My two pennies - I was called to be a bishop when I was 30 years old. My family was living in Tennessee at the time. I shared with a few people at work that I had been called, and it was difficult for them to get how it all worked. A co-worker who was studying to be a pastor / minister was very skeptical that I had been asked / assigned (I certainly didn't volunteer for it!) to be a "pastor" out of the blue, while he was hoping to be hired as one once he finished his divinity schooling for which he was paying a lot of money. At first I didn't know how to really respond to his skepticism, but as I thought about it, I came up with this response. From the time I was twelve until nineteen, I've been involved in different types of church callings or responsibilities for a few hours a week. Additionally, I attended 4 years of seminary in high school, totaling over 1,000 hours of schooling. Beyond that, I had a year of institute, and two full years completely dedicated to ecclesiastical service / leadership as a missionary in Japan. Since the 8 years of my mission, I'd had callings that required 4-8 hours a week of effort, in addition to the three hours at church every Sunday. I'm not saying it's quite as concentrated as a 4 or 6 yr divinity degree, but it's a lot closer than one would think. And - I was younger than many who had that responsibility. Don't get me wrong - I certainly got things wrong as a bishop, and there's lots of things that I would do differently. But - I had been observing church leaders for 15 years, and had hundreds of hours of church leadership training by that point in my life.
