Hello,
1) what exactly have you added to your cron?
2) well, as the error message says, you have invalid code there, so you have not copied it from the manual correctly; please, double check it
I think the problem is that you have spitted the code to multiple lines, please, make sure it is on single line, such as
$pdf_url = "index.php?option=com_vminvoice&controller=invoices&task=pdf&cid=".$db->f("order_id");
The formatting in PDF breaks the code to multiple line, you can check the online version, there it is correct -
www.artio.net/vm-invoice/documentation#d0e565