Category Archives: Critical Thinking

Critical Thinking, General living, Human interest, Profile

Running the good race

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I follow athletics more than the average person, I think. I can tell a rising prospect, a declining legend and an unexploited potential.

When I first saw Kiptum run at the London marathon, I knew he was special. It was only his second major marathon, and he was already the second fastest in history. In his first marathon in Valencia some months earlier, he had debuted under 2.02, the third fastest time, which was simply astonishing.

He went on to break the record in Chicago in his 3rd major race, at only 23. Who does that? Most marathoners, like Kipchoge, started on the track and transitioned to marathon in their late 20s.

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Apologetics, Book Review, Critical Thinking

Should you always follow your conscience?

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In the book ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’, something profound is said in Chapter 11 by Atticus, the father of the narrator of the story. The book is written from the perspective of Scout, a young girl who is 6 to 9 years old in the course of the book.

Atticus who is a lawyer has taken up a case to defend a black man who’s accused of raping a white girl. It’s a big deal in 1930s Alabama in a racially charged small town and the whole family suffers because of his decision. Scout and his brother Jem are constantly mocked in school, the neighbors call them names and the extended family is openly against it.

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Critical Thinking, General living

Twenty twenty one

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On December 1st 2021, I met a guy I have known for a few months. I asked him about a project he was working on that he had mentioned to me a few months earlier. He had no response. To put it better, he didn’t want to talk about it. The project was one of his many fails of 2021. He was just glad that it was December which means that the year is finally coming to an end. “I just want this year to end, everything I have tried to do this year has failed. I have never experienced a worser year like this,” he said, shaking his head as he thought of how his goals for the year were ruled out by a callous and invisible referee.

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Another Good Story, Critical Thinking, Human interest

Nancy’s Voice Part II

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In case you did not catch the first part Nancy’s story, you can find it HERE.

After the cyst was discovered in Nancy’s liver, talks about going to India to seek a second opinion began. Her son Allan wasn’t convinced that going to India was necessary.

“We had gotten the best doctors locally, and whatever they had done could not be corrected by any other doctor anywhere else in the world. I told my parents that I didn’t think there was any more value that the Indian doctors would add” Allan told me. Continue reading Nancy’s Voice Part II →

Apologetics, Critical Thinking

When Christians Lose to Pain and Suffering

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There is a prayer that prompts more questions than answers for me whenever I hear it. The prayer goes something like this ‘God we thank you for the gift of life, there are those who wished to be alive but are not’. Others would be about thanking God for health because there are those in hospital beds who are unwell or thanking God for waking up in the morning because there are others who did not wake up.

I believe that most people say these prayers from their hearts and not to exude an inflated sense of self-importance. It is said innocently, not putting much thought to the other side of the coin. But for some reason, I can’t help but think about that person who died, that person who was not able to wake up or the one who is sick. Does it mean that they are on the wrong side of God?

And then it makes me think about the different kinds of suffering that people go through in this world; accidents, natural disasters, wars, sickness and others. There are those who survive and those who Continue reading When Christians Lose to Pain and Suffering →

Critical Thinking, General living

The Complications of Moi’s Public Apology

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The Late President Moi’s legacy is a complicated one, split between the good, the bad and the ugly. On one hand you have a man who attended church religiously, openly loved children, gave them free school milk, built schools and universities and did much more recognizable good. On the other hand, you have a man whose government had a torture chamber, who exiled people, enriched his associates through corruption and land grabbing and more that I might not know about.

There are different levels of Interactions with Moi. There are those who suffered or benefited directly because of his actions. There are those who suffered or benefited courtesy of their family members’ good or bad experience with Moi. And then there is the rest of us, who were affected positively or negatively by his policies and whose perception of Moi was mainly carved by the media and other people’s experiences of him.

Clearly his presidency and personality had many faces.

And what are we supposed to say when such a man dies? How are Continue reading The Complications of Moi’s Public Apology →

Apologetics, Critical Thinking

How should Christians approach social good?

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Sometime in 2017 Rev. Wandii Rukorio, a missionary pastor who was based in Northern Kenya preached in our church. He talked of the great work that God was doing in Northern Kenya extending to South Sudan. It was quite interesting to hear about the intrigues and unique challenges of evangelizing to the ‘unreached people groups’ in that area and how God was working everything out.

But one statement stood out for me and I have been pondering over it ever since.

He said that he had purposed in his life that he would not do those things that the world can do.

He went on to talk about how people in South Sudan, when they heard that there was a missionary in their midst, came to him in a delegation, to let him know that they did not have a hospital, a school and good roads.

‘What else don’t you have?’ Rev Rukorio asked them. They Continue reading How should Christians approach social good? →

Critical Thinking, General living

Gospel musicians or musicians who sometimes sing gospel music

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Opinion is colossally divided about what we have come to know as ‘gospel music’. There is a big concern that most of the new school kind of gospel music is not really about the gospel. Many argue that it’s about performance, showbiz, fame and money. The old timers, especially in church are particularly disturbed, they don’t understand the ‘perversion of the sacred’ that is going on. Even people who vaguely understand Christianity have an opinion on this.

But I think we need to take a step back and think about the definitions, which is where we got it wrong in my opinion.

In all other professions people go about their business without being labelled Christian, gospel or secular except in music. There are no gospel lawyers, gospel teachers, gospel doctors, secular engineers or secular writers. But we have gospel musicians. Why? Continue reading Gospel musicians or musicians who sometimes sing gospel music →

Critical Thinking, General living

The fight against corruption is a moral one

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The fight against corruption in Kenya (and all over the world) is first and foremost a moral one. There is a legal and physical aspect to it, but morality is the most central question in all corruption cases. It is a fight between right and wrong, between darkness and the light.

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Critical Thinking

The older generation has failed us in the fight against corruption

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Corruption in Kenya has reached such levels that even the habitually corrupt are shocked. Let’s be honest, we Kenyans know corruption too well. It is a common practice, we encounter it all the time. It is the level of corruption rather than corruption itself that is now troubling us. Continue reading The older generation has failed us in the fight against corruption →