United States is done by people who come from the lowest income brackets.

The only way people will ever truly give in a way that both meets the church’s needs and also glorifies God is when they take the very adult step of stopping the comparison of their lives to anyone else’s or their church to anyone else’s or the church’s needs to their resources. When they stop asking of God, “What about . . . ?” and they simply look at life from the perspective of their own personal experience with the presence of the living Christ with them in this moment. In other words, we will give out of gratitude when we are walking in gratitude with the Christ who is with us.

This past Monday I had the chance to play in an Arthritis Foundation golf tournament. It was a tournament in which orthopedic surgeons were asked to play and to bring along someone on whom they had inflicted their surgical skills; Phil Berry asked me to go along. Phil and I were paired with these two young, very athletic-looking flat-bellies. They looked and dressed like good golfers. They played as well as they looked. At least three times, I said to Phil, “I feel so intimidated playing with these younger guys.” I was especially intimidated after our first drive off the tee. Theirs went 300 yards straight down the fairway.

As Phil and I were rummaging through the trees looking for my tee shot, I said it again. “I am so intimidated by these younger players,” Phil said something that caught me short. “Instead of being intimidated you ought to just be grateful,” Phil said, and then just left it hanging there. He didn’t tell me what to be grateful for. For my game? Yeah! My game! For my life! For this day! For this opportunity to play in God’s creation! I decided to give it a try. All of a sudden, the tension went out of my body. My game didn’t improve any, but it sure was a lot more pleasurable. Of all things, our foursome won second place in the tournament! Most of all, I told Phil later that I had the best time I’ve had in months because I stopped comparing my game to anyone else’s and thanked God for the game he gave me.

If you’re not a grateful person this morning, to the point of sharing out of whatever is yours, why not? What are you waiting on to change? What are you waiting for to change in your life, to finally tip you over into gratitude? Would you be so honest this morning as to answer Jesus’ question, “Do you love me? Do you, you, love me?” Like nothing else really matters but that he loves you and you love him. And everything else is gravy.

That kind of perspective can transform your life. I believe with all my heart, or I wouldn’t be doing this, that the presence of the grace of God can transform our perspective from one of bitterness to one of gratitude. Our perspective can change. Do you believe that? If you don’t, what are you doing here?

Nancy sent me some lines from some songs for aging Baby Boomers to consider. Some of these will be recognizable only to the front end of that generation. You’ll remember some of these songs, so I’m going to ask you to help me finish the lines. You remember Herman’s Hermits (my seventh grade year)? “Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely _______ (Daughter).” It’s changed. “Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Walker.” The Bee Gees: “How Can You Mend a Broken ______ (Heart)” has changed. They now sing, “How Can You Mend a Broken Hip.” Bobby Darin used to sing, “Splish Splash, I Was _________ (Taking a Bath).” Now, it’s “Splish Splash, I Was Having a Flash.” Ringo Starr, “I Get By With a Little Help From ______ (My Friends)” has changed to “I Get By With a Little Help From Depends.” Roberta Flack, from my freshman year in college, sang, “The First Time Ever I _________ (Saw Your Face).” Now, it’s changed. Roberta’s singing, “The First Time Ever I Forgot Your Face.” Johnny Nash, “I Can See Clearly Now.” Remember? “I Can’t See Clearly Now.” And one more, Paul Simon used to sing, “Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover.” It’s changed to “Fifty Ways to Lose Your Liver.” One’s perspective of life and what really matters tends to change with age!,

If for just a moment, in this moment of worship, we will focus on the presence of the risen Christ in our lives, then there will come a time, if we choose to follow Jesus and just walk with him, our perspective of life will change also. The life that we think is ours we will come to see as nothing more than pure gift and give gratitude for it, no matter what it is and, along with that, give gratitude to God.

I was touched this past week by the story of Alec Baldwin, whose taped conversation with his eleven-year-old daughter was broadcast everywhere. Alec Baldwin and his ex-wife have been going through a brutal child custody struggle. Baldwin was recorded as having said some very unkind things about his ex-wife to his eleven-year-old, and then saying some very unkind things to his daughter as well. There’s no excuse for that. Children, whether their parents are married or divorced, should never be used by their parents to communicate bad feelings to the other parent. Ever! That’s child abuse.

Hearing the story brought back some poignant memories of when I was living through those days. Where are the boys going to stay this week? I remember the sharp pain in my heart when they would ask, “Whose house are we spending the night at tonight?” For just a moment, I was able to sympathize with the kind of pain that can drive a parent to the point of breaking, over not knowing when they’ll see their children again. I was reminded of the book that saved me from living a life of total bitterness. It was the book written by John Claypool, Tracks of a Fellow Struggler. Claypool said that what helped him finally get through the grief of losing his eleven-year-old daughter to leukemia was when he stopped focusing on having lost her and started focusing on giving gratitude to God for the time he had had her at all.

That thought changed my life, because it helped me move from being angry and bitter about the times I didn’t have my children as a result of divorce, to focusing on the time that I did have them. When my perspective changed from one of bitterness over what was not mine to gratitude for what was gift, I became a healthier parent, a healthier father, and I think my children are better off for it as well.

With each passing day, I am grateful for the life that is uniquely mine, because of what grace can do with even the worst of our sins. I am grateful for a church that was willing to look past my sin to see God’s grace still at work in me. I am grateful for the lives I’ve been privileged to touch because of my experience with Christ in that kind of tragedy, an experience of grace I might have never known otherwise. I am grateful for the authentically human experiences I’ve had that pulled the curtains of fake humility and piety apart, Toto-like, and did not allow me to live curtained off from genuine humanity behind the false pretense of ministerial holiness.

I am discovering that I can live every day being intimidated by the overwhelming needs in my own life, being intimidated by what’s happening in someone else’s experiences, being intimidated by how much I think they’re blessed or how wonderful their life is, or I can spend my day living the life God has given me and be grateful for that one. Every single time I do that, my gears flip over, and no matter how bad the score is, I at least enjoy playing the game a lot more.The most childish question we will ever ask of God is, “What about . . . ?” The most important question we will ever answer is the one Jesus asked Peter and left hanging for you and me to answer as well: “What is that to you? You follow me.”

When you follow Jesus, you might find yourself surprised at where you show up. You might find yourself showing up in missions in Latvia. Or, you might find yourself showing up in Bible Drill, helping some students discover Exodus. Or, just before someone leads you where you don’t want to go, you might find yourself retiring and singing in the choir before you go to heaven. No matter where the call of Christ leads you, if you will choose to focus on the walk of Christ with you, you will discover that he will walk with you and he’ll talk with you and he’ll tell you that you’re his own. And, the joy you share as you tarry there, well, no other person has ever known.

There is a unique joy for you to experience with Christ that no one but you and Jesus can know. If you could leave here this morning believing nothing but that, then this day of worship has been well spent. Well, will you?