John Newton spent his early years working in the slave trade, about as far from God as a man could get. Later he became a preacher, the rector of the parish in Olney, England, and he ended up fighting to abolish slavery. In 1772 he wrote the words to ‘Amazing Grace,’ and it was first printed in the Olney Hymns in 1779. It wasn’t married to the tune we all know until about 60 years later. When we sing that grace saved ‘a wretch like me,’ we’re singing the testimony of a man who knew exactly what he was talking about.
