Q&A with Rev. Russ Kapusinski
Q: A pastor is charged by God to preach to the church and to shepherd the people in a more individual way. Which aspect of the ministry appeals to you the most?
Russ: The call to preach the gospel and to love and serve God's people was at the heart of why I initially pursued vocational pastoral ministry. While there is still capacity for much growth in both areas-preaching and shepherding, this was burden and passion God laid on my heart in the summer of 1986 when I was called to the pastorate.
It's extremely difficult for me to separate the "preaching" aspect of my ministry from the "shepherding" aspect of my ministry. I believe that the way that I primarily "shepherd" God's people is through the preaching of the gospel and the whole counsel of God as revealed in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament. I believe one of the primarily roles of a pastor is to help people understand their lives from God's perspective. This is done through preaching God's Word and applying it to 21st century men, women, boys and girls. This is shepherding through preaching. The more I spent time with God's people, in what is probably typically understood more technically as shepherding, the more I can better guide and counsel people from the Word of God.
I think driving a wedge between these two things has opened the door for people to turn to things other than God's Word to ultimately understand their lives. For example, if shepherding is ultimately divorced from ministering the Word of God to people than folks must turn to some other mode of instruction as to how to live functionally in every day life. We see that the pop-psychology, the "Life Coach," and the endless list of armchair counselors from Dr. Phil, Oprah Winfrey and countless others have become the "shepherds" to this generation functionally. For Christians, church and the preaching of God's Word has become a compartmentalized aspect of their lives that comes under the heading of "my spiritual life" and sometimes those things learned effect my daily living, but for the most part wisdom for daily living comes from the aforementioned armchair gurus and the "Self-Help" section at Barnes and Nobles.
So, as you can see like a good preacher I'm long-winded and always preaching, the aspect of the ministry that appeals to me most is shepherding God's people through the ministry of the Word of God.
My favorite quote on preaching is taken from Herman Melville's book Moby Dick,
...for the pulpit is ever the earth's foremost part; al the rest comes in its rear; the pulpit leads the world. From thence it is the storm of God's quick wrath is first descried, and the bow must bear the earliest brunt. From thence it is the God of breezes fair or foul is first invoked for favorable winds. Yes, the world's a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; and the pulpit is its prow.
Q: What are your specific and regular practices regarding the spiritual disciplines (e.g., personal prayer, Bible study, meditation, stewardship, learning, etc
Russ: As a pastor I have the unique privilege, and responsibility, to be engaged in the spiritual disciplines as an aspect of my calling. I've grown over the years to consider this one of the most precious and delightful aspects of pastoral ministry. And, while every Christian is called to these spiritual disciplines I have more time to devote to them.
Prayer, meditation on the Word of God, in-depth study, reading of great devotional and theological works, journaling, private (along with family) and corporate worship, tithing, involvement in relationships of deep-rooted accountability are a regular part of my spiritual disciplines.
I believe that a Christian best grows in the context of community-that is, a local church. So, while private prayer, meditation, study and the like are all important aspects of our growth in the grace of Jesus Christ I practice these spiritual disciplines in the context of the church. The most important spiritual discipline that I practice is worshipping God with His people on Sunday morning. This is the greatest, and in my mind, the non-negotiable spiritual discipline for every person who calls upon the Name of Jesus. God has done more to grow me through the corporate worship of His people on Sunday morning-singing His praises, confessing my sin, responding to His forgiveness with joy, embracing my brothers and sisters in Christ, hearing the Word of God read and preached, giving the tithe & offerings, confessing my faith, feasting at the Lord's Table, beholding new believer's come to their Lord through baptism and hanging out with God's people-this is the greatest and most delightful spiritual discipline to me!
Q: How would you describe a successful pastor? How would you describe a successful church?
Russ: There is only one way to determine how to describe a successful pastor and a successful church and that is to go to God's Word and seek for God's definition of "success" and what it might look like. I think the answer that arises out of the Word of God on both counts is pretty clear although I must confess that I am constantly enticed to substitute "worldly" definitions for what God has readily made lucid in His Word.
A successful pastor is one who faithfully preaches and teaches God's Word graciously and with humility always battling the temptation to seek man's approval as more important than God's. A successful pastor is a servant and serves His flock and the community that he resides in by faithfully praying for her growth in grace, conversion of heart and mind to Christ and who is characterized by a love that can be felt and is uncompromising in its commitment to Christ's Lordship.
A successful pastor realizes that he can't be a "successful pastor" apart from the power of the Holy Spirit enabling him to put off his own selfishness, pettiness and self-promoting heart. God alone can make a pastor "successful," and that "success" will bear the same marks of our Savior.
A successful church remains true to the Word of God as her only standard for what they believe and how they live in this world. A successful church has a heart for their city and for those who don't know Christ to come to yield their life to the Savior. A successful church has a heart and focuses ministry on the poor, the widow, the orphan and the marginalized. A successful church functions as a leavening force for truth and righteousness in their city and makes that city a better place to live. A successful church is filled with people who are NOT self-righteous but realize that they are "beggars only showing other beggars where to get food." In other words, a successful church is filled with people who are in the process of becoming more humble, kind, and compassionate and that can be felt by those who visit and are searching for truth. A successful church structures her worship, ministries and programs in such a way to enable it to become like the church I've described here.
At Harbor, we summarize what it means to be a successful church by saying that a successful church is: gospel-centered, missional and is focused on grace-renewal.
Q: How is the pastor held accountable? What relationships in your life currently provide accountability for responsible attitudes and behavior, both personally and as pastor?
Russ: The church I serve is called Harbor Presbyterian Church. The word "Presbyterian" in our name actually points to the formal, and we believe Biblical, accountability that is built into our denominational structure. The word is derived from a word that appears in the New Testament, prebyteros or presbyterion, that points to the nature in which the first century church was governed and by which her leadership was formally held accountable according to what they taught and how they lived. The word signifies a plurality of leaders and within the multiplicity of leadership there was to be accountability. This is the case in the denomination that Harbor functions within called The Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). As a pastor I'm accountable, formally, to three church courts called a Session, a Presbytery and a General Assembly. The Session is local accountability, the Presbytery is regional accountability and the General Assembly oversees the whole church. I report to these various courts and it is to these courts that I must answer to if I teach things not found in God's Word or if I begin living in a manner inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Presbytery ordained me as a minister of the Gospel and has the power to remove my credentials if I deviate from God's Word in doctrine or lifestyle.
However, on an informal level, I've always been in the practice of having a few close friends in the Lord to whom I share my joys, struggles, hardships, seek counsel and as one friend put it so aptly-"allow them to hunt on my property." I have an accountability group of five pastors that has been meeting for the last seven years and we know each other as well as we know ourselves. This group functionally serves as my most intimate accountability and encouragement structure and I thank God for these men and what they've meant to my family and me over the years.
Q: Who are your favorite Christian writers, commentators, theologians, etc.? Why? What books have you read in the past year?
Russ: Some of my favorite Christian writers that have impacted me deeply are: John Calvin, Saint Augustine, C.S. Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, Lesslie Newbigin, R.C. Sproul, J.I. Packer, John Piper, Harvey Conn, Ed Welch, Howard Hendricks, O. Palmer Robertson, Richard Pratt, Peter Leithart, Eugene Peterson, Peter Kreeft, Jack Miller, Dorothy Sayers, Henri Nouwen and John Frame.
These men are my favorite writers and theologians for different reasons. I believe one of the common threads is they all share a passionate love for Jesus and for His truth to be communicated with clarity and without compromise. I've come to appreciate different theologians for different reasons and for a distinct aspect of the Christian life that they pronounce better than any other person. The above list is by no means exhaustive, but it's a good start as a representative list of some of the men that have influenced my walk with Jesus over the last twenty-one (21) years.
Some of the books that I've read in the past year;
The Return of the Prodigal Son by Henri Nouwen
Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller
The Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin
Blessed Are The Hungry by Peter Leithart
Reaching Out Without Dumbing Down by Marva Dawn
The Contemplative Pastor by Eugene Peterson
Working the Angles by Eugene Peterson
The Bible & The Future by Anthony Hoekema
The Chronicle of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
Blame It On the Brain by Ed Welch
Truth to Tell: The Gospel As Public Truth by Lesslie Newbigin
Wisdom & Eloquence by Robert Littlejohn & Charles Evans
The Treasure Principle by Randy Alcorn
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Don't Waste Your Life by John Piper
Stop Dating the Church by Joshua Harris
Depression: A Stubborn Darkness by Ed Welch
Against Christianity by Peter Leithart
Back To Virtue by Peter Kreeft
For All God's Worth by N.T. Wright
How Shall We Worship? By Marva Dawn
Peculiar Speech: Preaching to the Baptized by William Willimon
Tom Landry: An Autobiography by Tom Landry
The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
The Heart of A Servant Leader by Jack Miller
The Way of the Heart by Henri Nouwen
Q: Describe your leadership style. What have been some weaknesses? Strengths?
Russ: One of the frameworks that we utilize at harbor Presbyterian Church to understand our "leadership style" is through the offices held by Jesus as a Prophet, King and Priest. A "prophetic" leadership style is visionary with an emphasis on leading through communicating a vision verbally. Its emphasis is also on authority and can be captured in the phrase, "This is where God is leading us." The "kingly" leadership style has a real emphasis on control and the detailed planning side of the vision. The phrase describing this leadership style is: "This is how we can get there." Finally, the "priestly" leadership style focuses on caring for people as the church is fulfilling her mission in the world and is characterized by presence. The phrase describing this leadership style is: "You can be part of this. I'll help you."
Usually people have a dominant style with some strength in a second style and only a few people probably possess strengths in all three. My particular leadership style is prophetic as my primary strength with a kingly as a second-tier strength. The strength of this style is that we have a clear vision of where God is leading us and we even have a plan as to how to get there. The weakness is that people can get burned out without priestly leadership gifts.
This whole question, and even my own strengths and weaknesses, highlights the fact that we shouldn't do ministry alone and why God calls us to team ministry. At Harbor, if we didn't have other Ministry Team leaders and pastors with an emphasis on priestly leadership gifts we would go no where because people would burn out without proper training and encouragement. In fact, early on in the life of our church right after we began public worship we experienced this burn-out. It wasn't until we identified its source, and God provided leaders with other styles and strengths that we began really flourish and grow as a young church.
Q: According to your observations, what doctrines need special emphasis in our day?
Russ: The doctrines that need to be emphasized in our day are: the nature and character of God (called Theology Proper) including the Doctrine of the Trinity, the person & work of Jesus Christ, the Biblical Gospel-what is the gospel and what does it require, the nature and role of the church (called ecclesiology), a proper understanding of Biblical worship and the sacraments and missiology-the role and function of the church as it relates to the world.
To expand on any of these topics would require much space. However, let me focus my comments on the need to understand the Biblical Gospel-what it is and what the gospel requires. A false gospel has permeated our culture like wildfire and its basic message is that "Jesus is a means to personal happiness and self-fulfillment." This message fits well with the so-called spiritual gurus in our day who are promoting pursuing "your best life now" as an ultimate pursuit in life and the countless personalities and institutions that are designed to help an individual achieve the greatest measure of prosperity, happiness and personal well-being in this present life. The only problem with this thinking is that it's not Biblical, nor is it the call of mankind to pursue our happiness as an ultimate goal; rather, we're called to glorify and serve the God who created and redeemed us in His Son. The byproduct of serving, worshipping, obeying and loving God is a life of joy, peace, purpose and contentment. To pursue those things without putting God first is to put the proverbially "cart before the horse."
Yet this is exactly what's going on in America, and to make matters worse this message has been coated with a thin veneer of "Christianity." Jesus, in this gospel, is no longer the One who calls us to "deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow Him;" rather, Jesus is preached as the key to self-fulfillment. The message is: give your life to Jesus and He'll give you the life you've always wanted: prosperity, worldly success and much, much more.
The problem with this gospel is captured well by C.S. Lewis in his essay entitled The Weight of Glory,"
Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.
This false gospel so prevalent in our day is designed for people who are "far too easily pleased." The richness of eternal rewards and the priceless gifts of God's Holy Spirit given to believers in the gospel are exchanged for what the world defines as true riches and Christ and all His real benefits are discarded as a second rate, at best, reward.
The gospel of Jesus Christ gives us the greatest thing and the most desirable thing in this life, and the next, and that is: God Himself! There is nothing more satisfying and delightful than God and to exchange Him for a bigger home, fanciful vacations, fast cars, and a trophy wife and/or husband is to be engaged in activity that can be rightly described as insane.
Q: Tell us about your hobbies and likes.
Russ: My hobbies: almost any sport on dry land with special delight in football and basketball. I enjoy coaching and have coached basketball and football at a high school level most recently coaching at Eastlake High School in the fall of 2005. I love to read and study. I have a special interest in history, literature, philosophy, psychology, theology along with almost any form of science. I have a passion for education and to see reform in the educational institutions of our society. I enjoy weight training and running. I enjoy hanging out with Diane (my wife of 14 years) and our two boys, Joshua and Caleb. I love to travel.
I like music, all kinds of music but especially country music! I enjoy hanging out at Starbucks and a drinking a great cup of coffee (or Mocha) with friends. I love great movies, epic novels, classical literature, Shakespeare and stand-up comedy-I deeply enjoy laughter, hiking in the mountains, especially Yosemite. I like solitude. I deeply enjoy my family and can't imagine life without them. I'm a huge college football and basketball fan-Go Buckeyes! I enjoy a lot of simple things in life. I love the church, with all her warts-it's been and continues to be a conduit of grace to my family and me.
I like big cities, great food, excellent beer (especially Guinness) and a smooth Cabernet alongside a great steak-I guess we're moving into indulgences now. I love getaways with Diane, Joshua's enthusiasm for life and Caleb's sense of humor and showmanship. And, I'm amazed by grace-God has been so good to me, and this is only the beginning and a slice of what awaits those who love Jesus, and are loved by Jesus.
