"God this day gives thee a new year"

Come therefore to this circumcision betimes, come to it, this day, come this minute: this day thy Saviour was circumcised in the flesh, for thee; this day circumcise thy heart to him, and all thy senses, and all thy affections. It is not an utter destroying of thy senses, and of thy affections, that is enjoined thee ... captivate, subdue, change thy affections, and that is the destruction which makes up this circumcision: change thy choler into zeal, change thy amorousness into devotion, change thy wastefulness into alms to the poor, and then thou hast circumcised thy affections, and mayest retain them, and mayest confidently say with the apostle, We are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.

Do this to-day; as God this day gives thee a new year, and hath not surprised thee, nor taken thee away in the sins of last year; as he gives thee a new year, do thou give him a new-year's gift, a new and a circumcised heart, a new song, a delight to magnify his name, and speak of his glory, and declare his wondrous works to the sons of men, and be assured that whether I, or any other of the same ministry, shall speak to you from this place, this day twelve-month, and shall ask your consciences then, Whether those things which you heard now, have brought you to this circumcision, and made you better this year than you were the last ...

If you will hear his voice this day, This day you shall be with him in paradise, and dwell in it all the year, and all the years of an everlasting life, and of infinite generations. Amen.

From a sermon of John Donne, preached on the feast of the Circumcision of Christ, 1624.

(The painting is Rembrandt, 'The Circumcision', 1661.)

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