Autobiography Timeline by Diana Leonchik

MLA Citation

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-15 00:36:14 UTC

Event #1: The Before (Prologue)

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-15 07:34:44 UTC

The author of this book Turner was the one who got really motivated in the history of the Amazing Grace song that he had researched so much giving a biography of John Newton who wrote the song and the results that the song gave after Newton died. The influence of John Newton writing this song in his hardships and trials leading him to Christ.

Event #2: Beginning

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:52:16 UTC

John Newton was born on July 24th, 1725 in Wapping, London. Located close to the tower of London and the north bank of the River Thames. He was born to his father John Newton who was a commander of various merchant ships and wasn't "affected by religion". His mother Elizabeth opposite of his father was frail and in-ward looking, being a devoted Christian.

Event #3: Someone close who went away

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:52:27 UTC

During his childhood Newton's mom Elizabeth put in the most work she could to tell her son about the Bible and God. She also taught him children verses written by Isaac Watts. Then a big tragedy hit him before his 7th birthday. In 1732 his mom got sick with tubernuculous which was one of the most potent disease and had died from it on July 11, 1732.

Quote #1:

"But nothing worked. On July 11, 1732, she died" (7)

Event #4: A Different Life

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:52:39 UTC

After Newton's father remarried everything changed in his life. He didn't receive the same teaching from his new mother and was taken to travel on ships for slave trading with his father. Religion for him was confusing and trying to be disciplining himself to God was not easy. Through the miracles that God did saving his life made him think that he was picked for a mission, but that was forgotten.

Quote #2:

"His father continued to be away for long periods: and after not very long as a widower he got remarried to a women known only as Thomasina, moved to Avely in Essex, and started a second family. During this time Newton was sent for two years to a boarding school...It was to be the unhappiest period of his life so far." (8)

Event #5: The Dream (About His Life)

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:52:49 UTC

Traveling on the ship to the Mediterranean with his father Newton received a dream which was when he was 17 years old. Newton was offered a gold ring in Venice. A figure came out giving him a ring, urging that accepting it would give him a life of happiness and success. Refusing or losing it would bring misery and trouble to him. After the figure disappeared, another one appeared that started pouring on him scorns for the promises that were made. While Newton was trying to defend the ring, he slipped it off and threw it into the sea. Then fire appeared in the air of the city and the accuser was saying that he had lost his salvation. After a third figure came, by Newtons agreement he got the ring from the Sea and said when he'll need he will give to him so that he didn't lose it again.

Event #6: - The little faith has been lost (March 1744)

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:53:00 UTC

Being on Harwitch on the quarterdeck John Newton had made two close friends, one Job Lewis who was simple in Christian faith and another on who was a "freethinker" which slowly started to remove Newtons faith. This lead for Newton starting to attack Lewis for his faith and Newton's character got progressively worse. He became rebellious

Quote #3:

"The freethinker...who tried to remove the remaining fragments of faith from Newton, felt that he was mistakenly creating an unsustainable synthesis of Shaftesbury's deistic ides and New Testament Christianity, and like the shadowy accuser in the dream of the gold ring he persuaded him to give up." (15)

Event #7: Challenges humbled Newton for a little

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:53:15 UTC

Going on a triangular ship trip, Newton arrived to Africa with a Englishmen slave trader who's African mistress P.I. disliked Newton. When she saw that after getting sick his health didn't improve, she treated him really badly and made fun of him. He now looked the same on the outside as his inner spirit. After getting better another trader lied about him and the slave trader put him in bad circumstances that lasted for a year. This humbled Newton for only a certain time.

Quote #4:

"His apparent meekness was the result of a broken spirit rather than a new heart. "I was no further changed than a tiger tamed by hunger. Remove the occasion, and he will be as wild as ever."

Event #8: Deadly storm turned into Mercy

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:53:34 UTC

While Newton was traveling on a Greyhound ship he read a book The Imitation of Christ that brought him concerning questions about Christianity which he ignored. At one point there came a violent storm ruining the ship with people panicking, since ships weren't perfectly made for slave trading then. Newton's mind was filled with his life, how he was a great sinner and can't expect mercy from God. Finally the storm had calmed down he made a step of faith and prayed. God has answered his prayer through a safe arrival to Ireland before another storm hit. Newtons life started to slowly change, he started to pray and went to church.

Quote #5:

"After five hours he was told that the ship was finally free of water, the first real sign of hope since the storm began forty hours previously. Newton was so relieved that he offered up a prayer. It wasn't a prayer of repentance. It was he reflected, like the cry of a hungry raven. More specific thoughts about the Christian gospel followed." (43)

Event #9: A New Captain

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:53:44 UTC

After getting married to his childhood sweetheart Mary Catlett he went on a trip ship again. Not long after his father had died really fast which has deeply affected him with thee loss of his father Captain Newton. After that he became the new Captain Newton who became a commander on the ships. Newton's action during his life as a Captain on ships was different compared to others, he put prayer as a big thing in his life insisting his crew to go with him for Sunday services.

Event #10: Slave Trading Movement

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:53:52 UTC

John Newton had become interested in politics and started to think about how slave trading is needed to be stopped. He says that the Bible doesn't say it's a sin but that it goes against how we are supposed to treat everyone with love. He was scared at first to talk about this publicly but the excitement of Wilberforce to be in power for the anti-slavery movement motivated Newton to stand up writing an essay Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade. Wilberforce put a bill for abolition of slavery which got passed and became a law. During all of this Newtons wife die which has been the toughest test for him.

Event #11: Being Part of Church/Hymn Writing

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:11 UTC

Newton's health began to fail and he stopped being part of the sea trips. So instead he started to be more part of a church bringing in more interactions between people, creating more kinds of services because the church is growing. But his main skill was at hymn writing, even though Church of England said only metric psalms can be sung. Newton said that hymns can open to people complex truths. So every week when he was supposed to say a sermon he always wrote a song. The song "Amazing Grace" was the first song to be written in December 1772 (there's no specific date since some of his diaries were lost).

Event #13: Newtons Last Days

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:18 UTC

On October 1806 Newton said his last sermon. Then on December 21st, 1807 he died. For a year his health was declining, having to be home all the time. He was having swollen legs, sight was going away, it was hard to hear and speak, also his memory was almost lost. But he remembers that he is a sinner and that Christ is a great Savior.

Quote #7:

"When asked to tell his story he said it could be summarized in the words of Deuteronomy 32:10: "He [God] found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye." (109)

Event #14: Tune book used for Amazing Grace

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:26 UTC

There was a tune book published that had written music in it for songs in which one of them was "Amazing Grace". A music instructor William Walker had looked through many tunes and finally found one that had perfectly matched with the words of the song "Amazing Grace".

Quote #8:

"When Walker put it with "New Britain" he was merely continuing the practice, but he displayed real genius, because not only did the words fit snugly into the required musical space but the music enhanced the meaning." (124)

#16: "Amazing Grace" Grew

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:34 UTC

Since "Amazing Grace" had been held by two advances by being spread to the northern settlers of America and that the words of the song matched up to the tune "New Britain" it didn't die off. It spread to the North with a new style of evangelism that vocal music was important to. There was a musical assistant Ira D. Sankey was a role model in many religious music, including "Amazing Grace". He had specialized gospel music. Making a Hymn book he added the song in a popular tune "Warwick". Then he added "Amazing Grace" to the Sacred Songs and Solos in a different tune advancing the music. But the tune "New Britain" is still sung to this day.

#17: Defining the Song (1900)

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:42 UTC

Another person Edwin Othello Excell who was a hymn writer, publisher, singer, and song leader had changed some of the arrangement of publishing his hymns. When he got "Amazing Grace" he made it sound better by taking out the awkward sounds in what the Walkers version of the song had. Excell also changed the harmony of the song so that it was more smoother, adding in more different changes of chords. Some other major change he did was added to another stanza that Newton didn't write.

Quote #9:

"Excell's achievement was in making "Amazing Grace" sound more contemporary by adding harmonies and ironing out some of the awkward transitions in William Walker's version. This made it more acceptable to the newly enforced middle classes, who wished to appear cultivated and to throw off the primitive associations of the shape-note traditions. (137-138)

#15: "Amazing Grace" impacted the life's of African Americans.

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:54:55 UTC

During the time of African Americans being enslaved they sang songs from the 18th century which one of them was the song "Amazing Grace" that became their most beloved song in the times that they were going through harsh trials in slavery. They learned the song from the church services that the whites took them too. From this song they have learned that even though they are physically being trapped they can still be freed spiritually.

#19: One of many Experiences

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:55:04 UTC

Many people have heard of "Amazing Grace" and had different experiences with it. One of them was Watson. He was someone that commercial music didn't affect him, he kept himself in the community that surrounded his life, including songs. When he had heard of "Amazing Grace" for the first time it was a testimony that was for him, it had a sense. Watson knew that there is a real meaning to the song.

Quote #10:

"The real meaning for Watson was that "when Jesus went to the cross it took more than what old-timers called 'bitting the bullet.' It was him showing that he loved us all enough that by the grace of God he would pay the sin debt for us on the cross and his grace showed me the way to go. The amazing grace of God is what the song is about." (172)

#18: Judy Collins sings the Song

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:55:16 UTC

Judy Collins was a singer who sang many songs. The "Amazing Grace" song she has known since being a child. When being a grown up she had sang the song in many of her concerts. After singing the song with a group in one of the evenings, her producer told her to record it. So she picked out the way she would sing the song fixing up some things and using the arrangement of "New Britain" by Edwin Othello Excell. It worked out, and she recorded it in 1970.

#20: Conclusions

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-02-23 06:55:25 UTC

Concluding the history of how the story behind the song "Amazing Grace" had a big impact on America. Many people like singers, and groups have sang the song. It grew up the Christianity in early American years. Many people were touched by the actual story behind this song. It has changed many times and there were different versions of the songs with different kinds of words that were added. Growing from when starting from the story of John Newton.

Outside Source #4:

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-01 23:16:54 UTC

Quote #6: Amazing Grace song

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-02 05:49:54 UTC

Quote #5: Amazing Grace Song (85-86)

"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!

Through dangers, toils, and snares,

I have already come;

'Tis grace has brought me safe thus far,

And grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me,

His word my hope secures;

He will my shield and portion be,

As long as life endures.

Yes, when this flesh and heart shall fail,

And mortal life shall cease;

I shall possess, within the vail,

A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,

The sun forbear to shine;

But GOD, who called me here below,

Will be for ever, mine.

Source #2

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-02 07:05:34 UTC

Source #3:

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-02 19:29:30 UTC

Source #5: Second Great Awakening

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-02 22:23:07 UTC

Source #1: Book "Imitation of Christ"

leoncdia000_1_1 — 2025-03-03 05:35:46 UTC