I cannot think that the woman lighting a candle and sweeping the house represents the Saviour. She is generally, and I think correctly, thought to represent the Church. If this be the case it may serve to teach how the whole Church of Christ ought to be entirely engaged in carrying out the sacred mission of our Blessed Lord. It is not the Spirit alone that is to say “Come,” {15} but the Bride and all that hear the message. He has become man and died for us, but we are to light the candle, sweep the house, and seek diligently till we find the lost ones. We are to spare no effort for their recovery: we are to search them out; we are to let them know that there is a Christian friend anxious for their safety, and that there will not only be joy amongst the angels of God, but a hearty welcome amongst His people on earth for any poor lost one brought in lowly repentance to the feet of the Blessed Saviour, there to find pardon and recovery. And what are we to say of the third parable, for we find no mention of the seeking there. But we find the divine act most remarkably represented, for there we may see how God Himself seeks the wanderer. We do not see the father doing it in the parable, but we do see how God Himself does it in fact. We there see the work both of His providence and of His Spirit. Of His providence, for the Father in heaven both sought and found him, just as He is doing with thousands now. He took from him one thing after another till all hope was gone, and he envied even the swine their meal. God was seeking him, so He broke him down and crushed him on purpose that He might save. But God did much more than bring him into trouble, for trouble very often does nothing but harden. But in this case the Spirit of God was seeking him, so that it was a trouble blessed by the Spirit, and he was led with a broken heart to say, “Father, I have sinned.” See how God Himself sought him and brought him to true repentance. He was far away from the hand of man. He was lost to his father’s home. But he was never lost sight of by God. There was a loving eye watching him, and a loving care seeking him, so that though lost to man he was not lost to God, and his father with a full heart was able at length to say, “This my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.” A DIVINE SALVATION “Salvation is of the Lord.”—JONAH ii. 9. “According as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain onto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue.”—2 ST. PETER i. 3.