I worked early in my career for a pastor that used me most effectively in the ministry. I baby sat his children for days on end while they traveled to see the other pastors. I mowed their lawn, I washed their dog and changed poopey diapers on the babies. Once I left the shower at the YMCA before the chief priest, because it was hot and I was done etc, and he followed me out to call me back in saying that I should never leave before he does as I might miss something important he had to say. That's when I learned I had buttons that could be pushed and yet I still had an override button to plaster a compliant smile on my face and march right back into the steam! I once got called out for going through the door before them etc. I don't have an override button anymore! I just have buttons.

Well, the whole thing of ministerial entitlements is rather a slippery and sloopy slope. Many normal and blessed with common sense pastors would never think of such things, but it is the least educated who are the most vociferous in their opinions and seem to be the most demanding in this area of entitlements. Being a "minister" in some parts of the country is one of the last credentials a man can take to himself, complete with perks that granddaddy got when he was a preacher, without actually earning them. Every third male in the Southeast United States believes that he is a "preecher." If he can read and tell jokes, cultivate the look and yell out what then seems like a "powerful sermon", which may only be powerful in that it is loud, he wins and qualifies. It is these types that usually harbor an expectation of entitlement and special priviledges as "the minister." The more educated the man, the more down to earth, realistic and genuine a minister can tend to be. Don't get me wrong, there are educated narcissists which inflict sheer carnage and destruction upon a local congregation, but I have written of this elsewhere.

It is never wrong to give honor where honor is due, but it is always wrong for a man to expect it just because he is a minister and somehow feels his sacrifice in life is more than anyone elses who has to make a living here on the planet themselves. Here are a few good rules to follow.