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Month: August 2020

The Danger of a Single Storybook with lights

The Danger of a Single Story

Published by andrewleewrites on August 24, 2020

I recently watched this highly inspiring TED talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a Nigerian author and speaker, who talks about “the danger of a single story.” Stories have the power to influence and to shape. Stories inform our beliefs and they also shape perception of the truth. A single story, therefore, twists and misaligns reality to that single perspective and lands us with stereotype or incomplete “half-truths.” She describes several of her experiences from childhood as anecdotal evidence: growing up reading American and British stories in Nigeria, she heavily internalized the contents of those stories as representative of ALL stories.

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Comparing Yourself to Othersstack of money

Comparing Yourself to Others

Published by andrewleewrites on August 18, 2020

There are lots of parables throughout the gospel of Matthew that explain the nature of the “kingdom of heaven.” The one that has been brought to the forefront of my mind recently is “The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard,” from Matthew 20. It reveals the error in our innate “human sensibilities.” And, it also helps demonstrate why living under God’s reign is both radical and freeing.

Let me begin by saying that I am always so tempted to compare myself to others. It seems to be instinctive human behavior. The only problem with this mentality—that’s not how God sees us.

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Church as Non-Transactional Familyblack payment terminal

Church as Non-Transactional Family

Published by andrewleewrites on August 11, 2020

I’ve been trying to read various different Christian books lately that are authored by people who are not white men. One of them is At Home In Exile, by Russell Jeung—Asian American Studies professor at SF State and incidentally, someone connected through the sister church that started my church, who has come to preach for us a couple of times. His book memoir details his narrative living in East Oakland’s “Murder Dubs” neighborhood, and finding solidarity and community with the Latino and Cambodian refugee families there. I found one particular passage particularly scintillating for me:

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God Cares About Changing Lawsjudgement scale and gavel in judge office

God Cares About Changing Laws

Published by andrewleewrites on August 3, 2020

Has anyone ever noticed that God cares about justice? As I’ve been reading through the first couple books of the bible again (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and now Deuteronomy), I’ve been noticing just how much of the text by sheer volume is dedicated to societal laws. When Yahweh, the God of Israel, calls Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt so that they might live a different way of life, in worship of him, he calls them to be a radically different society from the one they were just in.

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