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GALATIANS Chapter 5:17 The Inward Warfare Strange and mysterious is my life, What opposites I feel within! A stable peace, a constant strife; The rule of grace, the power of sin: Too often I am captive led, Yet daily triumph in my Head. I prize the privilege of prayer, But oh! what backwardness to pray! Though on the Lord I cast my care, I feel its burden every day; I seek his will in all I do, Yet find my own is working too. I call the promises my own, And prize them more than mines of gold; Yet though their sweetness I have known, They leave me unimpressed and cold: One hour upon the truth I feed, The next I know not what I read. I love the holy day of rest, When Jesus meets his gathered saints; Sweet day, of all the week the best! For its return my spirit pants: Yet often, through my unbelief, It proves a day of guilt and grief. While on my Saviour I rely, I know my foes shall loose their aim; And therefore dare their power defy, Assured of conquest through his name: But soon my confidence is slain, And all my fears return again. Thus different powers within me strive, And grace and sin by turns prevail; I grieve, rejoice, decline, revive, And victory hangs in doubtful scale: But Jesus has his promise past, That grace shall overcome at last.		from John Newton's Diary, relevant to this hymn: Saturday 20 June 1778 Alas! Stupid creature that I am to be no more affected with my goodness. I have been dull in my own spirit, and I have grieved thy Spirit in the course of this favoured week. I spoke every morning [at Bedford] in the [Barham] family. Subjects: Ephesians 3:14-19; 1 Corinthians 2:9; James 1:5; Matthew 9:13. Much converse, much kindness, nothing amiss, but this evil heart which besets, deceives and hurts me in every place. I came home lean and a hymn to make which other avocations broke in upon my evening. O my Lord – touch and revive, pardon and heal and cleanse me and prepare me a Sabbath's blessing. I have no plea but what I descry from thy Word, and from my past experience which encourages me still to cry, I am thine, save me [Psalm 119:94]. Sunday 21 June 1778 I praise thee, my Lord, for the mercies of another Sabbath. I usually am destitute of a subject – and when the text seems to fix I know not what I shall say to I begin – I truly live from hand to mouth, but thou dost furnish me. I had some liberty through the day, but most in the evening. But O my Lord – that it might please thee to give the word entrance and success in the hearts of the sinners. I fear many hear it in vain. Psalm 119:11 [Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee] Hebrews 10:37 Hymn No. 315 [On this date Newton preached from the above texts at his church, St Peter & St Paul, Olney, during the morning and afternoon services, and from this hymn at the informal evening service]

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Hymn: MS Eng 1317, Houghton Library, Harvard University
Diary: John Newton Collection, CO199, Princeton University