Scottsdale Bible Church
 In
Genesis 1 and 2, God records His establishment of the human race and marriage.
“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him;
male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, ‘Be
fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, ...’ ... The LORD God fashioned
into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the
man. The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man.’ For this
reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife;
and they shall become one flesh.”
Marriage is the foundational building block God created for relationships,
family, community and society. From the beginning of man, God has used it to
build the church, and today it is under attack like no other time in the past.
Because it is vital to healthy life, churches should give marriage a primary
focus, and with solid leadership raise up a volunteer lay-ministry team that
works in six key areas. These pillars of the ministry are:
- Marriage Preparation
- Enrichment & Education
- Couple-to-Couple Mentoring
- Couple Care
- Divorce Care
- Outreach
 Begin with a vision, developed and endorsed by the church leadership, and
built strong through gifted leaders who will champion each pillar. Make it stronger
still by well recruited, dedicated volunteers to do the work of the ministry;
searching for and providing the best available marriage resources through classes
and couple helps; and finding those key people who will get the word out to the
whole congregation.
The overall vision of the Marriage Ministry is for every believing couple
in the church, community and those coming under the church outreach partners
to be exposed to the fullness of God’s view of marriage and the roles that
husbands and wives each have in marriage. Its mission is to provide the most
effective training and tools to educate, encourage and motivate couples to grow
in their individual walk with Christ and to draw closer to the concept of “divine
US” that God gave as the foundation for marriage in Genesis.
To do this, the ministry will need to provide a comprehensive set of short-term
and long range ministry objectives that prepare and sustain individuals called
into marriage by God.
Each of the six pillars of the ministry should have that overall vision and
mission as a mandate. Each pillar also will draw its own supporting sub-vision
and mission, and develop annual actions plans to meet them.
The leader of the Marriage Ministry or Pastor personally selects lead couples
for each of the six pillars. The lead couples (the Marriage Ministry Council)
will be responsible to marshal a dedicated group of volunteers to serve in their
pillar. The Marriage Ministry Council couples should come together regularly
to discuss what each group is doing, what is working well and what things need
tweaking. Those recruited by the individual lead couples form teams that meet
separately to do the work of their ministry.
Foundational to a Marriage Ministry is a ministry of prayer that lifts up
the ministry and each of the team couples, daily. In addition to their rotating
team prayer roles, one church has their Marriage Ministry Council coming together
regularly in a home fellowship that bonds, binds and lifts one another through
ministry and life issues.
Pillar One: Marriage Preparation
Marriage Preparation is focused first in
children’s early development years by providing couples tools for the home
education of Christian values of marriage and family. This is to help them teach
their children what godly young men and women would choose to do in dating and
mate choosing, long before they reach the age where they begin to take interest
in the opposite sex. It may include classes for those in the fifth and sixth
grade and junior high to give young people a firm foundation as they enter their
dating years, especially if their parents are neglecting this opportunity. More
than half of the couples in the USA today live together without marriage, and
it is increasing. Those couples have only a 1 in 16 chance at success if they
marry, making a Marriage Ministry more important each year.
The second part of Marriage Preparation includes a Marriage Prep class for
those both entering first marriages, and Re-Marriage Prep class for those where
one or both are entering second marriages. Using relationship assessment tools
like Prepare Enrich and John Trent’s personality tool, will give the added
dimension of individualized work with couples as they prepare for marriage. This
is a supplement to, not a replacement of, pastoral, pre-marital work.
Pillar Two: Enrichment and Education
The ministry also aims at providing education
that teaches already married couples and those in trouble the fine points of
communication, conflict resolution, financial principles, how to deal with expectations,
etc., via small group studies and whole church conferences. Such classes may
be held in the church during the week, as Sunday School electives or as home
fellowship groups.
Pillar Three - Couple to Couple Mentoring
Couple-to-Couple Mentoring ministry
can be created with help from AMFM (Association of Marriage & Family Ministries).
Our church has served more than 80 mentee couples in the last four years. In
the future, it can be expanded to match mentors with all those couples coming
through the Marriage Prep and Re-Marriage Prep classes. This action will help
keep married couples connected to the church, since the majority of couples who
marry in the church - leave the church until they have their children or are
in a deep crisis.
Pillar Four: Couple Care
Couple Care may be carried on in small classes for
those struggling with unresolved issues, with individualized couple coaching,
and through referral to the church counseling ministry or outside professional
help.
Pillar Five: Divorce Care
The church will always have those who turn to God
in the pain of divorce, or who have marriages that they are thinking of leaving.
The church is the one place where they should feel the safest and hear the truth
about God’s plan for marriage, and if at all possible, work to reconcile
the marriage. The ministry’s role is not counseling divorce, but safety
for those in the marriage. Sadly, some will choose divorce instead of working
on their marriage. Then they must be lifted up in love, not judgment, and given
the help and opportunity to learn from their past, from their own mistakes in
the marriage that has ended, and how to grow into the man or woman that God designed
them to be. Those things that they failed to address in themselves during the
last marriage they will have to address now, or repeat their personal pattern
of dysfunction in the next.
Pillar Six: Outreach
Active community and world outreach make up the sixth
pillar of the marriage ministry. As you discover the fruit of a marriage ministry
in the church, you may desire to send teams to teach others the concepts you’ve
used, throughout the US or around the world.
Six pillars - these are designed to hold up the most highly prized relationship
on earth - between a husband and wife, in a growing relationship held together
by God’s love and grace.
Jamie Rasmussen, Senior Pastor
Ministry Contact: Wayne & Beverly Lehsten
Marriage Ministry, under the leadership of Pastor Wayne Lehsten
7601 East Shea Blvd
Scottsdale, AZ 85260
480-824-7200
480-963-4229 (Fax)
wlehsten@sbcaz.org
http://www.scottsdalebible.com
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