Expertise

With many friends in graduate school for various medical professions, I often feel a strange tension when discussing the seemingly endless academic work required for medical/theological graduate degrees. On the one hand, we get each other because it takes so long. On the other, they get to be doctors when it's done; I'll just have a masters. Again, they get to be recognized experts in their field of study, I just get to minister to people who already are experts in mine. I mean, really, a master of divinity is a misnomer. The more I learn, the less I am sure I know; and yet it will probably not be uncommon for the people who know less, have read less, studied less than me to assume that their perception of all things theological is better or at least as good as mine. This is only natural, because no one believes in something because they think it's wrong. I'm not complaining, though. Consider this my Bob blog, just pointing out another irony in our crazy world.