Pastor's Kids stories

[kittystrawberry]

I was reading this other post on minister's kids.
To my surprise, some people here are pastor's kids.
What was some stories, benefit, etc of being a pastor's kids or being friend of a pastor's kids? What were their parents like?
I wonder if female have a rough time as a pastor's kid. How does the pastor react to his teen daughter dating?

[ctay]

I'd like to hear some stories too.

[epitamyofthe9]

im a PK but unfortunatly i dont have any really interesting stories to tell and it dosent seem to cause me any problems at school or on the dating seen, my dads pretty cool:)

there are a few wierd thing like having people go threw mental brackdowns in youre living room or having people living in youre gest room and knowing not to ask y because they probably left an abusive relashion ship or they are having a mental crisis

but i grew up with this stuff and i seems normale to me;)

[ctay]

I guess the kids of pastors are expected to be more well behaved than non PK kids. Our pastor, he has 2 kids, age 8 and 6 I think. The youngest one stays in trouble, she's more mischievious than anything else. I looked up one sunday morning, she was sitting on the front row with a bunch of the post it notes stuck all over her.

[ClementofRome]

One of my most interesting memories was waking up on Saturday morning and my brother and I crawling over piles of hippies on the living room floor as we got our cereal and headed to the TV for cartoons. My Dad was pastor and my Mom was a college teacher and they had opened their home to the "Jesus Freaks" at the college (circa, '72). I remember going to bed while the hippies played guitar and sang "It only takes a spark to get a fire going...that's how it is with God's love..." They would crash for the night. There were also some black students who were involved and this caused no small concern for the rural UMC church where my Dad was pastor.

Unfortunately, we only stayed 2 years. They (whoever "they" is) burned a cross in our front yard and we began to receive hate mail and death threats. I really don't remember much of the bad stuff from that appointment, but do remember a bunch of the good stuff.

[PrinceOfPeace33]

I'm a PK and it's okay.

I don't really have any stories at all...and unlike the ones who already posted, I've never had someone stay at my house because my dad's a pastor. Not even some kind of experience like that. I just sometimes can't go into his office.

The benefits...well, I suppose there are a lot? But I can't think of them... I can get into the church when I need to...and use the copier machine...and sing in church whenever I want...and always know about church activities. Yeah...that's pretty much it.

The downside is that like, EVERYONE knows you...and I don't always know them back and they'll come up and just start talking to me and I don't know who they are. And, sometimes...you are expected to know things, or people think you know EVERYTHING because your dad's the pastor. Some people think I'm automatically going into Heaven because I'm a PK and some think I should know everything about the Bible, but I don't.

And your question about their daughter dating --- I don't think my dad has a problem with it. I've never officially dated anyone because I wasn't allowed until I was 16 (but that would've been that way regardless of my dad's job), but I came really close, and he liked the guy. I think it would be just like any other family. And I'm Methodist and this guy was Catholic.

[NewSong]

I have oodles of pastor's kid's stories. My dad pastors a church in another state from her and as a grown lady now I can look at some of the things that I personalized and either laugh or do what I can to help other Pks through those moments. I used to resent someone calling my parents up for their big toe so to speak and having them jump through hoops to answer the phone and visit them and then have that same person be rude to me in church. I could never figure out what made people tick---or they would say something to this effect, "Nothing personal about your dad but and then proceed to knock my parents" ---and why shouldn't I personalize it and why are you telling me? People are sometimes really stupid when it comes to pastor's kids or perhaps it was the church my father pastored that made it so stupid since my daughter hasn't gone through as much of it ---

One of the things I would tell ever pastor and wife that I have encountered now that I am a grown woman is do not take your kids for granted and ignore their needs by not balancing out the ministry and home. I loved to minister with my parents as long as we were a family but the minute someone became so needy and demanding on my folks and were rude then I resented it.

The story I will remember the most as pastor's kid and will probably tell it as long as I am alive is the one where we had a music evangelist and his family come to our home. It seemed as though there were an orphanage of kids that this family had and they always took their camper whenever they had evangelistic services so they could homeschool the children. The first time ever it seemed, people were bringing in food to help feed the small army and they were all trying to find something that would feed so many and we got goulash every night for almost a week. The last night of services, we were sitting around the table before dinner began waiting for the food to arrive and praying that there wasn't any more goulash :D .... But... we got another batch of it along with this horrible pie that tasted like it was left in the sun. We all looked at each other like we couldn't quite handle it----my mom trying to rescue us from yet another goulash dish ran out to the kitchen and started throwing things together to give us Sunday's meal so that we didn't have to eat the goulash. My father knowing the guy who had made up the meal said, "We have to at least taste this because ____ will ask how it is." Well my dad did and the pie was horrible it was left out in the sun and it was not even funny.... We laughed and joked around about running out in the back yard and digging a hole and naming the hole "THE SPOT" and then we dumping the spoiled food there so that when _____ asked how it was my dad could say it hit the spot. :D We never did--- With that same evangelist and family, they were all coming out of the church late at night bringing out all their sound equipment and instruments when the cops drove by and made all of them put their hands on the church and spread their legs until they called the pastor. YEP, we sat in the car and watched the whole thing and my dad was standing there with his hands in the air next to the church. The next thing I know the cop was looking in my dad's wallet --the cop was trying to verify that he was indeed the pastor because they couldn't reach anyone at the house. We all thought that was pretty funny.

I have tons of stories but unfortunately I am not a good story teller. :(

[Hediru]

I'm not a PK, but pretty close. My sister and I like to refer to ourselves as MDK's (music director's kid), and in some ways it presents the same challenges that face the PK. Only slightly different. Because my mother is lay and stayed at the church for awhile instead of being itinerant like pastor's families, I literally grew up in the church. I spent more time there than I did at home as a kid. My best friend in church was a PK, and we would spend a lot of time exploring the church and getting into all kinds of crazy trouble.

There are upsides to being a MDK:
1. Mom (or Dad) has a set of church keys, so if you forgot your purse on Sunday, you could go back and get it. ;)
2. You get to know the pastors and their families really well.
3. You get to hear all the inside church news.
4. Everyone knows you, so you have a very large extended family.
5. You can drop in and sing in the choir at any time - without attending rehearsal.

Downsides to being a MDK:
1. EVERYONE knows you, so you can't do something wrong without getting in trouble. (I wasn't a bad kid, but I don't think I could've been if I wanted to.)
2. It is almost required of you to participate in everything related to music of the church, oh and you have to do it really well too because you're Dianne's daughter.
3. If you do something special, like getting a nice part in the Christmas play, everyone thinks you got it because of who your mother is, not because you are actually good for the part.
4. No matter how hard you try to come into your own life and become an individual, you will never get out from under the shadow of your mother until you grow up and go to a different church.

[swingnscream]

Good things about being a pk would be the privilige of knowing a lot other pastors' families, so if I travel or go to a Christian event alot of times I'll know someone there.
Growing up as a pk I learn to explore churches, becuz we always visited a church while we were on vacation. So no matter what the size of the building or what the crazy-maze layout that it might be, I have a natural instinct to find my way around churches.

As far as dating, I actually have heard comments, a couple different times, saying things like: "you can't date her...she's the pastor's daughter!" and a few other likes that from different ppl. Although I wasn't suppose to hear any of them, I did. But basically I'd just rolled my eyes to that most of the time.

I always hated the label becuz it least describes who I am, and lot of ppl wouldn't take the time get to know me becuz most ppl have preconcieved ideas about the pastor's family being "holy" or something like that, that just puts you on a different level and makes you less human. It's always the worst when your in/at the church where your dad [or mom] is the pastor, but it is something that ppl well always react to when they find out, even if they're not in or from your church.

Growing up as a pk you learn about living in the spotlight or fishbowl, so you'd learn how to deal with what other ppl thought about you which is a very importain life lesson. I think it also helps me to appreciate and be more sympathic to ppl who live in the spotlight or who grow up in living in the fishbowl becuz of their parents. Being a pk hasn't always fun, and usually it's ackward but there are some adventages to be had. ...but of course individual results may vary.