Our Message Dear CBN Partner,
John Newton.
I trust that whatever you are feeling right now, you will be stirred and encouraged as you read this edition of Arise – a small mosaic of thoughts, stories and testimonies which, seen together, reflects our team’s heart and ministry at this time.
A selfish, ungodly sailor and cruel slave-trader, Newton found himself crying out to God for mercy one night as he clung on to the sinking remains of his severely storm-damaged ship in the Northern Atlantic. His life was spared. But besides experiencing God’s mercy that night, he also tasted the unexpected sweetness of Amazing Grace as he bowed to Jesus as Lord and Saviour for the first time.
Rather suddenly, we all find ourselves in the middle of one of the biggest global crises in modern history. As I write this, I wonder how this tectonic disturbance to ‘normal life’ has “How precious did that grace affected you? I’m guessing that appear for many of you, things are very the hour I first believed!” difficult right now. He was changed forever. Even in Our theme for May and June his 80’s, shortly before he died, (planned long before the start Newton remained amazed by of the Covid-19 pandemic) is God’s grace: “My memory is nearly Grace. Amazing Grace. Some of gone; but I remember two things: you might have watched Andrea That I am a great sinner, and that Bocelli singing the famous hymn Christ is a great Saviour.” live to the world from Milan last month, on Easter Sunday. As Mercy is not getting what we do this moving production flashed deserve. Based on his life up to real-time aerial views from the that point, Newton deserved to hauntingly empty streets of die that night, but God spared him. cities across the world (including That’s mercy. Grace, on the other Cape Town), I found myself hand, is getting what we don’t thinking about the well-known deserve. Despite our sinfulness, God through Jesus gives us story of the hymn writer, 03
