John Mark Comer's The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry came out in 2019 and quickly became the book Christian leaders were quietly pressing into each other's hands. The diagnosis hit a nerve: hurry is not a side effect of a successful life, it is a spiritual condition that hollows out the soul. Comer pulled language from Dallas Willard, John Ortberg, and the Quaker tradition and built a case that the great enemy of love, joy, and peace in our generation is not Satan, it is pace. The book is short, the writing is direct, and the prescription is unsettling. Here is an honest review for the Christian man running a business.
The Premise
Comer's argument is built around a quote he attributes to Dallas Willard: the most pressing question of our lives is the question of pace. Comer takes that observation and runs it the full distance. Hurry, he argues, is incompatible with the life of Christ. Jesus walked everywhere, slept enough, took regular days off, prayed in solitude for hours, and refused to be rushed even when the urgent was screaming. The Christian who claims to follow Jesus while running at twice his pace is in a kind of practical contradiction with the master he claims to serve.
The book then offers four practices as the path back: silence and solitude, sabbath, simplicity, and slowing. None of these are new. Comer's contribution is the framing — these are not optional spiritual disciplines for monks; they are the survival tools for any modern Christian who wants his soul to last the decade. The book is short on technique and long on conviction. It is not a how-to manual. It is a confrontation. Comer is essentially telling the Christian leader: your pace is killing you, and it is killing the people you say you love, and there is no spiritual workaround for the speed at which you are currently living.
Where It's Strong
The diagnosis is correct, and the courage to name it is the book's greatest strength. Hurry is a cultural addiction so deeply baked into modern leadership that even raising the question feels disloyal. Comer raises it cleanly. He names what most readers already feel — that they are running at a pace their souls cannot sustain — and he gives them theological permission to push back. For many Christian leaders this is the first book that names the affliction without moralizing about it.
The chapter on sabbath is the strongest in the book. Comer treats sabbath not as a legalistic command but as a gift the Father designed into the architecture of human life. Twenty-four hours a week of stop, of feast, of worship, of doing nothing useful — not because productivity is bad but because man is more than his productivity. For the leader whose identity has fused with his output, the sabbath chapter is a slow re-education in being a son rather than a producer.
The book's third strength is its honesty about the author. Comer was the lead pastor of a large fast-growing church and was burning out. He shares the breakdown openly. The reader is not being preached at by a man who has it figured out; he is being walked alongside by a brother who hit the wall first and is sending back a warning. That posture earns the book a hearing it would not otherwise get.
Where It Falls Short
Three honest gaps. First, the book leans monastic in a way that can leave the marketplace leader without a clear application. Comer's frame of reference is heavily influenced by the contemplative tradition — Quakers, desert fathers, Willard, Foster, Nouwen. That tradition is rich, but it was largely shaped by men whose vocation was prayer. The Christian businessman whose vocation is leading a company, hitting a number, and feeding a family inherits a slightly different problem: he needs to learn to rest and still ship. Comer is strong on the rest. He is lighter on the ship.
Second, the book has a soft posture in places where a harder one would have served. The masculine reader sometimes wants to be told plainly: cut these three things, this week, by Friday. Comer prefers parable and prose. It is beautiful writing. It is also occasionally too gentle for the man whose foot is on the gas because he genuinely does not know how to take it off and needs explicit instruction more than another invitation.
Third, the book engages hurry but does not engage ambition. The two are related but distinct. A man can slow his pace and still be driven by an ambition that has nothing to do with the Father's calling. Comer's book will help the reader slow down. It will not on its own help him discern whether the thing he is slowing down to do is even the right thing. That work has to be done elsewhere — and the marketplace leader needs it done before the sabbath chapter will fully bite.
How to Read It as a Christian Leader
Four pieces of advice. One: read it slowly, fittingly. The book is short — about 250 pages — and you can race through it in a weekend. Don't. Read one chapter a week. Sit with it. Talk about it with your wife or your accountability brother. The book is medicine, but the medicine works on contact with stillness, not speed.
Two: install sabbath before you finish the book. Don't wait for the whole framework to land. Pick a 24-hour window this week — sundown Saturday to sundown Sunday is the historic Christian pattern — and stop. No work, no email, no productivity. Worship, feast, walk, read, sleep, be with family. One week of obedience teaches more than five rereadings of the chapter.
Three: pair it with a productive complement. Comer will pull you toward rest. You also need to ship. Read this book alongside something on intentional execution — the 10X Freedom Path framework, or even Cal Newport's Deep Work read with discernment. The Christian leader's goal is not just to slow down; it is to slow down enough to discern the calling and then move on it with strength.
Four: let it cost you something. Most readers nod through the diagnosis and then keep running. The book is only useful to the man who actually changes his calendar. If your week looks the same in three months, you read the book without obeying it. Obedience is the test of comprehension.
Stop managing. Start mastering.
Let's get to work.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry worth reading?
Yes — especially for Christian leaders who are running hard and feel the spiritual cost. The diagnosis is correct and the call to sabbath, silence, and slowing is grounded in solid Christian tradition. Pair it with a productive complement; the book is strong on rest and lighter on what the marketplace leader does Monday morning.
What are the four practices in Comer's book?
Silence and solitude, sabbath, simplicity, and slowing. Comer treats these not as monastic options but as survival practices for any Christian whose soul is being eroded by the pace of modern life. The sabbath chapter is the strongest. Install one practice at a time rather than trying to adopt all four at once.
Is John Mark Comer a reliable theological voice?
He writes in the broader evangelical and contemplative tradition and his theology of rest and pace is well-grounded. Like any author he should be read with discernment, especially on adjacent issues. On the core argument of this book — that hurry is incompatible with the life of Christ and sabbath is a gift — he is on solid ground.
How is this book different from a productivity book?
Productivity books typically optimize output. The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry argues that the modern Christian's problem is not insufficient output but ruined inner life, and the fix is not better systems but a different pace. Read alongside a productivity book, not instead of one — the Christian leader needs both rest and execution.