Today is the memorial of Charles Wesley, who died, full of years as of faith and works, in London on this date in 1788. Wesley is rightly considered the most gifted writer of hymns that England has ever produced, and he was fully alive to the importance of hymnody in devotion and in the spread of the Christian faith. He was so prolific a hymnist, and his work is so rich, that there is no season of the Christian year when his words don't speak to us. We give thanks for his life and work.



Among the many riches of Gerard's site is a section devoted to Charles Wesley and his brother John and to the Methodist movement.



Here is the text, and a link to the music, of one of Charles Wesley's 6000 hymns.



O For A Heart To Praise My God



O for a heart to praise my God,

A heart from sin set free,

A heart that always feels Thy blood

So freely shed for me.



A heart resigned, submissive, meek,

My great Redeemer's throne,

Where only Christ is heard to speak,

Where Jesus reigns alone.



A humble, lowly, contrite, heart,

Believing, true and clean,

Which neither life nor death can part

From Christ who dwells within.



A heart in every thought renewed

And full of love divine,

Perfect and right and pure and good,

A copy, Lord, of Thine.



Thy tender heart is still the same,

And melts at human woe:

Jesus, for thee distressed I am,

I want Thy love to know.



My heart, Thou know'st, can never rest

Till Thou create my peace;

Till of mine Eden repossest,

From self, and sin, I cease.



Fruit of Thy gracious lips, on me

Bestow that peace unknown,

The hidden manna, and the tree

Of life, and the white stone.



Thy nature, gracious Lord, impart;

Come quickly from above;

Write Thy new name upon my heart,

Thy new, best name of Love.

Philadelphia is a great walking city, with fine examples of more than three centuries of architectural styles and the green expanse of Fairmount Park, the largest city park in the world. William Penn laid out the city's core in a grid pattern, so it's not easy to lose oneself on its streets, except in the imagination, with grand museums and sometimes quirky collections thick on the ground. There's a further richness in the faces and gaits of those who share the streets and sidewalks with you, and I've been able sometimes to sit on a wooden bench or concrete slab and watch the light and shadow of smile or grimace pass through a parade of people, in matching response it seemed to the expression on the face of someone passing by. A small or momentary thing, it might be thought, but a universe within it. I've never seen the movie "Pay It Forward" but that was part of its theme, I think. And catastrophe theory, too, wonders about the ultimate effect of the brush of a butterfly's wing. Older injunctions crowd in: As you sow, so shall you reap. The Lord Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the merciful, for they shall be shown mercy.

The county towns that ring Philadelphia at distances of eight to twenty miles, still seats of courts and county government and historic market and commerce centers, are also great places for walking. Interesting, compassable, rich. I headed to one of them a couple of weeks ago, West Chester, seat of Chester County, to walk some sidewalks and meet some family at their home for Sunday dinner. I use public transportation a lot, and that Sunday took a bus for the twenty mile trip, snagging a seat on the uncrowded back row, able to stretch my legs in the aisle. Settling in, I opened to Ephesians 6 and was reading there only very briefly when someone loomed in from my right with his Bible open and instructed me to turn back the pages and read Ephesians 4 and 5 again. He startled me a bit, this stranger, bigger and more imposing than I, but his proved a good injunction, and especially fruitful in Ephesians 4: 31-32: Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

It's something that we all struggle with, even though we know how great is the debt that has been forgiven us through Jesus Christ. The scalding and necessary wound to our pride in forgiving and seeking forgiveness. That stranger on the bus did me a service, pointing me back to that passage in Paul's letter, pointing me further to read again the words of the prayer that the Lord has taught us: Forgive us ...

There've been other reminders on the subject in recent months. Tom Wilson, best known from his role in the Back to the Future movies, recorded some of his songs a couple of years ago on a CD called In the Name of the Father. Tom's been playing his guitar in church for many years, beginning as a boy attending Mass at Daylesford Abbey outside Philadelphia. I had the happiness of working with his brother Brian years ago and knew Tom slightly. I hadn't known of this CD, though, until just a few months ago and it was a truly happy discovery. His music on it has been a blessing to me and the theme of a couple of the songs is forgiveness, given and received. The necessity of our surrender, we who are broken and worn. The price paid for our sins, the cost of our redemption, the reality of our forgiveness in Jesus Christ. Going home at last, and welcome. To our Father who waits with open arms to receive us.