Cornerstone Community Church, San Jose Ca

Have you ever been stereotyped? Most of us have. People find out a certain piece of information about you and from that one piece of information alone they conclude that they know pretty much everything they need to know about you. When we started Cornerstone I was working two full-time jobs -- I was an employment lawyer at a firm in Palo Alto and I was a pastor of this church. And it was interesting to see how people who didn't know me sized me up based on which job I told them about. If I told them I was a lawyer, I could see in their eyes that they thought they knew me, that I must surely fit the lawyer stereotype. And if I told them I was a pastor -- a pastor of a Baptist church, no less -- then they came to a whole different set of conclusions about what kind of a weirdo I must be. And when I told people I was a lawyer and a pastor, I could see two contrasting stereotypes crashing together in their minds. Most people didn't quite know what to say, other than, "You're a what?"