PastorHacks

Creativist reviews Evernote for iPhone

You really need to check out Evernote. The ability to capture pages, thoughts, paragraphs is amazing. not to mention the outstanding mobil access/ With the advent of iPhone 2.0 (cue symphonic swells...), and the Evernot App from the App Store, Evernote is even handier. I dig it. 

John at Creativist is pretty positive, but gives us some critical thoughts as well..

I’m deeply committed to Yojimbo, but I’ve been flirting with Evernote for about three months now. Last week, Evernote rolled out a beautiful new iPhone app with the launch of the app store. Here are a few early impressions of the iPhone app:

• It looks fantastic. It is fun to look at, and easy to understand.
• It is the perfect app to capture ideas as it will seamlessly allow the user to capture an image, a note, or even an audio reminder.
• The interface for viewing your notes isn’t as fun to look at. Text maintains the same formatting and linebreaks as the desktop version, so it doesn’t flow with the small screen. You can zoom in, but then you have to scroll side to side. Granted, it is a beautiful thing to have access to all my notes on the iPhone, but I’d like for them to be a little easier to read and navigate.
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• Read the rest of the review here
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Notes...

How to take notes...

The Cornell System: The Cornell System is a simple but powerful system for increasing your recall and the usefulness of your notes. About a quarter of the way from the bottom of a sheet of paper, draw a line across the width of the page. Draw another line from that line to the top, about 2 inches (5 cm) from the right-hand edge of the sheet. You’ve divided your page into three sections. In the largest section, you take notes normally — you can outline or mind-map or whatever. After the lecture, write a series of “cues” into the skinny column on the right, questions about the material you’ve just taken notes on. This will help you process the information from the lecture or reading, as well as providing a handy study tool when exams come along: simply cover the main section and try to answer the questions. In the bottom section, you write a short, 2-3 line summary in your own words of the material you’ve covered. Again, this helps you process the information by forcing you to use it in a new way; it also provides a useful reference when you’re trying to find something in your notes later. You can download instructions and templates from American Digest, though the beauty of the system is you can dash off a template “on the fly”.

Does taking notes matter?

Don't you love those people who sit down front every week with their notebooks/Moleskines and take notes while you are preaching?
Yeah- we all start this at some point, and then, when we realize that we never read those notes again, eventually quit...

But.

Is it possible that taking notes in class, during a lecture or conversation or sermon makes a difference even if you never look at them again?

Yup.

"When we listen to a lecture, the part of our brain that handles listening and language is engaged. This passes some information on to our memory, but doesn’t seem to be very discriminating in how it does this. So crucial information is treated exactly the same way that trivia is treated.

When we take notes, though, something happens. As we’re writing, we create spatial relations between the various bits of information we are recording. Spatial tasks are handled by another part of the brain, and the act of linking the verbal information with the spatial relationship seems to filter out the less relevant or important information.

So here’s what happens: in one psychological test involving students watching a lecture on psychology (psychologists who work in academia have a virtually unlimited supply of research subjects — their students!) students who did not take notes remembered the same number of points as the students who did take notes. That is, the mere act of taking notes did not increase the amount of stuff they memorized. Both groups of students remembered around 40% of the information covered in the lecture (which as a professor makes me sad, but I guess that’s the way humans work). But the students who had taken notes remembered a higher proportion of key facts, while those who did not take notes remembered a more or less random assortment of points covered in the lecture.

What this and other tests suggest is that when we write — before we write, although indistinguishably so — we are putting some degree of thought into evaluating and ordering the information that we are receiving. That process, and not the notes themselves, is what helps fix ideas more firmly in our minds, leading to greater recall down the line."

Read the rest here

Patristics for Busy Pastors

From Justin Taylor...

"Tony Reinke recently interviewed Ligon Duncan (MP3 [14.4 MB]) on patristics. Here's an outline of the questions (with time markers):
[00:00] – Intro

[01:30] – Define for us patristics or patrology.

[04:28] – Why should busy pastors read patristic literature in the first place?

[09:29] – What hurdles do pastors face in reading and benefiting from patristic writings?

[14:13] – For the busy pastor, recommend a few specific patristic titles covering history, biography, and primary sources.

[26:52] – What contemporary debates reflect controversies addressed by the patristic authors?

[32:00] – Our culture appears to be growing increasingly secular. If it's true that secularism is on the rise, what can we learn from the church fathers on engaging a “pagan” culture?

[36:06] – In patristic literature, a reader will be faced with thoughts or practices of the early church fathers that were incorrect. What concerns do you have for a pastor getting his feet wet in the patristic writings?

[41:46] – Would you agree that in patristic writings we see a stress on ethics over and above the gospel?

[45:08] – Dr. Duncan, you are a gifted patristic scholar and have been pastoring at First Presbyterian in Jackson for over twelve years now, preaching on a regular basis. How do your preaching and pastoral ministry reflect the impact of patristic authors?"

PastorHacks podcast at LeadershipBuzz.com!

I'm excited to announce the PastorHacks podcast at LeadershipBuzz.com.

LeadershipBuzz is meant to be a resource for church leaders- podcasts from practitioners giving short, practical messages on various issues facing church leaders today...

You can listen online, or join to download-

hosts include Len Sweet, Shane Hipps, Brian McLaren, Ivy Beckwith and Bob Hyatt (uh... me!). And a bunch more too.

From the site...

1. Your Heart and Brain Will Buzz. 

 

Conference-level training from some of the best and the brightest in ministry leadership. We’ll stretch your thinking, challenge your heart, and occasionally even mail you a fruitcake. (We have a ton of them left over from Christmases past. Literally a ton.)

 

 

2. Your iPod Runneth Over. 

 

20 fresh episodes a week designed to help you do ministry better. Plus, over a year’s worth of content from our archives available as soon as you join. Please . . . Hold your applause. Just kidding! Applaud all you want. You know you want to.

 

 

3. Shiny, Happy Tools. 

 

Two words about our content: Practical. Listen in the morning. Apply in the afternoon. Sleep well at night. Repeat.

 

 

4. Learn Whenever, Wherever. 

 

Listen online, download files directly to your computer or subscribe to a podcast feed. You decide how and when you want to plug in.

Check it out!

regreek

ReGreek is a pretty slick, pretty simple Bible resource from our good buddies at Resurgence. I especially dig the side by side greek/english capability.

Available English translations are ESV, NASB and KJV. I know other translations would cost them, and  I think philosophically they are going to stay away from the one I preach out of, (The NLT, second ed.), but all in all, very helpful.

Check it out

YouVersion

Via Stephen Shields...

Bobby Gruenewald:  “Six weeks ago, we announced our plans to build YouVersion , an online tool that allows people to connect media and web content with specific verses of the Bible.  We have been amazed at the initial interest and response that we have received so far.  We also thank all of you who have expressed an interest in participating or helping.Since the announcement, our Digerati Team has been working diligently to develop YouVersion.  Today, we are excited to announce that we have just released the Alpha test of YouVersion to a limited group of participants.”

- read more here.

Using Keyboard shortcuts to save time..

If you are not learning new keyboard shortcuts all the time, you are wasting time all the time...

Here's a handy list for Mac, and another

(My faves? cmnd+shift+right or left arrow to cycle through open tabs and cmnd+tab (hold it down for a sec) to cycle through open apps)

And for Windows...

Wikipedia Dashboard Widget

Wikipedia on your Desktop via Apple's Dashboard. Very cool...