{"product_id":"the-ruthless-elimination-of-hurry-isbn-9780525653097","title":"The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eTHE NATIONAL BESTSELLER WITH ONE MILLION COPIES SOLD! • A compelling emotional and spiritual case against hurry and in favor of a slower, simpler way of life—from the author of \u003ci\u003ePracticing the Way\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Prophetic, practical, and profoundly life giving . . . provides a way forward that creates hope, hunger, and a vision of a beautiful life. I consider this required reading.”—Jon Tyson, lead pastor of the Church of the City New York and author of \u003ci\u003eBeautiful Resistance\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e“Who am I becoming?”\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat was the question nagging pastor and author John Mark Comer. Outwardly, he appeared successful. But inwardly, things weren’t pretty. So he turned to a trusted mentor for guidance and heard these words:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e“Ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. Hurry is the great enemy of the spiritual life.”\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt wasn’t the response he expected, but it was—and continues to be—the answer he needs. Too often we treat the symptoms of toxicity in our modern world instead of trying to pinpoint the cause. A growing number of voices are pointing at hurry, or busyness, as a root of much evil.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWithin the pages of this book, you’ll find a fascinating roadmap to staying emotionally healthy and spiritually alive in the chaos of the modern world.“As someone all too familiar with ‘hurry sickness,’ I desperately needed this book.”\u003cb\u003e—Scott Harrison, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e best-selling author of \u003ci\u003eThirst\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“John Mark Comer is a hugely talented leader, speaker, and writer. You will find lots of wise advice here.”\u003cb\u003e—Nicky Gumbel, vicar of Holy Trinity Brompton, London\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Necessary. Freeing.”\u003cb\u003e—Annie F. Downs, best-selling author of \u003ci\u003e100 Days to Brave\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eRemember God\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Never has a generation needed a book as much as this. John Mark has beautifully written a remedy for our overworked and tired souls.”\u003cb\u003e—Jeremy and Audrey Roloff, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e best-selling authors of \u003ci\u003eA Love Letter Life\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Great guy; even better book!”\u003cb\u003e—Bob Goff, author of the\u003ci\u003e New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestsellers\u003ci\u003e Love Does\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eEverybody, Always\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Like a tall glass of ice cold water on the hottest day of the year, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003eis refreshing, revitalizing, and a shock to the system. Beautifully and compellingly written by one of our foremost thinkers, it is a prophetic message for our time.”\u003cb\u003e—Pete Greig, founder of the 24-7 Prayer movement and senior pastor of Emmaus Rd, Guildford, UK\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“There are those rare books that every single waking person needs to immediately go read. This is that book. We’ve found no better conversation or a more much-needed antidote to our culture’s problem of busyness and hurry than John Mark’s words in this book. Beyond helpful and encouraging and insightful to us!”\u003cb\u003e—Alyssa and Jefferson Bethke, New York Times best-selling authors of \u003ci\u003eJesus \u0026gt; Religion\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eLove That Lasts\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“John Mark Comer has given a gift to the church. This book is prophetic, practical, and profoundly life giving. He confronts the idolatry of speed that is causing so much emotional and relational trauma, and he provides a way forward that creates hope, hunger, and a vision of a beautiful life. I consider this required reading.”\u003cb\u003e—Jon Tyson, lead pastor of the Church of the City New York and author of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Burden Is Light\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“John Mark Comer’s transparency invites us to reconsider how we live our lives by getting straight to the point: if we don’t eliminate our busyness, we just may eliminate our souls. The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ewill inspire you to make the hard but practical choices that will utterly change your trajectory for the better.”\u003cb\u003e—Gabe Lyons, president of Q Ideas and author of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eGood Faith\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Living as a spiritually and mentally healthy follower of Jesus in our technological, calendar-driven culture is, it turns out, quite difficult. In this book John Mark Comer shares his story of discovering a different way of life that’s inspired by the way and wisdom of Jesus. This is a practical, personal, and challenging call to imagine new ways that our lives can imitate Jesus.”\u003cb\u003e—Tim Mackie, cofounder of the Bible Project\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eJohn Mark Comer\u003c\/b\u003e is the founding pastor of Bridgetown Church in Portland, Oregon, a teacher and writer with Practicing the Way, and the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003ebestselling author of multiple books, including \u003ci\u003ePracticing the Way, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eLive No Lies\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cb\u003ePrologue: Autobiography of an epidemic\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt’s a Sunday night, 10:00 p.m. Head up against the glass of an Uber, too tired to even sit up straight. I taught six times today—yes, \u003ci\u003esix\u003c\/i\u003e. The church I pastor just added \u003ci\u003eanother \u003c\/i\u003egathering. That’s what you do, right? Make room for people? I made it until about talk number four; I don’t remember anything after that. I’m well beyond tired—emotionally, mentally, even spiritually.\u003cbr\u003eWhen we first went to six, I called up this megachurch pastor in California who’d been doing six for a while.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“How do you do it?” I asked.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Easy,” he said. “It’s just like running a marathon once a week.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Okay, thanks.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eClick.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWait . . . isn’t a marathon really hard?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI take up long-distance running.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe has an affair and drops out of church.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat does not bode well for my future.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHome now, late dinner. Can’t sleep; that dead-tired-but-wired feeling. Crack open a beer. On the couch, watching an obscure kung fu movie nobody’s ever heard of. Chinese, with subtitles.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKeanu Reeves is the bad guy. Love Keanu. I sigh; lately, I’m ending most nights this way, on the couch, long after the family has gone to bed. Never been remotely into kung fu before; it makes me nervous. Is this the harbinger of mental illness on the horizon?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“It all started when he got obsessed with indie marital arts movies . . .”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut the thing is, I feel like a ghost. Half alive, half dead. More numb than anything else; flat, one dimensional. Emotionally I live with an undercurrent of a nonstop anxiety that rarely goes away, and a tinge of sadness, but mostly I just feel blaaah, spiritually . . . empty. It’s like my soul is hollow.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy life is so \u003ci\u003efast\u003c\/i\u003e. And I like fast. I’m type A. Driven. A get-crap-done kind of guy. But we’re well past that now. I work six days a week, early to late, and it’s \u003ci\u003estill \u003c\/i\u003enot enough time to get it all done. Worse, I feel \u003ci\u003e hurried\u003c\/i\u003e. Like I’m tearing through each day, so busy with life that I’m missing out on the moment. And what is life but a series of moments?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnybody? I can’t be the only one . . . \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMonday morning. Up early. In a hurry to get to the office. Always in a hurry. Another day of meetings. I freaking hate meetings. I’m introverted and creative, and like most millennials I get bored way too easily. Me in a lot of meetings is a terrible idea for all involved. But our church grew really fast, and that’s part of the trouble. I hesitate to say this because, trust me, if anything, it’s embarrassing: we grew by over a thousand people a year for seven years straight. I thought this was what I wanted. I mean, a fast-growing church is every pastor’s dream. But some lessons are best learned the hard way: turns out, I don’t actually \u003ci\u003ewant\u003c\/i\u003e to be the CEO\/executive director of a nonprofit\/HR expert\/strategy guru\/leader of leaders of leaders, etc.\u003cbr\u003eI got into this thing to teach the way of Jesus.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIs \u003ci\u003ethis \u003c\/i\u003ethe way of Jesus?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSpeaking of Jesus, I have this terrifying thought lurking at the back of my mind. This nagging question of conscience that won’t go away.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eWho am I becoming?\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI just hit thirty (level three!), so I have a little time under my belt. Enough to chart a trajectory to plot the character arc of my life a few decades down the road.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI stop.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBreathe.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEnvision myself at forty. Fifty. Sixty.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt’s not pretty.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI see a man who is “successful,” but by all the wrong metrics: church size, book sales, speaking invites, social stats, etc., and the new American dream—your own Wikipedia page. In spite of all my talk about Jesus, I see a man who is emotionally unhealthy and spiritually shallow. I’m still in my marriage, but it’s duty, not delight. My kids want nothing to do with the church; she was the mistress of choice for dad, an illicit lover I ran to, to hide from the pain of my wound. I’m basically who I am today but older and worse: stressed out, on edge, quick to snap at the people I love most, unhappy, preaching a way of life that sounds better than it actually is.\u003cbr\u003eOh, and always in a \u003ci\u003ehurry\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhy am I in such a rush to become somebody I don’t even like?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt hits me like a freight train: in America you can be a success as a pastor and a failure as an apprentice of Jesus; you can gain a church and lose your soul.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI don’t want this to be my life . . . \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e* * *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFast-forward three months: flying home from London. Spent the week learning from my charismatic Anglican friends about life in the Spirit; it’s like a whole other dimension to reality that I’ve been missing out on. But with each mile east, I’m flying back to a life I dread.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe night before we left, this guy Ken prayed for me in his posh English accent; he had a word for me about coming to a fork in the road. One road was paved and led to a city with lights. Another was a dirt road into a forest; it led into the dark, into the unknown. I’m to take the unpaved road.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI have absolutely no idea what it means. But it means \u003ci\u003e something\u003c\/i\u003e, I know. As he said it, I felt my soul tremor under God. But what is God saying to me?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCatching up on email; planes are good for that. I’m behind, as usual. Bad news again; a number of staff are upset with me. I’m starting to question the whole megachurch thing. Not so much the size of a church but the \u003ci\u003eway \u003c\/i\u003eof doing church. Is this really it? A bunch of people coming to listen to a talk and then going back to their overbusy lives? But my questions come off angry and arrogant. I’m so emotionally unhealthy, I’m just leaking chemical waste over our poor staff.\u003cbr\u003eWhat’s that leadership axiom?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“As go the leaders, so goes the church.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDang, I sure hope our church doesn’t end up like me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSitting in aisle seat 21C, musing over how to answer another tense email, a virgin thought comes to the surface of my mind. Maybe it’s the thin atmosphere of thirty thousand feet, but I don’t think so. This thought has been trying to break out for months, if not years, but I’ve not let it. It’s too dangerous. Too much of a threat to the status quo. But the time has come for it to be uncaged, let loose in the wild.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHere it is: \u003ci\u003eWhat if I changed my life?\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e* * *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnother three months and a thousand hard conversations later, dragging every pastor and mentor and friend and family member into the vortex of the most important decision I’ve ever made, I’m sitting in an elder meeting. Dinner is over. It’s just me and our core leaders. This is the moment. From here on, my autobiography will fall into the “before” or “after” category.\u003cbr\u003eI say it: “I resign.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWell, not resign per se. I’m not quitting. We’re a multisite church. (As if one church isn’t more than enough for a guy like me to lead.) Our largest church is in the suburbs; I’ve spent the last ten years of my life there, but my heart’s always been in the city. All the way back to high school, I remember driving my ’77 Volkswagen Bus up and down Twenty-Third Street and dreaming of church planting downtown. Our church in the city is smaller. Much smaller. On \u003ci\u003eway \u003c\/i\u003eharder ground; urban Portland is a secular wonderland—all the cards are against you down here. But that’s where I feel the gravity of the Spirit weighing on me to touch down.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo not resign, more like demote myself. I want to lead one church at a time. Novel concept, right? My dream is to slow down, simplify my life around abiding. Walk to work. I want to reset the metrics for success, I say. I want to focus more on who I am becoming in apprenticeship to Jesus. Can I do that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey say yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e(Most likely they are thinking, \u003ci\u003eFinally\u003c\/i\u003e.)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePeople will talk; they always do: He couldn’t hack it (true). Wasn’t smart enough (not true).\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWasn’t tough enough (okay, mostly true). Or here’s one I will get for months: He’s turning his back on God’s call on his life. Wasting his gift in obscurity. Farewell.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLet them talk; I have new metrics now.","brand":"WaterBrook","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304483049701,"sku":"NP9780525653097","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780525653097.jpg?v=1767741303","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-ruthless-elimination-of-hurry-isbn-9780525653097","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}