In Remembrance of Him: Profiting from the Lord’s Supper by Brakel Wilhemus a & Saldenus Guilelmus

Author:Brakel, Wilhemus a & Saldenus, Guilelmus [Brakel, Wilhemus a]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Reformation Heritage Books
Published: 2015-03-29T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

6

T hus, we have set before you how, by virtue of God’s gracious cooperation, the Lord’s Supper in many ways is efficacious in rendering us more fruitful and holy.

I want to conclude by briefly dismantling several objections to what I have just addressed.

Objection #1: I am ignorant of how the Lord’s Supper is efficacious toward sanctification. Regardless of whether I have partaken for the first or tenth time, I remain unaffected.

Answer: 1. If someone can say so casually that this is completely foreign to him, then I dare say that such a person has little reason to believe he has ever partaken of the Lord’s Supper in truth. Should such a person desire to detect this in his heart, may it then please the Lord at some point to grant him a measure of such fruit.

2. If these are the words of a concerned soul, then I wish to counsel her to refresh her memory and to determine whether she may have forgotten the effect the Lord’s Supper did have upon her. Such forgetfulness can frequently be caused by temptations, spiritual desertion, or other causes. It may also be that such a soul suspects what she perceives in herself, because it fell short of what she expected and thus has concluded that it was not of the right kind. Weak Christians commonly err in this regard.

3. Not everyone experiences the efficacy of the Lord’s Supper in regard to both sanctification and spiritual joy in the same measure. We already observed this in the preceding with regard to spiritual joy.

4. In regard to sanctification, one can grow either upward or downward, for “the remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward” (Isa. 37:31). The first occurs when there is a greater abundance of visible fruits, such as the exercise of faith, love, etc. The other occurs when we are troubled and grieved more intensely and passionately about our spiritual deficiency than has previously been the case. It is then that the root of sanctification, a genuine and spiritual humbling of one’s self, takes root downward deeper and deeper into the soil of our heart. Even when there is neither upward nor outward growth, a tree still may be truly growing. What matters is whether it then grows downward, causing its roots to be entrenched all the more thoroughly. It can possibly be that by partaking of the Lord’s Supper you frequently do not grow upward, but rather that you have decreased in your own estimation and have been exercised more deeply with your deficiencies. I have stated some evidences of this earlier. Or, your complaint may possibly be that your partaking of the Lord’s Supper has yielded so little progress in holiness.

5. It could also be that your sanctification is that vigorous that you may not notice that you are progressing by each successive participation in the Lord’s Supper. It is always true that the weak and the young can discern their increase in strength much more readily than someone who already is strong and mature.

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