Theses concerning the Lord’s Supper

1. The other sacrament of the New Testament is called the Lord’s Supper, not because it should be celebrated in the evening, or at the time of supper, but because it was instituted by Christ when he observed the last supper with his disciples before his death. It is called the Lord’s table, because Christ feeds us in its proper use. It is called the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, because the body and blood of Christ are communicated to us in it. It is called the eucharist, because there is in it a solemn thanksgiving for the death and benefits of Christ. It is called a covenant, because it should be celebrated in the public assemblies of the church. It is also called by the Fathers a sacrifice, because it is a representation of the propitiatory sacrifice which Christ accomplished upon* the cross, and because it is a sacrifice of thanksgiving.

2. The Lord’s supper is a sacrament of the New Testament, in which, according to the command of Christ, bread and wine are distributed in the assembly of the faithful, and received in rememberance of Christ; or that Christ may testify to us, that he feeds us unto eternal life by his body and blood broken and shed for us, and that we may return thanks to him for his benefits.

3. The first and chief design or use of the Lord’s supper is, that Christ may declare to us that he died for us, and feeds us with his body and blood unto everlasting life, that he may, by this declaration, establish and increase our faith, and so by consequence this spiritual food in us. The second end is the giving of thanks for these benefits of Christ, and a public and solemn profession of our duty to him. The third, is to distinguish the church from all other religions. The fourth, that it may be a bond of mutual love. The fifth, that it may be a bond of the public assemblies of the church.

4. The first end of this sacrament which is a confirmation of our faith in Christ, the Lord’s supper has, because Christ himself gives this bread and wine by the hand of the minister in remembrance of himself; that is, that he may admonish us by this symbol, as by his visible word, that he died for us, and that he is to us the bread of everlasting life, whilst he makes us his members; and because he has added to this rite the promise that he will feed those who eat this bread in remembrance of him, with his own body and blood, when he says, This is my body; and because the Holy Spirit by this visible testimony influences the minds and hearts of the faithful to believe with stronger confidence the promise of the gospel.

5. There is, therefore, a double meat and drink in the Lord’s supper one external, visible and earthly, which is the bread and wine; the other is internal. There is also a double eating and receiving the one external, and signifying which is the corporal receiving of the bread and wine are accomplished by the hands, mouth and senses; the other internal, invisible and signified, which is the fruition of Christ’s death, and a spiritual ingrafting into his body, accomplished not with the hands and mouth, but by the Spirit and faith. There is, finally, a double dispenser of this meat and drink the external of the external, which is the minister of the church, giving to us with his hand the bread and wine; the internal of the internal, which is Christ himself, feeding us with his body and blood.

6. The signs which serve for the confirmation of our faith are bread and wine, and not the body and blood of Christ; for the body and blood of Christ are received, that we may live for ever; whilst the bread and wine are taken, that we may be confirmed in regard to that heavenly food, and enjoy it more and more.

7. The bread is not changed into the body of Christ, nor is the wine changed into the blood of Christ; nor are the bread and wine abolished to give place to the body and blood of Christ; nor is the body of Christ substantially present in the bread, or under the bread, or where the bread is; but the Holy Ghost employs this symbol in the right use of the Lord’s supper, as a means for the purpose of stirring up our faith, by which he more and more dwells in us, inserts us into Christ, and brings it to pass that we are justified through him, and draw from him everlasting life.

8. When Christ says, This, that is, This bread is my body, and This cup is my blood, the form of speech is sacramental, or metonymical, so that the name of the thing signified is attributed to the sign, to teach that the bread is the sacrament, or symbol of his body, that it represents him and declares that the body of Christ was offered for us upon the cross, and is given unto us as the bread of everlasting life, and is, therefore, the means which the Holy Ghost employs for preserving and increasing this food in us, as Paul says, The bread is the communion of the body of Christ, by which it is meant, that the bread is the thing by which we are made partakers of Christ’s body; and in another place, We have all been made to drink into one Spirit. The same thing is also taught when it is said, that the bread is called the body of Christ on account of the resemblance which there is between the sign and the thing signified, viz, that the body of Christ nourishes the spiritual life of the believer, as bread supports our natural life; and on account of the certain joint-reception of the sign and the thing signified in the lawful use of the sacrament. This, too, is the sacra mental union of the bread, which is indicated by the sacramental mode of speaking, common in relation to this subject, which is no local conjunction as some imagine.

9. As the body of Christ is, therefore, both his natural and sacramental body, which is the bread of the eucharist; so the eating of the body of Christ is two-fold: the one sacramental of the sign, viz, the external and corporal receiving of the bread and wine; the other real, or spiritual, which is the receiving of the very body of Christ. To believe, too, in Christ dwelling in us by faith, is to be ingrafted by the power of the Holy Spirit into his body, as members to the head, and branches to the vine, and so to be made partakers of the benefits of the life and death of Christ. It is, therefore, evident that those who thus teach, are falsely accused and represented, when it is said that they make the supper consist in the bare signs, or in a participation of the merits of Christ alone, or of his benefits, or of the Holy Spirit, whilst they exclude the true, real, and spiritual communion of the body of Christ itself.

10. The lawful use of the supper consists in this, that the faithful observe this rite instituted by Christ in remembrance of him, or for the purpose of stirring up their faith and gratitude.

11. As the body of Christ is eaten sacramentally in the right use of the supper, so without this use, as in the case of unbelievers and hypocrites, it is sacramentally eaten, but not really; that is, the sacramental symbols or signs, which are the bread and wine, are, indeed, received, but not the things which the sacraments signify, viz, the body and blood of Christ.

12. This doctrine of the Lord’s supper is based upon many and most solid arguments. It is confirmed by all those passages which speak of the Lord’s supper. Christ, too, calling the visible and broken bread, and not something invisible in the bread, his body which was given, or broken for us, which, as it cannot be understood properly or literally, himself adds the declaration, that that bread is truly received in remembrance of him, which is as if he had said, that the bread is a sacrament of his body. He also says, that the supper is the New Testament, which is spiritual, one and ever lasting. Paul, in like manner, says, that it is the communion of the body and blood of Christ, because all the faithful are one body in Christ, who can have no fellowship or communion with devils. This same apostle also makes the same ingrafting into Christ by one Spirit in baptism and the holy supper. The same thing is confirmed by the entire doctrine and nature of sacraments, which exhibit to the eyes the same spiritual communion of Christ to be received by faith, which the word, or promises of the gospel declare to the ear. It is for this reason that the signs are called by the names of the things signified, and have the reception of the things themselves joined with them in the lawful use of the sacraments. The articles of our common faith establish the same thing, which teach that the body of Christ is a true human body, not present in many places at the same time, but is now placed in heaven to remain there until the Lord come to judge the quick and the dead; and that the communion of saints with Christ is effected by the Holy Spirit, and not by an interpenetration of the body of Christ into the bodies of men; and is, therefore, the doctrine which has been held and professed with great agreement by the whole church in her earlier and purer days.

13. The Lord’s supper differs from baptism, 1. In the rite and manner of signification. The dipping or washing in baptism signifies the remission and removal of sin by the blood and Spirit of Christ, and our fellowship with Christ in his afflictions and glorification; the distribution of the bread and wine signifies the death of Christ to be laid to our account for the remission of sins, and our ingrafting into Christ, so as to be made his members. 2. They differ in their operation. Baptism is the testimony of our regeneration, of the covenant made with God, and of our reception into the church; the Lord’s supper testifies that we are to be perpetually nourished by Christ dwelling in us, and that the covenant once entered into between God and us shall ever be ratified in regard to us, so that we shall forever remain united with the church and body of Christ. 3. They differ as it respects the persons to whom they should be administered. Baptism is ad ministered to all who are to be regarded members of the church, whether they be adults or infants; the Lord’s supper is to be given to none except those who are able to understand and celebrate the benefits of Christ, and to examine themselves. 4. Baptism is to be received but once, because the covenant once entered into with God is always ratified in the case of those who repent; the Lord’s supper is to be often received, inasmuch as it is necessary for our faith that we frequently renew that covenant and call it to mind. 5. They differ in the order which is to be observed. Baptism precedes the Lord’s supper; the Lord’s supper should be given to none except those who are baptized.

14. Those who examine themselves, and who are possessed of true faith and repentance, are worthy guests at the Lord’s table. Those who have not this testimony within themselves, ought not to approach the Lord’s table, lest they eat and drink judgment to themselves; nor should they defer that repentance which is necessary in order that they may come, and so bring upon themselves hardness of heart and everlasting punishment.

15. The church ought to admit to the Lord’s supper all those who pro fess to receive the fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith, and who have a purpose to live in conformity thereto; but should exclude all those who are unwilling to abandon their errors, blasphemies, or sins, when they are properly admonished by the church, and convicted of their errors and sins.

16. The Pope is guilty of corrupting the sacrament of the Lord’s sup per, in that he has removed from it the breaking of the bread, and refuses the cup to the laity. He is also guilty of the same thing in having changed the Lord’s supper, by the addition of so many ceremonies not delivered by the Apostles, into a theatrical mass. These innovations, however, are still more wicked and idolatrous: That the mass is a propitiatory sacrifice, in which Christ is offered to the Father, by the sacrificing priests, for the living and the dead, and is, by virtue of the act of consecration, substantially present, and remains as long as the forms of bread and wine continue uncorrupted; that the mass confers the grace of God and other benefits upon those for whom it is offered; that Christ is eaten orally, even though those who approach the Lord’s table are destitute of any good de sires or purposes; and that he is concealed and carried under the forms of bread and wine for the purpose of being adored. In view of these base corruptions, the mass ought to be abolished in all Christian churches. These corruptions may be included under these heads: 1. Transubstantiation. 2. The worship of bread. 3. Making a sacrifice out of the; Lord’s supper. 4. Mutilating the Lord’s supper by various human devices.

Certain principal arguments of the Consubstantialists against the sincere doctrines of the Lord’s Supper, and those whom they call Sacramentarians with a refutation of them.

The errors of the Sacramentarians, say they, are these:

1. That they make the Lord’s supper consist merely in naked signs and symbols. Ans. We teach that the things signified are, together with the signs, exhibited and communicated in the lawful use of the supper, although not corporally,, but in a manner corresponding to sacraments.

2. The Sacramentarians,, say they, hold that Christ is present in the supper only according to his efficacy. Ans. We teach that Christ is present, and that he is united to* us by the Holy Spirit, although his body is at a great distance from us, just as whole Christ is present in the ministry, although differently, according to the one nature. 3. We, say they, believe that an imaginary, figurative and spiritual body of Christ is present in the supper, and not his true, essential body. Ans. We have never spoken of an imaginary body, but of the true flesh of Christ, which is present with us, although it remains in heaven. We teach, moreover, that we receive the bread and body, but in a manner peculiar to each. 4. We, say they, hold that the true body of Christ which hung upon the cross, and his blood which was shed, for us, is distributed, and that it is spiritually received only by those who* are worthy guests, whilst such as are unworthy receive nothing but the bare signs, and these to their condemnation. Ans. We admit the whole as being in accordance with the word of God, with the nature of the sacraments, with the analogy of faith, and with the communion of the faithful with Christ.