Slave Ship, Pulpit, Pen
My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things: that I am a great sinner and that Christ is a great Savior.
John Newton, spoken shortly before he died, recorded by William Jay in his autobiography
For the first three decades of his life, John Newton worked hard at being self-serving, causing trouble and, not to put too fine a point on it, debauchery. He was the kind of man people would cross the street to avoid. He excelled at unpleasantness. It seemed that life conspired against him and he was more than willing to return the favor.
Born to a Christian mother and seafaring father, Newton heard the stories of the Bible at his mother’s knee, but that education and influence were cut short. His mother died of tuberculosis when Newton was seven. The formative influence in Newton’s life switched from his kindly mother to his roughneck father, a commander on a merchant ship. At age eleven, Newton began his life at sea, sailing with his father until he was seventeen. Later he worked onshore in the merchant’s office until he was fired for bad behavior.
When he was nineteen, the British navy decided he needed to return to a life on the ocean and, against his will, inducted him into service aboard HMS Harwick, a man-of-war ship. His father had enough influence to have his son installed as a midshipman—a low-ranking officer. This was a much better situation than others forced into service had to endure, but it was still too much for the young man. He deserted, something the navy wouldn’t tolerate. He was found, shackled, and flogged. Somehow he talked his way out of the navy by suggesting he be discharged to a slave ship, and they allowed it. As it turned out, this was no favor.
Newton served under Captain Amos Clow, a harsh and cruel man. Clow owned a lemon plantation on a West African island. Newton was forced to live there in horrible conditions until his clothing wore to rags and he had to beg for food. In many ways, he was a slave to Clow’s African mistress.
In 1746, he was transferred aboard the Greyhound, a slave ship from Liverpool, which proved to have better living conditions. He now had clothing and food. Newton sailed the waters between Africa and ports of call where slaves could be sold. He rose through the ranks, and at the age of twenty-two he became a slave ship’s master. His cruelty and wickedness even put off his crew. Once, while drunk, Newton fell overboard. His crew rescued him—by harpooning him in the leg and drawing him back to the ship. The scar stayed with him throughout his life and served as a reminder of how low he had sunk.
In 1748, on a return trip to his home port, his ship was caught in the teeth of a vicious storm. He had been reading Thomas à Kempis’ book The Imitation of Christ, one of several classics that Newton had recently taken to in an attempt at self-education, and had been pondering a passage that dealt with the “uncertain continuance of life.” The storm must have been fierce, because the seasoned sailor was shaken. On the pitching ship, Newton committed his life to Christ. It was a beginning, but in some ways his conversion took time, at least when it came to his work on a slave ship.
He continued his slave work but with a more humane bent. Part of his goal was to lessen the cruelty experienced by the slaves—still, they were slaves and would be sold. Slave trading gradually grew abhorrent to Newton, leading him to taking a job on land officially tracking tides in Liverpool.
Newton may have left the slave trade behind, but it didn’t leave him. It ate at him, troubling his mind and soul. More and more he felt called to ministry and studied to prepare himself for life that exchanged the ship’s wheel for a pulpit. In 1764, at the age of thirty-nine, he was ordained as an Anglican priest and took a church in Olney. Although anyone would have been hard-pressed to see it during Newton’s wild years, the new priest had an artistic side as a gifted lyricist. He held Bible studies on Thursday nights and liked to have his parishioners sing hymns. Unable to find enough hymns suitable for the people who attended, he began composing lyrics and setting them to common tunes. He did this almost weekly.
During that time William Cowper joined the church. Cowper was a man troubled with mental problems that left him depressed and suicidal. Although he found comfort in the church, he fought his mental demons all his life. Like Newton, he was gifted with words. He is best known for the opening lines to the hymn “Light Shining Out of Darkness”:
God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
These words no doubt resonated with John Newton, who found faith in the midst of a storm. Together they wrote scores of hymns. In 1779, they compiled what became known as the Olney Hymns. The hymnal contained 280 of his hymns and sixty-eight of Cowper’s. Many of these hymns are sung today and are loved by millions, and included what may be the best-known hymn of all: “Amazing Grace.”
“Amazing Grace” reflects the new heart in Newton:
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now, I see.
’Twas Grace that taught my heart to fear,
and Grace, my fears relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear,
the hour I first believed.
The treatment of slaves at the hands of their captors and owners haunted Newton. What he had seen and done troubled him. In 1787, he wrote Thoughts on the African Slave Trade, in which he hoped “this stain of our National character will soon be wiped out.” He further wrote, “If I attempt, after what has been done, to throw my mite into the public stock of information, it is less from an apprehension that my interference is necessary, than from a conviction, that silence, at such a time, and on such an occasion, would, in me, be criminal.”1 Forty years after his conversion, he was still haunted by his contribution to the enslavement of his fellow man. Perhaps this is why, despite the urging of friends, he refused to slow down in his last years. “I cannot stop. What? The old African Blasphemer stop while he can still speak?”2
Newton died at the age of eighty-two, a changed man from his days of sailing ships with holds packed tight with humans who would be bought and sold by other humans. Newton had been changed from a man who made his living in trading human flesh to one who lived to save the souls of men.
Centuries later, John Newton stands as an example of the change faith can make in a single life, and how that life can change others. He became proof of the transforming message of faith and the need to stand for the protection of those who have no voice.
In the heart of the slave trader rested the soul of a poet, one whose words have been sung for over two centuries. He remains proof of God’s amazing grace.