“As You Wish”

At the outset of the film The Princess Bride, a poor farm boy named Westley is constantly ordered around by Buttercup. She tells him to shine her saddle or bring water to the house. All he says in response is, “As you wish.” Later in the film, she goes so far as to push him off a hill and tell him to die—you can hear him yelling all the way down the hill, “As you wish!” (directed by Rob Reiner [Twentieth Century Fox, 1987]). While Westley survives, and things work out between the two, the phrase “as you wish” should ring in our ears. It is a phrase of submission, of dying to our own will and obeying the will or authority of someone around us. And we do this every day! We submit to teachers by doing our homework. We submit to the law by following the speed limit. But as Christians, we are called to submit—first to Christ, and second to all other Christians.