Proposition 6

The breaking of the loaf and the drinking of the cup are commemorative of the Lord's death.

Upon the loaf and upon the cup of the Lord, in letters which speak not to the eye, but to the heart of every disciple, is inscribed, "When this you see, remember me." Indeed, the Lord says to each disciple, when he receives the symbols into his hand, 'This is my body broken for you. This is my blood shed for you. The loaf is thus constituted a representation of his body — first whole, then wounded for our sins. The cup is thus instituted a representation of his blood — once his life, but now poured out to cleanse us from our sins. To every disciple he says, For you my body was wounded; for you my life was taken. In receiving it the disciple says, "Lord, I believe it. My life sprung from thy suffering; my joy from thy sorrows; and my hope of glory everlasting from thy humiliation and abasement even to death." Each disciple, in handing the symbols to his fellow-disciple, says, in effect, "You, my brother, once an alien, are now a citizen of heaven; once a stranger, are now brought home to the family of God. You have owned my Lord as your Lord, my people as your people. Under Jesus the Messiah we are one. Mutually embraced in the everlasting arms, I embrace you in mine: thy sorrows shall be my sorrows, and thy joys my joys. Joint debtors to the favor of God and the love of Jesus, we shall jointly suffer with him, that we may jointly reign with him. Let us, then, renew our strength, remember our King, and hold fast our boasted hope unshaken to the end."

• Blest be the tie that binds

  Our hearts in Christian love;

  The fellowship of kindred minds Is like to that above.

Here he knows no man after the flesh. Ties that spring from eternal love, revealed in blood, and addressed to his senses, draw forth all that is within him of complacent affection and feeling, to those joint heirs with him of the grace of eternal life. While it represents to him 'the bread of life' — all the salvation of the Lord — it is the strength of his faith, the joy of his hope, and the life of his love.13

This institution commemorates the love which reconciled us to God, and always furnishes us with a new argument to live for him who died for us. Him who feels not the eloquence and power of this argument, all other arguments assail in vain. God's goodness, developed in creation and in his providence, is well designed to lead men to reformation. But the heart, on which these fail, and to which Calvary appeals in vain, is past feeling, obdurate, and irreclaimable, beyond the operation of any moral power known to mortal man.

Every time the disciples assemble around the Lord's table, they are furnished with a new argument also against sin, as well as with a new proof of the love of God. It is as well intended to crucify the world in our hearts, as to quicken us to God, and to diffuse his love within us. Hence it must in reason be a stated part of the Christian worship, in all Christian assemblies; which leads us to state, illustrate, and sustain the following capital proposition, to which the preceding six are all preliminary.