Where His Heart Now Shudders: The Liberating Pen of John Newton – Part Two

The words…they seemed so hollow. What power would they have to lesson one less stripe of the lash that his ships – his slave ships – had condemned innocent men and women to? What life could it bring back from being snuffed out through abuse and hard labor in what, at the most, was a nine-year life sentence among the West Indies’ plantations, where it was deemed cheaper to work slaves into the ground and replace them than to moderate their labor and care for them into old age? He, the eloquent preacher who penned hymns, cheered parishioners, and showed the way of salvation to would-be Nicodemuses, was utterly powerless to cheer or redeem one African, whose misery he had profited from.

He read on:

I hope it will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me, that I was once an active instrument in a business at which my heart now shudders. My headlong passions and follies plunged me, in early life, into a succession of difficulties and hardships, which, at length, reduced me to seek a refuge among the Natives of Africa. There, for about the space of eighteen months, I was in effect, though without the name, a captive and a slave myself; and was depressed to the lowest degree of human wretchedness. Possibly, I should not have been so completely miserable, had I lived among the natives only, but it was my lot to reside with the white men; for at that time, several persons of my own colour and language were settled upon that part of the Windward coast, which lies between Sierra-Leon and Cape Mount; for the purpose of purchasing and collecting slaves, to sell to the vessels that arrived from Europe.

This is a bourn, from which few travellers return, who have once determined to venture upon a temporary residence there; but the good providence of God, without my expectation and almost against my will, delivered me from those scenes of wickedness and woe; and I arrived at Liverpool in May 1748. I soon revisited the place of my captivity, as mate of a ship, and in the year 1750, I was appointed commander, in which capacity I made three voyages to the Windward coast for slaves.

The rest of his testimony disclosed all his firsthand knowledge of the slave trade from those three voyages. He could only pray that, somehow, the evil he had done could be used for good. His mind wandered. What was that line, that stanza to the hymn he had written: “Tis grace that hath brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.” Yes, that was it. God’s grace had not redeemed him for nothing. Maybe, just maybe, his deeds of shame could be used to give liberty to even more than he had once seen as slaves.

John Newton – known the world over as the pen behind the hymn, “Amazing Grace,” saw the passage of the Abolition of the British Slave Trade bill just months before his death in 1807. Though once a hand who bound many, that same hand penned “Thoughts on Slavery,” which was part of the body of evidence brought before Parliament and used by abolitionists to awaken England to the horrors of the slave trade.

Kenzi Knapp is a follower of Christ, homeschool graduate and student of history. A fourth generation Missourian she enjoys writing about daily life enrolled in Gods great course of faith and His story throughout the ages at her blog, Honey Rock Hills.

Source: Thoughts on Slavery by John Newton