Sunday, March 11, 2007

Amazing Grace

We went to see the movie over the weekend. It was very good. Touching without being overly sentimental. I took the kids to see it because it is something I think they need to know. That one person taking a principled stand based on scripture can change things.

I found this to be intriguing:

John Newton (played by Albert Finney in Amazing Grace) wrote the words to one of the most beloved hymns of all time between 1760 and 1770, while working as an evangelical pastor. Son of the commander of a merchant ship, Newton was captain of a slave ship for many years, until he underwent a dramatic religious conversion while steering his vessel through a storm.

Repenting and regretting the misery he had inflicted on the thousands of human cargo he had transported across the Middle Passage for many years, he devoted his life to the Church, and wrote the lyrics to many hymns which are still popular today.

In 1780 Newton left Olney to become rector of St. Mary Woolnoth, St. Mary Woolchurch, in London. There he drew large congregations and influenced many, among them William Wilberforce. Newton continued to preach until the last year of life, although he was blind by that time. He died in London December 21, 1807.


Newton had been Wilberforce's pastor when Wilberforce was a child and became a mentor to him during the struggle to end slavery in Britain. God truly redeemed a man's evil acts to affect a great good. What an awesome God we serve.

Go see the movie.

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