Seeking the Bride

This classic fairy tale comes with many ingredients of a great story. It is filled with sword fighting, giants, romance, Rodents of Unusual Size, betrayal, revenge, and the passion true love. The story begins with a young farmhand Westley and his true love Buttercup. Westley goes off to find a way to support his love, but word comes back to Buttercup that he is dead by the hands of the Dread Pirate Roberts. Buttercup goes into depression and then is betrothed to a prince, set now to become the queen.

On the eve of their wedding, the princess is captured by bandits, but the group of bandits are followed by a masked man. The man in black first fights with one of the bandits known for his skill in sword fighting and bests the swordsman through skill. Then the man in black must fight a giant in a battle of strength, ultimately wearing him down and defeating him. Finally, he must face the last bandit in a battle of wits, easily beating him by forcing him to choose the goblet with poisonous iocane powder. Upon discovering that the man in black is in fact the Dread Pirate Roberts, the man who killed her Westley, she becomes angry, but soon finds out that it is in fact her beloved Westley after all, who was not killed by the pirate but mentored by him. He has come back to rescue her and reclaim her love. Have you ever been loved by someone so much that they were willing to sail across oceans, engage in battle, fight giants, and put themselves to the test in order to be with you? Consider Jesus Christ, who was willing to put himself into a lowly place, face tests and temptations, and come face to face with death itself in order to be with his bride (the church).

We find out that it is the prince himself who has ordered the kidnapping of the princess in order to start a war with his neighbors. Westley and Buttercup are captured, and they willingly go as long as the prince agrees to let Westley go, which he doesn't. He is sent to be tortured and killed. Having been fully tortured and taken for dead, the sword fighter and giant come to find him dead, though he is resurrected and comes again to stop the wedding between Buttercup and the prince and to save her life as well, for the prince plans on killing her that evening. Westley saves Buttercup, marries her, and the rest of them live happier ever after. In our culture we don't have many situations that call us to go to our death for the sake of other people, but Jesus Christ endured the worst of tortures willingly for his bride, went into the "Pit of Despair", and overcoming death he fought his way back through all enemies to the heart of his bride to be with her.

Read Ephesians 3:14-21 to hear of the love of God through the Christ Jesus!