God’s Sovereignty

Centuries after Esther lived, and years before James Hastings, there was a man named William Cowper. At the age of 32, he lost his mind. And in his emotional state of affairs, without a friend in the world, William Cowper decided to take his life. He hired a carriage to take him to the Thames River in England, and the carriage driver who had never met him before, grabbed him just before he was about to leap off the bridge into the raging water, and held him back.

He drove him back to his home, then, he took poison, and someone found him. An antidote was provided, and he lived through that. That night he took a knife, fell on it, and the blade broke. Early the next morning, he hung himself.

And a neighbor who was concerning about him, found him, and cut him down. He couldn’t even take his life, because of the unsearchable, the unfathomable power of God, the invisible power of God though it was. Several months later he took up friends with the famous, John Newton, also a Christian. They jointly composed the famous hymnal called “Olney Hymns,” in which Newton released the ageless song “Amazing Grace.”

But Cowper wrote 67 of the 68 hymns, the most significant of which you’ve just read concerning the Sovereignty of God. For more detail backdrop to this theme, (Sovereignty) read the book of Esther.