"YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN"

TWICE-BORN
MEN

TRUE
CONVERSION
RECORDS OF
~100 WELL - KNOWN
MEN IN ALL
RANKS OF LIFE

Compiled by
HY. PICKERING

A Slave Trader and Poet

JOHN NEWTON, slave trader, preacher, poet, one of
       the greatest trophies of grace ever won.   His life truly
manifested that "God moves in a mysterious way, His
wonders to perform."
  After what he declares himself
to have been a life "flagrantly profane," in the course
of a voyage he picked up and read Sta.'s "Thomas à
Kem.,"
which impressed him, and caused him to think
more seriously than had been his custom.   But a terrific
tropical storm was what awakened him most of all.   A
fellow-seaman had been swept overboard, and all hands as
well as the vessel were in great danger.   After safety being

assured, his thoughts were turned in upon his own con-
dition.   His past was brought vividly before him, and then
he turned to his Testament and found help in these two
verses: "how much more shall your heavenly Father give
the Holy Spirit to them that ask [H]im?"
(Luke 11. 13);
and, "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the
doctrine"
(John 7. 17).   He understood the facts of the
Gospel, but also that the Holy Spirit alone could enable
him to understand these things.   Accordingly in his own
way he prayed for light and help.   Thus by divers ways
and experiences souls are led from their state of sin and
misery to "Behold the Lamb of God" (John 1. 29).   From
that time John Newton started on the Christian pathway,
and has recorded: "The 10th of March is a day much to be
remembered by me, and I have never suffered it to pass
wholly unnoticed since the year 1748."
  Surely it was his
own experience he described in his hymn of later years:

"Amazing grace! how sweet the sound!
   That saved a wretch like me;
I once was lost, but now am found;
   Was blind, but now I see.

"’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
   And grace my fears relieved:
How precious did that grace appear
   The hour I first believed."

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