[citation needed] In 1663 Richard Alleine, a Puritan, published Vindiciae Pietatis: or, A Vindication of Godliness in the Greater Strictness and Spirituality of It.
[6] In his Short history of the people called Methodists,[7] Wesley describes the first covenant service; a similar account is to be found in his Journal of the time.
Wesley reports that he "recited the tenor of the covenant proposed, in the words of that blessed man, Richard Alleine".
[10] This later text, known in modified form as the Wesley Covenant Prayer, remained in use—linked with Holy Communion and observed on the first Sunday of the New Year—among British Methodists until 1936.
[14] In the 1920s, British Wesleyan Methodist minister George B. Robson expanded the form of the Covenant Service by replacing most of the exhortation with prayers of adoration, thanksgiving and confession.
Although the form of the covenant prayer and service have been simplified, important elements of them are still retained from Wesley's Directions.