Grace Evangelical Society

P.O. Box 1308, Denton, TX 76202
  • About
    • Home
    • Beliefs
    • Staff
    • Board of Directors
  • Resources
    • Grace in Focus Blog
    • Grace in Focus International Blogs
    • Grace in Focus Radio
    • Grace in Focus Magazine
    • Free eBooks
    • Journal of the GES
    • Book Reviews
    • Partners in Grace Newsletter
    • Audio Messages
    • Videos
    • Email Subscription
    • Bookstore
    • Online Tracts
  • Store
    • Main Page
    • On Sale
    • Return Policy
    • Your Cart
    • Your Account
  • Events
  • Connect
    • Contact Us
    • Free Grace Church and Bible Study Tracker
    • Free Grace Jobs
    • Ministry Links
  • Donate
    • One Time Donation
    • Monthly Donation
    • Your Account
  • Search
Home
→
Journal Articles
→
Book Reviews
→
Amazing Grace in John Newton: Slave-Ship Captain, Hymnwriter, and Abolitionist

Amazing Grace in John Newton: Slave-Ship Captain, Hymnwriter, and Abolitionist

Posted in Book Reviews

Amazing Grace in John Newton: Slave-Ship Captain, Hymnwriter, and Abolitionist. By William E. Phipps. Macon , GA : Mercer University Press, 2001. 270 pp. Cloth. $35.00

If you like the song Amazing Grace, then you’ll probably like this book about its author.

Much confusion surrounds John Newton. His life is often idealized. Phipps points out that a major biography by Kathleen Norris notes that he came to faith in Christ while captaining a slave ship. Then he immediately turned the ship back to Africa and released the slaves and renounced the slave trade once and for all (p. 206). That never happened. Not only did he not stop the slave trade abruptly due to some religious conversion, it is far from clear when (or if) Newton came to faith.

Phipps points out that Philip Yancey in his book What’s So Amazing about Grace? mistakenly suggests that Newton wrote Amazing Grace while in an African harbor waiting for a shipment of slaves (p. 281 in Yancey, cited by Phipps on p. 206). The truth is, Newton composed Amazing Grace while a pastor in Olney, “long after his years as a ship captain” (p. 206; see also pp. 125-31, 146-58).

Many point to March 21, 1748 as the date of Newton’s “conversion.” That was when Newton nearly drowned in a storm. Newton felt that God saved him from certain death that day. From then on, he began daily devotions and cleaned up his language. But he remained a slave trader. And by his own testimony he did not yet believe the gospel: “I seemed humbled and thankful. But I was still blind to the gospel” (p. 207).

Newton was a Calvinist with significant reservations: “I am what they call a Calvinist, yet there are flights, niceties, and hard sayings to be found among some of that system, which I do not choose to imitate” (p. 104). He admitted, “What is by some called high Calvinism, I dread. I feel much more union of spirit with some Arminians, than I could with some Calvinists” (p. 105).

One of Newton ’s reservations with Calvinism may have been the doctrine of eternal security. Phipps comments, “The ‘once saved, always saved’ doctrine of high Calvinism troubled Newton because it minimized human responsibility. Unlike those who believed that once ‘elected’ there would be ‘perseverance of the saints’ evermore, Newton acknowledged with the Methodists that there are ‘backsliders,’ those who had professed their faith but were no longer expressing it in word or deed” (p. 105). Does Phipps mean that Newton believed in eternal security but not guaranteed perseverance? While Phipps starts by talking about eternal security, the rest of his statement concerns the possibility of failure to persevere.

Phipps suggests that Newton was not so concerned about a point of coming to faith in Christ, but about a process of becoming more and more godly. Phipps suggests that the line “the hour I first believed” was not meant by Newton , as we assume, to suggest that we know when we come to faith and at that time we are born again and eternally secure. Instead, Phipps says, “ Newton intended the hymn to refer to a complex conversion that might begin early in life and continue to grow sporadically for the remainder of life…The hymn’s opening stanza can be thought of as alluding to conversion stages” (p. 210).

One is not born again until he believes that Jesus guarantees eternal life to all who simply believe in Him (John 6:47; 11:25-27). Did Newton ever believe that? Possibly he did. Note this statement which is contrary to the conclusion of Phipps cited above (without giving any proof from Newton): “But now I began to understand the security of the covenant of grace, and to expect to be preserved, not by my own power and holiness, but by the mighty power and promise of God, through faith in an unchangeable Savior” (p. 66).

The book ends with an Afterword. While it begins well, it ends with Phipps preaching social activism. I found the closing pages of the Afterword to be a bit annoying. Fortunately, the preachy tone is not found elsewhere in the book.

This is an outstanding book. I highly recommend it.

Robert N. Wilkin
Editor
Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society
Irving , TX

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Pinterest
  • LinkedIn
Bob_W

by Bob Wilkin

Bob Wilkin (ThM, PhD, Dallas Theological Seminary) is the Founder and Executive Director of Grace Evangelical Society and co-host of Grace in Focus Radio. He lives in Highland Village, TX with his wife, Sharon. His latest books are Faith Alone in One Hundred Verses and Turn and Live: The Power of Repentance.

Cart

Recently Added

March 27, 2023

1 Peter–Part 06–5:1-11 Epilogue

Welcome to Grace in Focus radio. Today, Ken Yates, Philippe Sterling and Bob Wilkin are winding down an excellent short study of the NT book...
March 27, 2023

Is My Testimony Common or Uncommon?

I’ve been teaching a Sunday school class entitled “Answering Your Bible Questions.” Each week I answer four or five questions. One of them was this...
March 24, 2023

1 Peter–Part 05–3:8-4:19

Welcome to Grace in Focus radio. Today, Bob Wilkin, Philippe Sterling and Ken Yates continue their study and discussion of 1 Peter. Suffering is a...

Grace in Focus Radio

All Episodes

Listen to Stitcher

Listen on Spotify

Grace In Focus Magazine

Grace In Focus is sent to subscribers in the United States free of charge.

Subscribe for Free

The primary source of Grace Evangelical Society's funding is through charitable contributions. GES uses all contributions and proceeds from the sales of our resources to further the gospel of grace in the United States and abroad.

Donate

Bookstore Specials

  • Here Walks My Enemy: The Story of Luis (Hardcover) $13.95 $5.00
  • Here Walks My Enemy: The Story of Luis (Paperback) $6.95 $3.00
  • A Free Grace Primer: The Hungry Inherit, The Gospel Under Siege, and Grace in Eclipse $20.00 $12.00
  • Hebrews: Partners with Christ $22.00 $15.00
  • The Road to Reward, 2nd Edition $9.95 $5.00
Grace Evangelical Society

(940) 270-8827 / ges@faithalone.org

4851 S I-35E Suite 203, Corinth, TX 76210
P.O. Box 1308, Denton, TX 76202

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube