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A34902 Advice to communicants for necessary preparation and profitable improvement of the great and comfortable ordinance of the Lords Supper that therein true spiritual communion with Christ may be obtained, and the eternal enjoyment of God sealed / by Robert Craghead ... Craghead, Robert. 1695 (1695) Wing C6791; ESTC R32371 116,968 168

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Lords words but Confessest him before men then take comfort from what Christ saith Mat. 10. 32. Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men him will I confess also before my Father which is in Heaven and mind what followeth in the next verse But whosoever shall deny me before men him will I also deny and though we have not often the occasion of such publick confessions as many Blessed witnesses had before us yet while we converse with men on Earth we shal still be found either confessing Christ his words and true godliness or ashamed and fainting great may be their Comfort who a vow Holiness in all companies This is the more to be adverted because if some Christians be permitted to keep their chambers or much retired from Converse with men then they obtain some measure of comfortable exactness in their Practice but no sooner engadged in Company but some fainting appears shrinking from their former exactness and failing of the Duties required in all company sinfully forgeting God whereby they often return with loss to their Souls and a condemning Conscience Therefore let the fear of being Denied by Christ still influence thy deportment more than fear of mens displeasure 7. When thou art helped in some sincerity to Obey thy Lord having a respect to all his Commands endeavouring to act all thy obedience by Grace out of Christs Fulness and taking delight to do his will yet art thou not of the same mind that Christ requireth Luke 17. 10. When ye shal have done all these things which are Commanded you say we are unprofitable servants though ye take comfort in obeying from the heart as an evidence of Gods grace and Favour yet dare not trust to it as a procuring Cause of the least of your Mercies thou thinkest in heart there is no more cause to boast of the best of thy performances than if a man should declare himself a fool by boasting of filthy rags then the Grace that helpeth thee to obey maketh thee also humble and of the poor in spirit who are rich and Blessed in Christs account CHAP. IV. Sense of sin necessary before Partaking The third Inference THis Blessed Ordinance of Christ being the Communion of his Body and Blood Then Communicants are to approach it with a humble sense of their sin as needing the Vertue of that Precious Blood And that this is necessary Consider First That if ye have not the Sense of your sin you cannot duely regard a Crucified Christ and so may mistake the whole work despising his Death as of no great use for you and so cannot and will not apply his Blood for purging away of Sin and Guilt for thou art not sensible of Guilt This of it self were there nothing else will make thee eat and drink Unworthily undervaluing that Life-giving Death for the Communicants work is humbly and thankfully to receive a Crucified Christ Represented in that Ordinance as knowing they perish without him 2. If there be no humbling Sense of sin thou shalt Partake as an hypocrite pretending before God and men that thou comest to Embrace Christ as the onely propitiation for thy sins and yet there 's no such thing on thy heart Thou doest not Judge thy self so Guilty or that ever thou provocked God to such wrath but that less might have served Thou felt no such a Burden of thy sin but such as thy self could bear with great ease thou wonderest there should be such a stirr in the World about sin thou never committed any sin but thou hadst a Covering of thy own to cast over it Thou couldest at any time after thy greatest abominations with the whorish Woman Prov. 30. 20. Wipe thy mouth and say I have done no wickedness If thus thou comest to the Lords Table thou wilt but receive Bread and Wine finding need of no more 3. If thy sin do nothing smart and wound thee thou wants the very best Qualification of a Communicant which is hungring after the Bread of Life For he satisfieth the longing soul Psal 107. 9. The Lord hath his Eye upon such more than all others ●sai 66. 2. But to this man will I look even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit he findeth out such when others are passed by such as are so sensible of their Guilt that they wonder that he should look upon them any other way but to Consume them such as are ashamed to look up to him because of their Iniquities Psal 40. 12. And yet are Longing for a Favourable Look They cannot look up and yet cannot but look up necessity constraineth them to hang upon him for Mercy knowing they perish without him such as these will be Graciously Visited and Received Isai 57. 15. He will revive the spirit of the Humble and revive the heart of the Contrite ones But thou a Stranger to these Contritions of heart will be a Stranger also to these Revivings and no wonder for thou feelest no need of them and therefore Consider 4. That it 's the way of God first to wound and then to Heal Deut. 32. 39. I wound and I heal If thou didst never know any Wounding of heart for sin what Healing canst thou either expect or value for no wounding and no healing no casting down and no raising up no sickness and no Physician For the whole need not the Physician but the Sick Thou hast no use for his coming with Healing under his Wings Thou has nothing to Heal he may spare his Visit until thou has more need of him and keep his Medicines for others Thus thou mayest sit down at the Lords Table with the Best but Christ and thy Soul have no Merciful meeting When the poor and needy are drawing out of Christs fulness getting their Diseases Healed and their Souls Restored Thou art sent away Empty neither art thou Disappointed for thou sought after no more Thou canst not complain of Christ for he Refused thee nothing thou sought Thou art like these Rev 3 17. I have need of nothing 5. Consider also that of all the meetings between Christ and poor sinners on this Earth this is the most Endearing and Comfortable when Sense of deep Guilt and deep Mercy meet together some times the poor sinner is ready to sink under the weight of Guilt it 's a Burden they cannot bear the Fear of Gods Wrath and Separation from him being intollerable The Soul chusing rather if possible to be Reduced to nothing and some times ready to Cry out O happy no Beings being compared with me they shal have no Anguish but my Anguish I can neither bear nor escape no Mountains can cover me from my Judge no Death will extinguish my Pain but if I die in my sins my pain shal never Die Death will flee from me when thus the the poor sinner is Bruised and can stand no longer how Gracious is that Message as Job 33. 24 Deliver him from going down to the pit I have found a ransom And Ezek.
for that Try thy self the more exactly in this point of thy love to the people of God because God is greatly dishonoured in this age for the want of it Beware of patcht up counter feit agreements and love before Communions But as thou art to labour for Communion with Christ himself so labour to the utmost of thy power for a cordial Communion of Saints that you may Feast together here in love and hope to be together in a better place and be not saying I forgive such a Christian but I desire never to see him I desire never to speak with him this will not be found forgiving from the heart as Christ requireth Matth. 18. 35. Let your love be without dissimulation Rom. 12. 9. Not in Word only but in Deed promoting the good name of one another See that ye love one another with a pure heart servently 1 Pet. 1. 22. These are the Words of God but Ah how little regarded and I fear shal not be much regarded while we continue falling from our first love to Christ love to him and his followers must revive together 4. We should also examine our Repentance because First Christ hath enjoyned it with a certification that except we repent we shal perish Luke 13. 3. How speechless will it render the impenitent perishing sinner when the Books are opened and this found that this obdured sinner was forwarned of this perishing but shut his ears and would not hearken 2. This repentance is that part of Religion which we are most averse either to act or try and therefore the greater need to oblige our selves to search if we have it For to hear of Faith and love and Love goeth more easily down the very naming of them is sweet to such as know little of them but cannot with patience hear of conviction mourning or departing from iniquity many also continue to ensnare their own souls with the conceit that they believe so well that they need not trouble themselves with repentance but they should remark Christs requiring of both Mark 1 15. Repent and believe 3. Others observing repentance to be peremptorly commanded Conclude that some repentance they must have but are satisfied with a shadow of it and are so superficial that any extorted flash of sorrowing any change any returning though not to the most High satisfieth them We find Hos 7. 16. That some return but not to the most High They think they have returned sufficiently And therefore need no more saying as Mal. 3. 7. Wherein shall we return The Lord seeth that they are yet to turn to him as in the same ver return unto me saith the Lord but they think otherwise this should make us afraid lest God do not iudge of our Repentance as we do and therefore to examine it in time It 's easie for people to think themselves sufficiently qualified for a Communion or for Heaven it self but the woe will be that it was only themselves thought so when they find God their judge of another mind 4. There is the more need to examine our Repentance in this age wherein the broken in spirit and contrite in heart are as signs and wonders as if all the broken in heart before us had been in an error and troubled themselves in vain or as if God never regarded any such Soul-exercise and wounding of Spirit though he hath expresly declared Isa 66. 2. But to this man will I look even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and trembleth at my word Then it 's necessary as men would have God to look favourably upon them as ye would have a comfortable reviving look at this Table to try if ever you were wounded in heart for your sin See to it lest the searcher of hearts have it to say here is a man that to this day was never humbled Jer. 44. 10. Never pierced at the heart never at what shal I do to be saved never so wounded but he could easily cure himself no use for that mercy Psal 147. 3. He healeth the broken in heart and bindeth up their wounds You will needs go to the Communion but it 's not for any great business you have to do there you have no burden of sin to take off as finding it too heavy for your selves Psal 38. 4. 5. There is the greater need to search particularly into the sincerity of our Repentance before we approach the Lords Table because some serious Christians may deprive themselves of that benefit fearing their Repentance is not sound and that because they had never such a measure of grief as others never so deeply wounded for sin as they think they should or as they have perceived by others who refused to be comforted were long in bondage of fear and ready to be swallowed up with grief and terrour To clear this alittle Consider first That trouble or terrour of mind of it self cannot prove any gracious good in a soul A Judas hath terror of mind but no grace terrour is sometimes a Judgement from God as Lev. 26. 16 I will appoint over you terrour and Deut. 28. 20. The Lord shal send upon thee vexation And some wicked persons are consumed with terrours Psal 73. 19. Therefore it 's not safe to desire such terrour of mind as some have been under for it was their plague 2. Men may have a temporary sorrowing and grie● which sin hath occasioned and yet their sorrowing is not for their sin nor any sanctifying grace in their mourning A Saul may lift up his voice and weep and confess others more Righteous than himself and yet still go on in his sin 1 Sam. 24. 16 17. Some may make a great noise of their repentance as he lift up his voice and wept And yet but a worldly sorrow that David was like to have the Kingdom is his greatest grief 3. Some are surprised with a sudden fear of Wrath which they cannot shake off but are as captives so far from any true and humbling sense of sin that all their trouble is for being troubled and cannot help it They are in chains and fetters not knowing for what for it seised them without any apprehension or sense of their sin This doth sometimes make a great alteration and commotion while it continueth so that they tremble under it as Felix Acts 24 25. The poor man knew not what was come on him he is frighted but getteth no good of it and therefore desires Paul to be gone I have seen severals after the same manner frighted with a sudden fear of Judgement and for any thing appeared their Religion never went a greater length yet their trouble in the time was great and made a great noise but when the fright was over their Religion was also over It is not safe then to set up such as paterns for your Repentance though the degree of their anguish might be greater than yours 4. Though the Law be our School-master to bring us unto Christ Gal. 3.