Who that knows aught of the pure and most excellent grace of God, or that has tasted aught of the true blessedness of divinely-accomplished redemption, could tolerate such language as, "Christ for His part" and "THIS INFANT FOR HIS PART?" Who that has listened, by faith, to those words, "It is finished," issuing, as they do, from amid the solemn scenes of Calvary, could endure a sinful mortal's "I do," or "I will?" What a total setting aside of grace! What a tarnishing of the brightness of God's salvation! What an insult to the righteousness of God, which is by faith, and without works! What a manifest return to a religion of ordinances and the poor works of man! Christ and an infant, or the infant's sureties, are placed on the same platform to work out salvation. Is it not so? If not, what mean the words, "Christ for His part, and this infant for his part?" Is it not plain that salvation is made to depend upon something or some one besides Christ? Unquestionably. The vows must be fulfilled, or there is no salvation! Miserable condition! Christ's accomplished work abandoned for a sinner's unaccomplishable vows and resolutions! Man's "I do" substituted for Christ's "I have finished!"
My reader, can you own such a fearful surrender of the truth of God? Are you content with such a sandy foundation? Whither, think you, will such a system lead you? To heaven, or to Rome? Which? Be honest. Take the New Testament, search it from cover to cover, and see if you can find such a thing as infants making vows by proxy, to renounce the world, the flesh, and the devil, and to keep all God's commandments, in order to salvation. There is not so much as a shadow of a foundation for such an idea. "By works of law shall no flesh living be justified." "But now the righteousness of God, without law, is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets." "To him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justified the ungodly, his faith is counted to him for righteousness." "For by grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast." "Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us." (See Rom. iii. 20-28; iv. 4, 5; Eph. ii. 8, 9; Titus iii. 5-7.)
These are but a very few of the numerous passages which might be adduced in proof of the fact that the Confirmation Vows are diametrically opposed to the truth of God—totally subversive of the grace of God. If my vows mean anything I must be miserable, because I am in imminent danger of being lost forever, inasmuch as I have not kept them, and never could keep them.
Oh! what sweet relief for the wearied heart and sin-burdened conscience in the atoning blood of Jesus! What full deliverance from my worthless and worse than worthless vows! Christ has done all. He has put away sin—made peace—brought in everlasting righteousness—brought life and immortality to light. In Him may you, my beloved reader, find abiding peace, unfading joy, and everlasting glory. To Him and His perfect work I now most affectionately commend you, body, soul, and spirit, fully assuring you my object in this paper is not to attack the prejudices, or wound the feelings of any, but simply to take occasion to show how the perfect work of the Lord Jesus Christ is thrown into full and blessed relief by being looked at in contrast with the "Confirmation Vows."
THOUGHTS
THE LORD'S SUPPER
PREFACE
The institution of the Lord's Supper must be regarded, by every spiritual mind, as a peculiarly touching proof of the Lord's gracious care and considerate love for His Church. From the time of its appointment until the present hour, it has been a steady, though silent, witness to a truth which the enemy, by every means in his power, has sought to corrupt and set aside, namely, that redemption is an accomplished fact to be enjoyed by the weakest believer in Jesus. Eighteen centuries have rolled away since the Lord Jesus appointed "the bread and the cup" in the Eucharist as the significant symbols of His broken body and His blood shed for us; and notwithstanding all the heresy, all the schism, all the controversy and strife, the war of principles and prejudices which the blotted page of ecclesiastical history records, this most expressive institution has been observed by the saints of God in every age. True, the enemy has succeeded, throughout a vast section of the professing Church, in wrapping it up in a shroud of dark superstition; in presenting it in such a way as actually to hide from the view of the communicant the grand and eternal reality of which it is the memorial; in displacing Christ and His accomplished sacrifice by a powerless ordinance—an ordinance, moreover, which by the very mode of its administration proves its utter worthlessness and opposition to the truth. (See note to page 29.) Yet, notwithstanding Rome's deadly error in reference to the ordinance of the Lord's Supper, it still speaks to every circumcised ear and every spiritual mind the same deep and precious truth—it "shows the Lord's death till He come." The body has been broken, the blood has been shed ONCE, no more to be repeated; and the breaking of bread is but the memorial of this emancipating truth.
With what profound interest and thankfulness, therefore, should the believer contemplate "the bread and the cup"! Without a word spoken, there is the setting forth of truths at once the most precious and glorious: grace reigning—redemption finished—sin put away—everlasting righteousness brought in—the sting of death gone—eternal glory secured—"grace and glory" revealed as the free gift of God and the Lamb—the unity of the "one body," as baptized by "one Spirit." What a feast! It carries the soul back, in the twinkling of an eye, over a lapse of eighteen hundred years, and shows us the Master Himself, "in the same night in which He was betrayed," sitting at the supper table, and there instituting a feast which, from that solemn moment, that memorable night, until the dawn of the morning, should lead every believing heart at once backward to the cross and forward to the glory.
This feast has ever since, by the very simplicity of its character, and yet the deep significance of its elements, rebuked the superstition that would deify and worship it, the profanity that would desecrate it, and the infidelity that would set it aside altogether: and furthermore, while it has rebuked all these, it has strengthened, comforted and refreshed the hearts of millions of God's beloved saints. It is sweet to think of this—sweet to bear in mind, as we assemble on the first day of the week round the supper of the Lord, that apostles, martyrs and saints have gathered round that feast, and found therein, according to their measure, refreshment and blessing. Schools of theology have arisen, flourished, and disappeared; doctors and fathers have accumulated ponderous tomes of divinity; deadly heresies have darkened the atmosphere, and rent the professing Church from one end to the other; superstition and fanaticism have put forth their baseless theories and extravagant notions; professing Christians have split into sects innumerable—all these things have taken place; but the Lord's Supper has continued, amid the darkness and confusion, to tell out its simple yet comprehensive tale. "As oft as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show[10] the Lord's death till He come" (I Cor. xi. 26). Precious feast! Thank God for the great privilege of celebrating it! And yet is it but a sign, the elements of which must, in nature's view, be mean and contemptible. Bread broken, wine poured out—how simple! Faith alone can read, in the sign, the thing signified; and therefore it needs not the adventitious circumstances which false religion has introduced in order to add dignity, solemnity and awe to that which derives all its value, its power and its impressiveness from its being a memorial of an eternal fact which false religion denies.