The Homeless Man Who Kept the Ring Safe

In February 2013, Sarah Darling of Kansas City accidentally dumped her diamond engagement ring into the donation cup of Billy Ray Harris, a homeless man who often slept under a bridge. She didn’t realize it until the next day. When she found him and asked, he said yes, he had it, and he had kept it for her. He could have sold it, but he didn’t. Darling and her husband set up a fundraiser to thank him, and donations poured in from around the world.

John Newton: Amazing Grace from a Slave Trader

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.