Author: Nathan Campbell

Nathan runs St Eutychus. He loves Jesus. His wife. His daughter. His son. His other daughter. His dog. Coffee. And the Internet. He is the pastor of City South Presbyterian Church, a church in Brisbane, a graduate of Queensland Theological College (M. Div) and the Queensland University of Technology (B. Journ). He spent a significant portion of his pre-ministry-as-a-full-time-job life working in Public Relations, and now loves promoting Jesus in Brisbane and online. He can't believe how great it is that people pay him to talk and think about Jesus. If you'd like to support his writing financially you can do that by giving to his church.

How I find this rubbish (and the time to post it)

A lot of readers – both casual readers who I know in real life, and fellow bloggers, have made comments on my seemingly inhuman ability to track down the stupid stuff I post here. And almost as many wonder how I find the time.

I have been umming and ahhing about sharing my “secret” with the world. But today, Jeff, speculated that I have invented some sort of time travelling device just so that I can surf the Internet.

It’s time to come clean. Here’s the method to my madness.

  1. I try to write one or two substantive posts a day in my main page part – and I try to cover off each category in a week (including a little bit of whatever is going on around me in day to day life. These bits are easy. I don’t have to go looking.
  2. I subscribe to a bunch of blogs in each category I write about (I have 349 subscriptions in Google Reader).
  3. Each morning I skim through them as quickly as I can – there are usually about 600 posts when I log in before heading off to work. I read all the posts by people in full, skim the gadgets, bookmarking aggregators and the “how to” blogs I subscribe to looking for eligible blog fodder.
  4. When I see a post I like, that I don’t want to rewrite substantively, I share it.
  5. When I see something I want to post I “star” it.
  6. When I have a spare moment I go through my starred pile and post them. Posts in the curiosities column take me about five minutes. I have 207 posts in the queue. You can see what’s “coming up” on my Starred Items page.
  7. I visit the blogs of people who comment regularly, or who I know, and keep up with discussions because you never know when someone’s going to say something blogworthy.

During work hours I’ll keep my Google Reader open for down time, I have my gmail open all day (and get emails when people comment), and I keep Windows Live Writer open to work on the longer posts when I’m on the phone or waiting for a meeting.

September 7, 2009

A wee little man

There are pointless USB devices and then there are USB devices created by Japanese USB company Thanko.

Thanko will never be devoid of USB ideas because they’ve veered well and truly away from the path of the practical and into the realms of the completely bizarre.

And so, in this tradition, I give you this urinating USB fountain – complete with a one litre water tank (a significant portion of your recommended daily water intake).

Do with it what you will. I suggest you don’t buy it. But if you want to you can go here.

I found this here.

September 7, 2009

My (not yet) famous Spag Bol

I’ve now been tagged in two memes. I’m a good sport when it comes to such things. So thanks Ali. I will use this opportunity to once again share one of my recipes with the world.

According to the rules of this “meme” I’m to pick an ingredient from Ali’s recipe and share a recipe that uses the ingredient. Luckily there are a few ingredients to choose from… I’m going to go with butter. Because that rules almost nothing out. And I’m going to share my recipe for spaghetti bolognese. It’s not quite a “from scratch” special – I could, given the inclination, probably use fresh tomatoes. But I haven’t yet. And I like this one a fair bit…

What you’ll need (I normally do a big batch of this because it’s just as good the next day, and the next, etc.):

Ingredients
(some quantities are estimates)

  • Spaghetti
  • 1kg Mince
  • 1 big tin of Heinz Tomato Soup (500ml)
  • 1 big tin of crushed/diced tomatoes
  • 1 jar of sun dried tomatoes
  • Lots of mushrooms
  • A carrot (grated)
  • 2 medium sized onions
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • Assorted herbs and spices (of an Italian bent)
  • 100ml of cream
  • Enough butter to lubricate the saucepan/wok, and nicely brown the onions and garlic

What to do

  1. Slice the onion, crush one clove of garlic, cook on medium to high heat with the butter.
  2. When the onion starts browning, add the mushrooms.
  3. Add the mince.
  4. When the mince starts to brown add the sun dried tomatoes (I normally add a little bit of the oil from the sun dried tomato jar/container too. Stir them through.
  5. Add the tinned tomato and tomato soup – tomato soup is great because it has a rich, slightly salty flavour. This mix is, in my opinion, better than any pasta sauce on the market.
  6. Cook your spaghetti while letting the bolognese simmer.
  7. Add the carrot.
  8. Add the cream, stir through, the sauce should be a goldy colour.
  9. Crush your other garlic clove and stir it through the bolognese. Add your herbs based on taste and personal preference.
  10. Your spaghetti should be ready soon – throw a piece at the wall to see if it sticks (remove any water from the spaghetti strand first).

Serve in a bowl with cheese.

The end.

I tag whichever four of you volunteer first.

We’ll probably be doing this with our cooking friend this week – let me know if you’ve got ideas for ingredients that I might not have considered.

September 7, 2009

The camp camp

I’m sorry. I feel compelled to put finger to keyboard to comment on a social phenomena probably best left to Ben.

I can no long stay silent on this topic. It’s divisive. It’s controversial.

I think my gaydar is broken. It used to be well honed because gay men had an air of difference about the way they presented themselves. They were more articulate, more likely to wear shirts with plunging necklines, and more likely to wear tight pants.

Over the weekend (which we spent in Brisbane for the Rugby and some impromptu father’s day meals) I could have used these descriptors on 90% of the men I cam across. Statistically this figure should have been much lower. Even in the valley.

What’s going on? This can’t really be any good for either camp. Neither the camp camp, nor the straight camp benefits from this fashion osmosis.

It reminds me of the time I walked into City Beach and couldn’t tell which clothes were for men and which ones were for women. But that’s another story.

I’m just saying…

September 7, 2009

More on pragmatism

Mark Baddely on Pragmatism after a comment from Tony Payne on this Solapanel post…

“But a church or Christian who engages in life apart from the knowledge of God and ourselves that the Word gives us will also go nowhere. A pragmatism that abstracts ends from the gospel, and then sees the getting of those ends as a practical, and not theological, matter can’t be the process for growth in the knowledge of God either.”

I think the problem people are suggesting with pragmatism is academic rather than practical. Tony’s comment is perhaps echoing my thinking…

“It seems to me that as I observe those pastors and/or churches that I really admire, they have this constant running interplay between theological principle and smart practice. On the one hand, they are always being driven by the Bible and the gospel and the ‘strategies’ that God himself lays down in Scripture (knowledge of God), and they recognize their utter dependency on these. But on the other hand they keep noticing things about themselves and people and the way church and ministry ‘works’, and adjusting their practice accordingly (knowledge of ourselves). And the two aren’t separate, non-overlapping magisteria. The knowledge of God feeds into and informs the the understanding of people and how they tick, and the understanding of people and how they tick seems only to reinforce and foster more growth in the knowledge of God.”

September 6, 2009

Subtitled hymns

I post this without editorial, for your viewing pleasure.

Actually, I posted it without seeing the thumbnail frame. It’s a bit rude. Here’s the link to the video.

Here’s a new fangled version…

September 5, 2009

All the trappings

The humble mouse trap has not really evolved in my lifetime – despite the complexity offered by the Rube Goldbergesque “Mouse Trap” board game.

This designer, Sarah Dery, obviously got sick of picking up dead mice…

September 4, 2009

Be a blockhead


Tetris makes you smarter. Which makes Robyn the smartest of all my Facebook friends.

This is a scientifically proven fact (well, almost) backed up by proper medical research… Here’s the study.

Here’s the summary from wired…

“The study, funded by Tetris‘ makers and authored by investigators at the Mind Research Network in New Mexico, shows that playing the classic puzzle game had two distinct effects on the brains of research subjects: Some areas in the brain showed greater efficiency (the blue areas in the diagram above), and different areas showed thicker cortexes, which is a sign of more grey matter (red).”

September 4, 2009

Super Mario Art

I’ve probably used this heading before. But it seems fitting. You can generate your own Mario ending sequence here. They come out a little something like this:

September 4, 2009

Is pragmatism a dirty word?

It seems pragmatism is on the nose. I’ve read a few posts around the Christian blogosphere that bag out a “pragmatic” approach to ministry.

Why is this? Am I missing something? I would have thought a ministry based on the ability to know and proclaim an absolute truth, where the methodology of communication is based roughly on “that which works” was both right and Biblical – those would seem to be key areas of the pragmatic school of thought – and yet, we seem to be so keen for our ministries not to be ego boosting that we’re fleeing the notion of pragmatism having a bearing on what we do.

Didn’t God give us the innate ability to strategise, plan for the future, and gifts to equip us for ministry. Shouldn’t we work with these gifts in a way that maximises our return (while being faithful to other imperatives – like not being proud etc). Does pragmatism necessarily lead to people planting churches with big screen video links?

This whole anti-pragmatism thing is strange to me. Perhaps I’m getting the wrong end of the stick… your thoughts? 

September 4, 2009

The union war

K-Rudd has declared an end to the History Wars that crippling battle for supremacy between Australia’s academic elite… but there’s one philosophical battle between the elite and the working class that will not be ended by Prime Ministerial decree…

We’re flying to Brisbane this weekend. We’re heading south for a Rugby match. Of all the things to head south for… I don’t really like Rugby. But Robyn does. So we’re going to watch Australia play South Africa.

Robyn really likes Rugby. She owns a number of jerseys and actually understands the rules enough to yell at the ref about an infringement before he gives a penalty. This is what marriage is about.

But, so that my protest is recorded for posterities sake – here are three areas where Rugby League is clearly the superior game…

  1. Pointscoring – the union point scoring matrix is messed up. It discourages attacking play. Union can not hope to be a spectacle while a penalty goal is worth more than half an unconverted try. There is no incentive to chance your arm for a try when you can do half the work and score more than half the points. Drop goals are also significantly overvalued. If Union swallowed its pride and adopted League’s point scoring methodology attack would be suitably rewarded.
  2. Penalties – Penalty goals are only such an issue because penalties are so common. Seriously. Is there anything in Union that you’re actually allowed to do? Every time the ref watches the play closely he blows his whistle and the team in possession boots the ball between the posts.
  3. Scrums – The claim by Union fans that I find most risible is that their scrums are superior to those used in League. Contested, yes, superior, no. 98% of scrums contested in a Union test are packed more than once, 65% result in penalties. 12% result in wins against the feed (I made these stats up). They’re just as pointless as the scrums in league – it’s like a coin toss to see whether the attacking side gets a penalty or has to stand around in a hemorrhoid inducing group hug.

But I’m a good husband. So I’ll go along without pointing out too many of these areas.

September 4, 2009

Argument with argument

I have a bone to pick with logic. I am sick to death of putting forward great arguments backed by examples and employing a suitable amount of pathos only to be ignored because I’ve broken one of the codified rules of “logical argument”.

I have news for you Messrs Logic and Reason – nobody cares if you think I’m arguing with a “straw man” or producing some sort of syllogismic fallacy. Nobody cares if you hate analogies so much that the very presence of one as a piece of supporting evidence is enough for you to completely ignore the material at hand and instead dish out a lecture on what are essentially the “Queensbury Rules” of discourse. Nobody likes the Queensbury rules. They’re for losers who can’t fight with all the tools at their disposal.

Perhaps my line of reasoning is a straw man – but your job isn’t to point out that this invalidates my argument, it’s to correct my thinking. Perhaps my analogy isn’t perfect. Few are. A perfect analogy is like a rare pearl – hard to find and expensive.

When did the style of a debate become more important than the substance?

September 4, 2009

Visible Holiness

I mentioned my theory of the “Holiness Shelf” back when I had about ten readers (but curiously could attract 31 comments on a trivial post).

The Holiness Shelf is a dedicated space on a public bookshelf. Typically at eye level. The idea is that people judge you by the books in your collection, and your music and DVDs. If the first thing they see is overwhelming holiness manifested in your well thumbed “Gospel and Kingdom” or “The Cross of Christ” they’ll judge you positively.

It’s a tactic I recommended to many single guys, while I was myself single. I’m not sure it works.

Ali makes a good point in this post that people are now judged by their online presence. Facebook has replaced the bookshelf. Which is why it’s important to list good bands and intelligent books in your Facebook profile (I’ll post a list of impressive books for your profile later). Christians are pretty bad at judging each other on the basis of faith and holiness too – so the availability of information like what books, movies and music you like opens you up to all sorts of questions from others. Should I tell everybody that my favourite movies are Fight Club and the Godfather (both R rated)? Or should I pretend I love the Passion of the Christ (which I’ve never seen), and Amazing Grace (which I did like)?

The personal “brand” we build online opens us up in a new way to Christians who may or may not be weaker brothers, and may or may not be the judgemental type who emphasise the “not of the world” part of “in the world, but not of it”. This raises questions about what you should and shouldn’t blog about if you’re bloggingly inclined. You should read Ali’s post, and join the discussion there.

I post just about anything. I’m not sure I’d want people making an assessment of my holiness on the basis of that which appears in the right hand column of this page. Especially the bits about toilet paper.

I don’t want to be more discerning about what I blog about, it would take away half the fun. But nor do I want to be judged solely on what I blog about.

September 3, 2009

Cereal Offender

I love cereal. I eat it all the time. I think that cereal companies should be most upset that they’ve been pigeon-holed as “breakfast cereal”.

I don’t think trivial rebrands solve any problems, so I don’t understand the NRL’s pitch to change their logo in order to resurrect its credibility.

If a lobby group consisting of Kellogs, Sanitarium and other major cereal players was to form in a bid to rebrand their products as all day things I would totally understand that sort of thing. And support it.

I am eating a bowl of Fruit Loops as I write this.

That is all. 

September 3, 2009

When to make unpopular decisions

John Howard has re-entered the political fray – and probably done more bolster Rudd’s leadership than to aid his former parliamentary colleagues. He’s commended Rudd on a couple of points – and made this interesting comment, which I think probably applies to starting at a new church too…

From the SMH.

The time for unpopular or difficult reforms should always be in the first term for new prime ministers, who tended to be cut a lot of slack by the public.

When you’ve been there two years, you haven’t done anything that’s the least bit unfriendly – jeez, it gets hard in the third year.

September 3, 2009