Austenn Akers

“In our own contemporary context of the rat race of anxiety, the celebration of Sabbath is an act of both resistance and alternative. It is resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lives are not defined by the production and consumption of commodity goods.”
― Walter Brueggemann, Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now

“Spiritual formation in Christ moves toward a total interchange of our ideas and images for his.”
― Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart: Putting On the Character of Christ

“Because what you give your attention to is the person you become. Put another way: the mind is the portal to the soul, and what you fill your mind with will shape the trajectory of your character. In the end, your life is no more than the sum of what you gave your attention to. That bodes well for those apprentices of Jesus who give the bulk of their attention to him and to all that is good, beautiful, and true in his world. But not for those who give their attention to the 24-7 news cycle of outrage and anxiety and emotion-charged drama or the nonstop feed of celebrity gossip, titillation, and cultural drivel. (As if we “give” it in the first place; much of it is stolen by a clever algorithm out to monetize our precious attention.) But again: we become what we give our attention to, for better or worse.”
― John Mark Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry: How to stay emotionally healthy and spiritually alive in the chaos of the modern world

“The beginning and the end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others.”
― Henri J.M. Nouwen, The Wounded Healer: Ministry in Contemporary Society