Resurrection by "ordinary means"

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The former resurrection (that of a sinner to repentance by preaching) is wrought by a plain, and ordinary means here in the church; where you do but hear a man in a pew, read prayers, and pronounce absolution, and a man in a pulpit preach a sermon, and a man at a table consecrate, and administer a sacrament; and because all this, though it be the power of life, and the means of your spiritual resurrection, is wrought by the ministry of man, who might be contemptible in your eye, therefore the whole work is referred to God.

John Donne Sermon XVIII, preached at St. Paul's, in the evening, upon Easter Day 1625.

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