Aboveallthings.org has moved
Published on June 16th, 2009.
If you are looking for content by Trent Hunter (the writer at aboveallthings), please visit http://www.trenthunter.net. Two years ago, a domain by my name would have felt pompous. Today, it feels like an email address. This is where I write. All of the posts and comments have been moved and the theme has been maintained at this new site.
Please bookmark this site and update your reader feeds and and links, as I am no longer blogging at this address.
See you around the corner!
~Trent Hunter
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Under Construction
Published on May 29th, 2009.
I gave at least two minutes to the title of this post, but this will have to do! I am now – and finally – in the process of reframing, rewiring and refocusing this blog.
In the process, I welcome you to join me in reflecting upon the following verses, from which the title and, I pray, the substance of this blog is derived:
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If “everyone is handed a Bible,” where are theirs?
Published on May 29th, 2009.
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Ehrman Interrupted
Published on April 12th, 2009.
| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Bart Ehrman | ||||
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“It’s the sears tower”
Published on March 20th, 2009.
Yes, the Sears Tower is getting a name change. I am sure there are good and fixed reasons why this is taking place, but this is tempting!
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America vs. Europe: Thinking about what Makes U.S. Special
Published on March 17th, 2009.
Intervals between posts are growing and growing. It’s a combination of life happening and the overwhelming volume of matters to think about and to think through. In addition, this blog was never meant to be a primarily political blog, but when the election season started, matters political were the only matters. In truth, good theology touches politics everywhere, but for this young student of culture, I would prefer to open my mouth less than more during a time of so much learning.
A time will come when I will rethink and refocus the purpose of this blog.
Until that time, I will continue to link periodically to articles that I find helpful and of interest to me personally without respect to any specific purpose other than to think Christianly about all of life. But even that goal gives me some pause, as I do not want to imply that everything I write about or article to which I point is a matter of essential Christian concern. Some issues are gospel issues and others are just important. I never want to confuse the two.
How to think about what is called the American Experiment is one of those important issues.
In his article, The Europe Syndrome and the Challenge to American Exceptionalism, Charles Murray makes the case that the American capitalistic tradition is better for human flourishing and happiness then the European socialistic model.
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Man calls 911 to complain about his Burger King order
Published on February 10th, 2009.
The regularity of my blogging has slowed down significantly. At the minimum, this site is meant as a filing cabinet for slices of life for use as illustrative material in future writing and preaching.
While I am doing much less writing than I would like, I simply must paste the entirety of this recent article from the Palm Beach Post,
Man calls 911 after Burger King runs out of lemonade
Saturday, February 07, 2009
BOYNTON BEACH — A man was charged with misusing 911 today for a midnight complaint that a Boynton Beach Burger King had run out of lemonade, police say.
Jean Fortune, 66, dialed 911 and told dispatchers he was “unhappy with his order” at the Burger King at 1521 W. Boynton Beach Blvd., according to an arrest report.
When a Boynton Beach police officer arrived, the cashier told him she had informed Fortune at the drive-thru that the store no longer served lemonade. He became angry when he picked up his order at the window and threatened to call police.
The cashier told him to “Go ahead.”
The officer noted in his report that Fortune could not explain why he resorted to calling 911 for a “civil dilemma.”
He was issued a notice to appear in court.
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CCM in 1987
Published on January 22nd, 2009.
Lord, help us to contextualize the gospel in a way that transcends our cultural moment. But regardless of how good or bad we are at this, let us never stop singing these words as those who aren’t ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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Praise for Change, Pray for Change
Published on January 20th, 2009.
These are our two responsibilities before God on this Inauguration day.
An hour from now, Barack Obama will be President of the United States. We have much to be thankful for in a peaceful transition of power. As history can testify, humans are capable of dramatic and dangerous changes in power. But while the ordering of this “change” is peaceful, underneath the surface of today’s events is a terrible violence. It is ironic that President Elect Obama, an icon of human and civil justice as the first African American president, is also a champion of injustice against the unborn members of our race. This is an irony famous to all of us who are both made in God’s image but who are fallen sinners in rebellion against our Creator.
Our nations sickness in its approval of abortion, I pray, will be an embarrassment of our nation’s history. Today, of all days, is a reminder that we can change our mind. Today is a reminder that we are capable of embarrassment over our own nation’s history.
The following two links express well the heart of and concern of those who know and follow Christ. Let us engage as citizens with the clarity and spirit of this letter, and let us pray with the fervency, theological conviction and creaturely-dependence of this prayer.
An open letter from Ron Jones, pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church, just blocks from the White House.
A prayer for Obama by Dr. Albert Mohler, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
Today, President Elect Obama sing the words ofGod, Our Help in Ages Past, in the tradition initiated by President Roosevelt in 1941. These words will help facilitate our own prayers for our president and our nation.
O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.Under the shadow of Thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is Thine arm alone,
And our defence is sure.Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting Thou art God,
To endless years the same.Thy Word commands our flesh to dust,
Return, ye sons of men:
All nations rose from earth at first,
And turn to earth again.A thousand ages in Thy sight
Are like an evening gone;
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.The busy tribes of flesh and blood,
With all their lives and cares,
Are carried downwards by the flood,
And lost in following years.Time, like an ever rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.Like flowery fields the nations stand
Pleased with the morning light;
The flowers beneath the mower’s hand
Lie withering ere ‘tis night.Our God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be Thou our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.
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When is a person a person?
Published on January 7th, 2009.
According to New York News, police are searching a garbage dump in New Jersey for a baby that was thrown out with the trash. According to his mother, Basher Moyd passed away twenty minutes after he was born. The Hospital stays that the baby was stillborn.
Twenty minutes. What’s the difference? The difference, under New Jersey law, is whether or not this baby was a person or not. If the child was born alive, then he is a person. If the child was stillborn, then he is not a person.
The story does not play out the entailments of the personhood of the baby. I take it that there is a significantly greater interest for the state and the hospital in the discovery of the child if he was stillborn.
Personhood, in the context of the law, indicates the moral significance of a humanbeing. In the eyes of New Jersey law, human beings become important and gain dignity and rights as persons when they leave the womb. In this case, personhood is determined by environment and degree of dependency. Of course, the child is far from independent when he leaves the womb.
I don’t think the mother would recognize that distinction whether her son was stillborn or not.
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