High Capacity Leaders, Church Growth, and Productivity Culture

How mono-tasking has changed my pace of living, spiritual growth, and mental health

Newport Beach, CA - Photo by: Young Yi

Mammon Loves High Capacity Leaders

I won’t lie, a little bit of this desire to be a “high capacity leader” still exists in me. You know, that type of leader who lives, breathes, and injects the task-lists into their veins. That type of church leader who could easily be mistaken for a Silicon Valley tech bro or a Wallstreet stock market evangelist. This is that type of leader who has to get everything done while wearing what seems like twenty different hats.

A part of me still desires to be this type of leader because it is heralded so much as a virtue in the evangelical space. If you aren’t a “high capacity leader”, it seems to communicate that you are a sub-par leader and can’t hang out with the big boys and girls. But if you are, you can wear it as a badge of honor. In this world of high-capacity leaders, truth be told, there is much of the flesh (ego and pride) wrapped around that niche, and honestly for me, as the kids say nowadays, it gives me the “ick”. Lol.

This type of leader is so valued in the evangelical space because in order to lead a church that can reach far and wide, you need a “high capacity” guy or gal. And it’s at this intersection where church growth and productivity culture exists.

Between you and me, I still go back-and-forth on the morality of church growth and the metrics we use to measure them, along with the motives and intentions church leaders have when they strive to have a boom in their church’s attendance. Jesus spoke of Mammon in the New Testament and though I am an advocate of capitalism to some degree, I also believe Mammon has shown his ugly face within the Church through said capitalism. To try and ignore how capitalism has seeped its way into the American Church would be akin to denying how water has seeped its way into a sinking ship - you’d be crazy to say otherwise. That’s why I say there is a moral aspect to church growth because our motives and intentions can be captured by Mammon and for our own glory, ego, and pride. Evangelicals are notorious for this, no matter how many times we say, “all the glory goes to God.”

Stop lying - we want some of that glory too.

You Can’t Task Manage Your Way Out of Burnout

In the church growth space, it is the “high capacity leader”, who because of this trait, is most susceptible to this slippery slope. Personally, I don’t know if I am a “high capacity leader” anymore. (I think I used to be? I don’t know, it’s weird.) At one point early in my very infant ministry career, I recall handling tasks left and right. I had acquired administrative skills over a few years of ministry and checking off to-do items was like a drug for me. But I ultimately burned out, like most young leaders do when “high capacity” meets a wall. For me, that metaphorical wall was my marriage, mental health, and personal image in the ministry space.

There was no “high capacity” way to guide me during my season of burnout. Overcoming ministry burnout was not something I could just easily tick-off like how I had been doing for a few years with all the tasks that come with working in ministry. It took time, effort, a lot less multi-tasking, and a lot more mono-tasking.¹ I had to focus on one thing at a time: sometimes it was a time of sabbath with the Lord, and for other times, focusing on my marriage. Ironically multi-tasking and tapping into this “high capacity leader” within me wasn’t going to help because I would find myself back to square one. It was reeling things back, slowing down, finding intention in my decisions that was foundational to undoing burnout.

Finding Freedom With Mono-tasking

The human brain and perhaps even our souls, were never designed for multi-tasking … at least the lengths we can multitask now.² And the amount of burnout we see at least tells me humans aren’t “evolving” toward being multi-tasking creatures. If anything, we are digressing.

Mental health issues are rampant.
In recent years, burnout among pastors was at one point an all-time high.³
Money and social media clout became more of a god than we could ever imagine.
Family and relationships became secondary.
All of this for the sake of getting more done in the same or shorter amount of time.

At the end of the day, I ask this question, “was it worth it?”
I think many of us would say, “no, not at all.”

Mono-tasking has been a gift to me as of late.

If I’m making food, then I focus on making food.
If I’m making a pour over, then I focus on making a delicious cup of coffee.
If I’m writing, then I focus my attention on writing.

You get what I’m saying.

When I look at the life of Christ, I observe a life full of mono-tasking. I’m sure there were moments when Jesus had to handle multiple things at once, but when I see Him sitting down with people, eating with others, performing one miracle after another, it is a singular act He embarks on. The pace of Jesus was not just slow, but intentional, and intentional acts can lead to such beautiful moments in life.

Multi-tasking, at least in my experience, muddies the waters of intentionality. Our attentions are divided and at least for me, I tend to fumble the reigns when I have to hold on to too many of them. Fumbling the reigns leads to stress and stress I carry back home, and there are people I love back at home who now have to deal with my inability to navigate said stress. It just all goes to hell … eventually.

Mono-tasking has been a gift to me because it slows me down. “Slow” is the only speed within this system. The goal of mono-tasking helps me to focus on what is essential in the moment. It helps me to not grasp for more than what my mind can handle. It forces me to appreciate my limits and in this case, I have embraced time as my limit. Surprisingly, I’ve felt much freedom with embracing this limit; it’s kept me sane the last few weeks and months. Mono-tasking is simple. Not necessarily minimalist in nature, but essentialist. It focuses on the singular task in front of the person, and maybe one or two additional tasks at best, but they are all related with one other. My attention is not divided, but narrowed and focused, and the water of intentionality is crystal clear. Again, intentional acts can lead to such beautiful moments in life.

A Solution To Ministry Burnout Culture?

This ended up being a much longer post than I originally intended. I listen to a lot of podcasts and read a lot of posts about the American Church and often times, I weep for her because I still believe in the Church, Christ’s Bride. The Church is Biblically and statistically the best way to have the light of Christ shine in our communities and cities. I am all in for the local and global Church. But when we have pastors, ministers, and leaders burning out left-and-right, all our efforts become thwarted by the enemy. Often times as I read these articles and listen in on these conversations, the question gets brought up, “how do we prevent burnout?” And I hear brilliant answers, talking about sabbath, solitude, and finding healthy rhythms. But I also always find myself waiting to hear someone respond with saying how we might have gotten this whole church growth, productivity and multi-tasking culture thing wrong. We’ve created systems to triage and treat ministry burnout when it happens instead of creating systems and spaces where ministry burnout cannot and will not happen (yes, I am an optimist on this topic).

For me, that solution is going back to mono-tasking.
Moving slower.
Moving with intention.
Moving with purpose and meaning.

Mono-tasking doesn’t mean we move at a snails pace, just slower.
Slower than the speed we’re all going right now. Because, reality check! We don’t have to go with the flow of traffic, especially if we can already see the flow of traffic leads to spinning out and crashing into one another.
Mono-tasking means we can focus on what’s in front of us - one thing at a time, one person at a time - all at variable speeds, without risking our humanity to go up in flames.

And through mono-tasking, I hope we find a renewed pace of living that leads to a more stable and healthier spiritual life following our mono-tasking Lord, Jesus Christ.

1. https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/the-art-of-monotasking

2. https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/1753326.1753340

3. https://www.barna.com/research/pastors-quitting-ministry/