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Grace Community Church Ramona Podcast


Aug 24, 2014

Cathy and I had a terrible two years of dating before our engagement. I was in a period of spiritual rebellion. Cathy was not sure about marriage. We call it two years of "kicking each other in the shins". But we loved each other and by God’s grace in December 1983 we were engaged. Initially we thought it would be a twelve month engagement, but encouraged by the counsel of my father, we shortened it to four and a half. April 28th, 1984 we were wed. We then honeymooned on the central coast of California.

Dating, engagement, wedding and honeymoon are traditionally the four stages of our western wedding system. In Jesus' day there were four stages as well in the Jewish wedding system: the arrangement, fetching, ceremony and feast. As the Bride of Christ, we will experience each of the four stages. In fact, we've already experienced the first stage – the arrangment. We're looking forward to the second stage – the fetching. And then we’ll experience the third and fourth stages revealed in Revelation 19:6-10 - the ceremony and the feast. But before we get to this, verses one through five of Revelation 19 vibrate with heaven's celebration at the fall of Babylon.