It is possible that this book may fall into the hands of some one who has forgotten his birthright, who, like the Scripture prodigal, has gone into a far country, and is trying to satisfy the hunger of his soul with the husks of this world—with money or land, or low, vile pleasures fit only for swine. To such an one let me say, your place in your Father's house and heart and table is still open to you. No one has taken it. No one ever will take it. It stands waiting for you, and unless you come home to occupy it, it must stand forever empty. Oh, my brother, my sister, remember that you are still God's child! You must be so, you cannot help yourself. Rebellious you may be, disobedient, ungrateful, lost to love, even to shame; you are still the child of God. Even though you have never been baptized in His name. He created you, and He has cared for you all these years. Return, then, to His House and His love while there is yet time, lest at last the door should be shut, and you be left to yourself, an orphan in the universe. Dan. iv. St. Luke xv. _SATURDAY BEFORE PALM SUNDAY._ _THE ALABASTER BOX._ THE selections of Holy Scripture set forth for the days of Holy Week are so abundant and so important that any one who studies them as they deserve will have little time for any other reading. * I propose, therefore, merely to glance at some one event of each particular day, following the chronology adopted by Dean Farrar. * For the same reason I have named no selections from the Bible. After the excitement which followed the raising of Lazarus, our Lord withdrew from Jerusalem to a little city called Ephraim, on the edge of the desert, where He seems to have spent some weeks in quiet and restful retirement with His disciples. Six days before the Passover He returned to the neighborhood of Jerusalem. He did not, however, enter the city immediately, but betook Himself to the little village of Bethany, the home of His chosen friends Mary and Martha, and their brother Lazarus. It was at a supper made for their honored guest that Mary's full heart overflowed in that offering which has made her name sweet through all the ages, and on which her Lord bestowed the emphatic commendation, "She hath done what she could." She hath done what she could! She gave her Lord the very best of all that she possessed—the alabaster vase of precious perfume, costly as gold; an article of luxury, even with the rich. Are we doing the same? Do we give Him the best of our time, our means, our labors? Or do we, like the covetous Jews rebuked by the prophet, offer Him only that which no one else will thank us for? "Cursed be the deceiver who hath in his flock a male, and voweth and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing." (Mal. i. xiii.)