Girlfriends Night At The Movies presents

Amazing Grace was written by John Newton, a former slave ship captain.

The Hymn Amazing Grace first appeared in the hymnbook, Olney Hymns, published in 1779.

There are currently 972 arrangements of the song and more than 1,100 available albums which feature versions of Amazing Grace.

The fourth stanza of the song changed in Edwin Excell replaced it with verse from the hymn "Jerusalem, My Happy Home.”

Arlo Guthrie performed Amazing Grace on the opening night of Woodstock. (Truth is stranger than fiction!)

William Wilberforce began to see his life's purpose: "My walk is a public one," he wrote in his diary. "My business is in the world, and I must mix in the assemblies of men or quit the post which Providence seems to have assigned me."

William Wilberforce wrote Real Christianity in 1797 at the age of 37.

We also know that law is made not for the righteous but for... slave traders and liars and perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine that conforms to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me. - 1 Timothy 1:9-11 (NIV)

If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time,...

... He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came,...

... shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? President Abraham Lincoln Second Inaugural Address March 4, 1865