Tomorrow is grocery day, so many decisions about our Day of Delight need to be getting settled so I know what I will be needing to buy for the meal, object lesson, and dessert.

I have been noticing my wedding gown on the top shelf of the closet since yesterday and learning that the candle lighting at the beginning of Shabbat in the Jewish custom has links to the expectation of the bride and that the Sabbath is seen as the Bride has all given me a direction for our Day of Delight - Bride, Bridegroom, and Wedding.

I know a little bit about how the Church is Christ's Bride, He is the Bridegroom, and just enough about Jewish customs related to marriage to know that this should be a very interesting theme for us.

First, I need to learn more, so research is in order. Here are some resource links that I found helpful:

• Jewish Marriage Customs Bible Study - The marriage customs of Biblical times Jewish marriage customs are first summarized. Then the author draws parallels between the customs and Christ as the Bridegroom and the Church as the Bride.
• Messiah Wedding - I like the way this author organized information - in a chart.
• Behold the Bridegroom Comes - Another good site for information
• What is in a bridal trouseau/Hope Chest? Potential future brides and moms of brides some day that never had this tradition want to know - Doorposts resource, The Hope Chest - great site with several links too!, History - short listing on this page see additional links along the side to learn more on this page, Sweet page from a gal who made one and wishes other young ladies the same joy,  You can buy a book on preparing the hope chest here, hope chest book and simple project you can buy here

OK, now to brainstorm some ideas for Saturday and Sunday:

• OK since the candle is a significant symbol of the begining of the Sabbath celebration and also has strong symbolism to waiting for the bride, the candle chosing and lighting of it will be significant for this Day of Delight. On my errand/shopping list I will make note of looking for a candle that will be significant for this purpose. Initial thoughts - maybe a white one for the color of the brides purity, maybe two of them to represent the bride's purity and the groom (Christ's) light, I may go with the favorites of the floating candles because that adds in the significance of water. I will just have to see when I get to the store.
• OK, how about dessert. Since the theme is wedding, how about a cake? When I asked for dessert suggestions last night, the only one who had a strong leaning was Tim and he took no time at all to shout out 'Cake!' Sounds like cake it will be. I can use the cake server that John and I had at our wedding and we can all do the giving each other the first bite of cake ritual common in weddings. That will be fun. John was such a comedian when he gave me my bite at our wedding - need I say more?
• The Meal. I found no hints of particular dishes mentioned for the wedding feasts in my research. From the Bible I know wine was served. No wine here thank you, but I could serve grape juice. I guess for the food part I am pretty well open to anything that strikes my fancy so long as it is feastlike.
• Hmmm. I think for individual quiet-time projects for Late Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon it would be nice to have some small sewing projects that Melody can pursue for starting her hope chest - I will check for internet ideas before shopping in hopes of finding free projects.
• Maybe some sort of woodworking project for the boys and John to parallel how the bridegroom goes to prepare/build a place for his bride. I will leave this area up to John's leading since he knows what wood we might have free for that pursuit and how energetic he might feel to lead it or when the timing might be.
• I want to emphasis how the bride must be ready at all times for the arrival of the bridegroom because she doesn't know what hour of the day he will arrive - though it is usually night. I think that I will set my wedding dress out in a nice quiet place in the house and encourage the kids to think of it as a reminder to always have our souls ready for the appearing of Christ. I will encourage them that if they suddenly become aware of commiting a sin during the day to go to where the wedding dress is and ask for forgiveness of God so that their hearts are always ready. It would be nice to add that in to the bedtime routine, reminding the children how the groom often came at night and that even then the bride had her wedding gown ready. This will help those that might not have thought to examine themselves for sin during the day the reminder to do so at least now.

My mind will be occupied with brainstoprming even more during the day. I will post more as I have enough ideas gathered to record them here. I also want to locate, design pages for, and print out key Scripture to have up around the house related to our Day of Delight. I will try to post these if anyone wants to use them.