Day: December 22, 2025

Before we go deeper, we need to be clear about what we’re talking about. God’s love is not a feeling or emotion. It’s a divine disposition: God’s character to be self-giving and for the good of the other, even at great cost to himself.

Love as Sacrifice and Self-Giving

The clearest expression of God’s love is Christ at the cross. God the Son exchanged heavenly glory for earthly servitude. He didn’t demand we prove ourselves first. He loved while we were still sinners, still opposed to Him, still broken.

Paul captures it: “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

This is love not in word but in deed.

Love as Covenant Faithfulness

God binds himself to his people not because they earned it, but because he chose to. His love is faithful: enduring through our unfaithfulness, our doubt, our wandering. He loved Israel when they forgot him. He came back, again and again. His love endures all things.

Love as the Culmination

Here’s where everything comes together:

Hope whispers: God will come.
Faith responds: I will act.
Joy announces: He has come!
Love reveals: This is why.

Love is the answer to the entire Advent question. Love drove the incarnation. Love sent God to earth as a vulnerable child.

Jesus said the entire gospel hinges on just two commandments: love God completely, and love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:37-40). Love is the interpretive key for everything God does.

The Scandal and Cost of This Love

The incarnation is not sentimental. God didn’t come as a concept or inspiration. He came as a vulnerable infant, grew in obscurity, lived as a servant, and died as a criminal:all to bridge the gap between sinful humanity and holy God. This love cost everything.

Christ’s incarnational love culminated in substitutionary sacrifice. He didn’t just show us a better way; He paid the price we owed. He bore God’s wrath that we deserve. He endured separation from the Father:the deepest possible suffering:so that we could be reconciled to God. This is love that is not safe, comfortable, or easy.

And here’s the scandal: we cannot earn this love or deserve this love or work ourselves into being worthy of this love. It comes to us while we’re still broken, still rebellious, still opposed to God. That’s what makes it grace.

The Window: The Princess Bride and “As You Wish”

In a castle, in a fantasy world, a farm boy demonstrates something true about incarnational love. His name is Westley. His refrain is “as you wish.”

Westley Remained the Farm Boy

Westley didn’t become the Dread Pirate Roberts and stop being the farm boy. He remained the farm boy while being the legendary pirate. He never ceased being the one who says “as you wish”:even when storming castles.

This is Emmanuel: God with us. Not distant. Not weak. Not limited. God present as both infinite power and intimate presence, unified in one person.

Jesus didn’t stop being God when he became human. He remained fully God while becoming fully human. Westley embodies this paradox: both legendary hero and humble servant, storming castles and saying “as you wish.” His identity as the one devoted to her good is never suspended, even when operating at legendary power.

A note on the limits of this illustration: Westley is a fictional character:his story ends, his love is romantic rather than redemptive, and he doesn’t require the sacrifice Christ required. The incarnation is far more scandalous than any film can capture. But in these specific ways:persistent pursuit, self-giving love, humble presence alongside power:Westley helps us see what incarnational love actually looks like in motion.

Westley’s Love: Three Movements

What does incarnational love look like in action?

Through service:the daily “as you wish.”
Farm work, ordinary moments, no grand gestures. God’s presence not in the spectacular but in the mundane. The infinite expressing love through daily grace. The difference between saying “I love you” and showing up day after day: “As you wish.”

Through sacrifice:willing to bleed and face death.
Climbing the Cliffs of Insanity with bleeding hands. Enduring the Machine. Facing death itself rather than renounce her. Paul captures it: “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). Westley’s willingness to sacrifice everything mirrors Christ’s willingness to endure the cross:not as a grand gesture, but as “as you wish” taken to its uttermost limit.

Through persistence:returning again and again.
The entire Dread Pirate Roberts arc is driven by one thing: getting back to her. Storming the castle while outnumbered. No obstacle stopping him. Returning again and again. This is God’s relentless pursuit of His beloved:pursuing us, calling us back, refusing to give up. Love that doesn’t abandon us when we fail. Love that endures all things. Love that says “as you wish” even when we’re engaged to someone else, even when we’ve forgotten, even when we’ve said no.

He loves us before we love him back. His love precedes our response. As Paul says: “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

What This Means for Us

At Christmas, we remember God’s love. It is complete. Not theoretical. Not from a distance.

He came. He served. He exposed himself to suffering and death for us. His love endures all things. It doesn’t demand we prove ourselves first: it precedes our response.

This love redefines everything:

• Our brokenness doesn’t disqualify us (Hope)
• Our doubt doesn’t defeat it (Faith)
• Our emptiness can’t contain the joy of receiving it (Joy)
• Our unworthiness is no barrier: this is where love finds us (Love)

Now God’s love in you should teach the world how to love. Not in word, but in deed. Through “as you wish”: the willingness to give yourself for the good of the other.

The Call: Your Turn to Say “As You Wish”

This is Advent Love: God’s willingness to be with us. Not from a distance. Not through intermediaries. God here, present, serving, bleeding, dying, rising to restore us.

As we enter Christmas, we celebrate the most radical truth: The infinite God loves you so completely that He became one of us.

And now:because you’ve been loved first, because grace has reached you:He invites you to learn from Westley. To say what Westley said again and again: “As you wish.”

But here’s what we need to understand: you cannot love incarnationally on your own. This isn’t a bootstraps-and-willpower kind of call. The love that storms castles and says “as you wish” daily and accepts the undeserving comes only from the Holy Spirit working in you. It flows from being loved so completely by God that you’re freed to love others without needing anything back.

This is the Gospel pattern: You are loved → You are transformed → You love others.

So this week, don’t approach this as a to-do list. Approach it as an invitation to let Christ’s love work in you. As you’re reminded of how completely He loved you, ask the Spirit to overflow that love through you toward others:

In service: Show up for someone in the mundane. Not with grand gestures, but day after day. The meal, the presence, the willingness to serve without recognition. This is what “as you wish” looks like when you’re no longer demanding that others earn your love.

In sacrifice: Choose someone’s good over your own comfort. Bleed a little. Risk something. Show them what love costs and what it’s worth. This is incarnational love:it requires something from you.

In persistence: Return to someone you’ve given up on. Call back. Show up again. Love that doesn’t quit when circumstances argue for it. This is God’s pattern with us. Now you, live it out.

He did this for you. He paid the price. He endured the cost. He loved you first.

Now, empowered by that grace, you say: “As you wish.”

And that’s the entire gospel lived out.

What would it look like to say “as you wish” to one person this week? Share in the comments below. I’ll be reading every one.

Grace and Courage to you as we enter Christmas.