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The Marriage Ministry team at Naperville Presbyterian Church provides for
premarital and married couples using the Prepare-Enrich Program. This program
helps identify and address a couple's relational strengths and growth areas.
The team regularly provides education regarding marital communication and
intimacy, and will, on request, provide consultation, support and mentoring to
couples with questions or in distress.
Your Wedding at NPC
Initial Contacts: Please contact the church office at 630-961-0579 to
check on availability and reserve the facilities for your use. You
will also need to contact the pastor you wish to perform your wedding service to
discuss and coordinate numerous issues including willingness, availability,
content and prerequisites. NPC wedding coordinator, Jamie Sonnenschein, will
assist you with various details in preparing for the wedding service.
Lew and Dottye Luttrell will arrange for premarital counseling.
Premarital Process
Naperville Presbyterian Church has developed a premarital process that we
believe will help you prepare, not only for your wedding, but also for a
life-long marriage that gives joy to you and glory to God.
We recognize the investment of time required for premarital counseling,
however, we believe the time spent developing skills and exploring and
discussing issues now will continue to pay dividends in improved communications
and your relationship as husband and wife until "death do you part". The
premarital process at Naperville Presbyterian Church generally includes the
following steps:
- Preliminary meeting with the pastor. Some of the topics that are likely
to be discussed during this meeting are:
- The date, time, and location of the service
- How the two of you met and fell in love
- Any special concerns you may have
- Your previous relational and marital experience
- Your spiritual life
- Recommended readings during this premarital process
- Mentoring. You will be paired with a married couple from Naperville
Presbyterian Church who are willing to share their experience and lessons
with you and help you explore and discuss issues and areas in your lives
that are likely to influence the course of your marriage. These issues might
include such things as your attitude toward sexuality, children, gender
roles, communication, household responsibilities, and finances.
- Your mentors will be chosen based on availability, scheduling,
location, personal preference, and pastoral discernment. Selection of
your mentoring couple will be done by your pastor and the leaders of our
premarital program, Lew and Dottye Luttrell.
- Your relationship with your mentors will be developed during a
number of informal meetings, generally from one to two hours in length.
You will have the responsibility of scheduling these meetings with your
mentors.
- Your first meeting with your mentors will include your completion of
a PREPARE Evaluation Instrument which is designed to identify areas of
strength, as well as potential growth areas that might be helpful to
discuss in future meetings. There are no right or wrong answers. It is
intended to help you see yourself, your future spouse, and your
relationship more clearly.
- There is a $35.00 charge for the computerized scoring and comparison
of the results. You will be expected to have cash or a check made out to
Life Innovations Inc. at the time you complete this instrument. There is
no other charge for the premarital process.
- After the results of the PREPARE Evaluation Instrument have been
delivered, you can expect to meet with your mentors a number of times to
receive feedback and to discuss the results. The number of meetings to
be held depends on you, the results of the instrument, and the length
and productivity of the meetings. The common experience has been between
three and six meetings.
- The results of this PREPARE Evaluation Instrument may be shared with
the pastor and/or pastoral care counselor who may be consulted, and
invited to join one or more meetings with you and your mentors. In some
situations, the pastoral care counselor may be asked to meet with you
individually or as a couple, without your mentors being present.
- In some cases, you may desire, or your mentors may recommend additional
meetings with
Dale and Meg DeJager of Crown Financial Ministries to more thoroughly
address stewardship issues and difficulties in budgeting, mutual financial
cooperation and submission, biblical principles of joint stewardship, and
debt management and repayment.
- Upon completion of the feedback process, you will again schedule one or
more meetings with your pastor to discuss what you have learned and to
finalize the plans for your wedding.
- We would anticipate three additional meetings with your mentoring
couple, at approximately four months, seven months, and twelve months after
your wedding. At these meeting, you will discuss your marital experience to
date and address any questions or problems you may have encountered along
the way.
This process is intended to give you the opportunity for a thoughtful and
thorough examination of yourselves and your relationship in order to identify
your relational strengths and address potential growth areas before they become
problems.
We look forward to your wedding day, and even more to your joyful, life-long,
God-honoring marriage.
Audio from the 2007 Sonship Marriage Retreat Conference
is posted here for download.
If you have any questions please contact
Jack Kelly, Director of Care & Counseling, at Naperville Presbyterian Church
630-961-0579.
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