CAPTIVATED BY CHRIST:
Seeing Jesus clearly in the book of Colossians
By Richard Chin
Matthias Media. 143 pages. £9.99
ISBN 978 1 925 424 492
In this book, Australian pastor Richard Chin has converted a series of talks into seven chapters working their way through the entire text of Colossians. The result is effective. The chapters do indeed read like talks (rather than a commentary as such): the language is fresh and accessible, the illustrations engaging, the content well laid-out, the applications clear and to the point.
Technical matters (e.g. the nature/ existence of the so-called ‘Colossian heresy’) are generally avoided or, in the odd case, relegated to footnotes, so the flow of the text is uninterrupted. Every few pages a sidebar box appears to deal with a specific issue arising from the passage in Colossians or Chin’s comments on it – ‘Who are “the saints”?’ / ‘Spiritual warfare’ / ‘Five rules for social media’ / ‘What is forgiveness?’, etc.), and these are generally an interesting addition rather than a distraction.
Each chapter ends with suggestions for thanksgiving and prayer, plus some discussion questions for use in a group context if applicable. One chapter (covering the ‘household codes’ at the end of Colossians 3) ends with a helpful few pages written by Chin’s wife Jeanette on the subject of marriage from her perspective. At the end of the book the author issues The Colossians Memory Challenge, encouraging the reader to have a go at memorising the entire letter, (something I did myself a few years ago and would equally heartily recommend).
All in all, Chin’s exposition is typical of all that’s good about material like this from Mathias Media: it handles the text well, and is up-to-date, easy to read, Christ-exalting, and practically applied. It would work particularly well for new, or fairly new, believers who could do with a reliable, relevant and fairly brief introduction to Colossians.
For more mature believers it could well help to restoke any fires of devotion to Christ that might be presently dwindling. And although preachers of Colossians will also need weightier commentaries than this, many will find good fodder for application and illustration within its pages.
