Extremists

The other night Bill Maher was on The Late Show with Craig Ferguson. He said all religious people were extremists. Man, I wish that were true of Christians. (Yes, including me.)

Tension

A group in our church is going through a parenting DVD series by a well known psychologist. His section on birth order was good but something he said made me think of pastors and denominations.

He pointed out that most company CEO's and presidents of institutions are first borns. It fits their psychological profile. They are driven, successful, orderly, systematic, and orthodox. Entrepreneurs, on the other hand, tend to be middle children. They are rough and tumble, are sick of being bossed around by older siblings, and have had to go their own way to find a voice for themselves.

I think both types of people have good qualities that serve a pastor well. I'm just not sure how well they do at leading each other. What kind of person ends up leading a denomination, conference, district, cluster, etc.? My guess is that usually it will be a first born. The problem is that the middle born pastors they lead will fight them every step of the way. I'm quite sure the same would be true if the roles were reversed.

Some might suggest that the answer is to let the babies of the family run the show. Get serious. The only thing good about that would be the speeches at the conferences.

I guess it just really takes a lot of understanding.