found it.  This woman represents Jesus.  The lost piece of money represents our souls lost by sin.  The efforts of the woman to find the lost piece represent what Jesus did, when he left heaven, and took our nature upon him, and came as “the Son of man to seek and to save that which was lost.”  And it was the love of Jesus for poor sinners which led him to do all this for us.  And everything connected with the history of Jesus when he was on earth shows the greatness of his love.  Think of Bethlehem and its manger; there we see the love of Jesus.  Think of Gethsemane with its bloody sweat; there we see the love of Jesus.  Think of Calvary with its cross of shame and agony; for there we see the love of Jesus.

And the parable of the prodigal son teaches us the same lesson.  We read of this in the same chapter, St. Luke xv:  11-32.  This son had been disobedient and ungrateful.  He had taken the money his father gave him and had gone away and spent it in living very wickedly.  And when the money was all spent and he was likely to starve, he went back to his father, hungry and ragged, and asked to be taken in.  And instead of scolding and punishing him as he deserved, as soon as his father saw him, he ran, and fell on his neck and kissed him; and took off his rags, and dressed him in good clothes, and made a great feast for him.  How beautifully this parable illustrates the love of Christ for sinners!

And when we learn to know and feel the love of Christ for us, it does two blessed things for us.

One is, it makes us good.  We hear a great deal about conversion.  This word conversion simply means—­turning.  When a person has been living without trying to serve or please God, and is led to see how wrong it is to live in that way, and then feels an earnest desire to turn around, and live differently, and really does so:—­that is conversion.  The teaching or preaching of the gospel is the chief means that God employs to convert men.  And the thing about the gospel in which this converting power lies is—­the love of Christ.  Here is an illustration of what this means.

“He Loved Me.”  An English minister of the gospel was traveling in Switzerland one summer.  As he passed from place to place, he preached by means of an interpreter in various churches.  One Sunday night he preached from the words, “He loved me, and gave himself for me.”  Gal. ii:  20.  Then he went on his way without knowing what effect had followed from his preaching.

One Saturday evening, several weeks after, the minister of this church was sitting in his study.  There came a faint knock at his door.  He opened it, when, to his great surprise he saw there a young man, who was known as the wickedest young man in that neighborhood, and the leader of others in all sorts of wickedness.  He invited him in, gave him a seat, and asked him what he wished.  Judge of his surprise when the young man said he wished to inquire if he might come to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, which was to be celebrated in his church the next day!