Whether you're developing a new marriage ministry or growing an existing ministry — it's important that your staff, leadership and volunteers are on the same page on a few key items.

This list applies to pre-marriage mentoring, but has application to general marriage ministry.

• Elder's Statement — Do you have standards in place regarding:
  
  
  Re-Marriage: Under what conditions is a person free to re-marry? Also consider a Divorce statement.
  
  Sexual Purity: Do you require a commitment to purity?
  
  Living Arrangements: What if a couple is living together?
  
  Spiritual Condition: How do you define equally yoked? Do you marry seekers?
  
  Will you marry unequally-yoked couples?
  
  
  
• Who can be married at your church? Who can engage in your marriage process? Does a couple need to attend your church? For how long?
  
  
• Will you mentor non-Christians? Seriously consider this evangelistic opportunity.
  
  
• Marriage Criteria. What biblical principles govern whether or not your church will marry a couple? How will that be communicated to the couple?
  
  
• Pre-Requisites. Prior to affirming a couple's ceremony date, what is required of the couple? A marriage workshop? A budget class? Mentoring?
  
  
• Decision to Marry. Who makes that decision? Are your volunteer mentors empowered to do so? Will leadership stand by those decisions?
  
  
• Your Mentoring Program:
  Who will mentor? You? Volunteers?
  
  If volunteers...
  What are your recruitment criteria? Who will recruit and train?
  
  Have you developed a mentor-training program?
  
  Have you considered ongoing refresher training? Consider these four important components of any strong training program —  skills training, mentoring, testing, and small group.
  • What pre/marriage topics will be addressed?
    
    What objectives or values are most important? Community? Evangelism? Spiritual Growth? What are the core building blocks of a quality marriage?
    
    What will be the duration and frequency of a mentoring session?
    
    What kinds of issues might qualify a referral to professional counseling?
    
    What assessment tool/inventory (such as PREPARE-ENRICH) will be used, if any?

Jim Mueller is the President of Growthtrac.
Copyright © 2007 Growthtrac. All rights reserved.