Calvin on Comfort for the Sinner Approaching the Lord's Supper

This is the quickest…method of preparation for you. If you want to derive proper benefit from this gift of Christ, you must bring faith and repentance. Therefore, so that you may come well prepared, the examination is based on those two things. Under repentance I include love, for there is no doubt that the man, who has learned to deny himself in order to devote himself to Christ and his service, will also give himself whole-heartedly to the promotion of the unity which Christ has commended to us. Indeed it is not perfect faith or repentance that is asked for. This is said because some people, by being far too insistent upon a perfection which cannot be found anywhere, are putting a barrier between every single man and woman and the Supper forever. But if you are serious in your intention to aspire to the righteousness of God, and if, humbled by the knowledge of your own wretchedness, you fall back on the grace of Christ, and rest upon it, be assured that you are a guest worthy of approaching this table. By saying that you are worthy, I mean that the Lord does not keep you out, even if in other respects you are not all you ought to be. For faith, even if imperfect, makes the unworthy worthy.