Open, Lord, my inward ear

Open, Lord, my inward ear. Charles Wesley* (1707-1788) This begins with the second stanza of a hymn beginning ‘Christ, my Hidden Life, appear’, entitled ‘The Same’ (the previous hymn was entitled ‘Waiting for Christ the Prophet’). It was first published in Hymns and Sacred Poems (1742). Stanzas 2 to 6 were included by John Wesley in A Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People called Methodists (1780), in the section ‘For Believers Groaning for full Redemption’. Subsequently British Methodist books followed this text, using all the stanzas of the 1742 hymn except the first, which was:  Christ, my Hidden Life, appear,   Soul of my inmost Soul, Light of Life, the Mourner chear,  And make...