John Newton & Amazing Grace

(found on page 649 of “Glory to God”, our new Presbyterian hymnal.)

John Newton was born in London July 24, 1725, and at age 7, his mother died. When he was 11, he went to sea with his father, making a total of 6 voyages with him before his father retired.

In 1744, Newton was impressed into service by the Royal navy. He deserted and was flogged and demoted. He was exchanged for service on a slave ship, was himself enslaved by the African tribal wife of a slave trader, and then finally rescued in 1748.  While at sea, a huge storm made him confront his fear and the faith his mother had tried to instill in childhood prevailed. Newton always considered May 10, 1748 as the day of his conversion to Christianity. He married in 1750.

He continued to ply the slave trade, making at least three more voyages until he suffered a seizure in 1755.  Between 1755 -1760, he worked in Liverpool as surveyor of tides.  He taught himself Greek and Hebrew and came to know George Whitefield, an evangelist preacher and leader of the Calvinistic Methodist church. He also met John Wesley during this period. Newton heard God’s call to ministry, but was denied permission to be ordained in the Church of England.  In 1764, he was finally ordained.

Sometime between 1760 and 1770, he wrote the now famous hymn, Amazing Grace. Newton along with his friend William Cowper, penned a number of hymns to aid in teaching and preaching. Together, they published the Olney Hymnal in 1779. As the evangelical movement grew in the 19th century, hymns were sometimes set to folk tunes which were simplified in harmony and style, allowing the message to be clearly heard, understood and remembered.

In 1780, Newton left Olney and became rector of St. Mary Woolnoth in London where he drew large crowds, among them William Wilburforce.  Wilburforce would tirelessly bring anti-slavery legislation to Parliament for many years before the practice was finally abolished.

Newton’s Amazing Grace grew in popularity, here in the United States more than in England, as camp meetings and lively church revivals became popular, especially in the American South.  Amazing Grace appeared in various hymnals during the early 1800’s: Southern Harmony, Columbian Harmony and others.  The hymn was set to tunes other than the one which has now captured our hearts.  Interestingly, the last verse (“when we’ve been there ten thousand years…”) was not actually written by Newton, but was added later.

In the 1960’s and 1970’s this hymn found an audience in popular culture when it was recorded by vocalists such as Mahalia Jackson and Judy Collins.  Amazing Grace stands as one of the most recorded songs of all time, in any musical genre.

Newton continued preaching late into his life, even after becoming blind. In 1807, he died and was buried in the vault of his church. This is his epitaph, in his own words:

JOHN NEWTON, Clerk
Once an infidel and libertine
A servant of slaves in Africa,
was, by the rich mercy
of our Lord and Saviour
JESUS CHRIST,
restored, pardoned and
appointed to preach
the Gospel which he had
long laboured to destroy.
He ministered,
near sixteen years in Olney, in Bucks,
and twenty eight years in this Church.