Nothing can shake up your church’s mission, outreach and future growth more than divorce.

If half the married couples in your congregation divorced, how would it affect the church?

 

Tithing, volunteerism, lay leadership, church attendance would all drop … significantly! Demand for financial assistance, childcare, and more of your time through pastoral counseling would all increase …significantly.

 

Make your church and your community less vulnerable by proactively focusing on improving the health and quality of your congregation’s current and future marriages. Have a vibrant and thriving Marriage Ministry!

 

Church-goers want Marriage Ministry. Those who’ve attended Marriage Education classes confirm that it works. And half of those who’ve never attended Marriage Education would if it were made available to them.

 

As a Pastor, you’re busy and probably have too much to do already. And while there are other church priorities that you are working on right now, your church can’t afford to delay having a Marriage & Family Ministry that excites, engages, energizes, and educates, your entire congregation and the surrounding community.

 

 

The Community Family Reformation Initiative is a systematic approach to Divorce-Proof Marriages by:

1. Adoption of Church/Community Wide Marriage Covenant

2. Sponsoring Christian Couples' Conferences/Events in your area

3. Having a Strong Marriage and Family Ministry at Local Church Level

4. Pre-marital coaching and counseling available and required

5. Providing access (virtual and real) to Trained Professional Counselors and Marriage Mentors

6. Professional and culturally relevant tools

 

1. ADOPTION OF CHURCH/COMMUNITY WIDE MARRIAGE COVENANT

 

Adoption of the community-wide agreement kicks off the Community Family Reformation Initiative (CFRI).  The signing is typically done on the courthouse steps at Noon on the Friday of the weekend seminar. We Are Relationships works with local supporters to promote the event through the local media, radio, TV, newspaper, church bulletin announcements, etc.  At this event, local pastors and lay leaders meet on the courthouse steps to read the Community Marriage Covenant and publicly sign the document as a show of commitment and support. You can view a sample of this document here.  

 

2. WE ARE RELATIONSHIPS (W.A.R.) COUPLES' CONFERENCE

 

Jim and Teresa Adams, co-founders of We Are Relationships (W.A.R.) have spent over 20 years teaching and speaking to groups on Marriage and Family matters.

 

The Adams’ have discovered that couples can divorce-proof their marriage by understanding and embracing basic biblical concepts, and learning proven tools and techniques.

 

FMF offers weekend sessions designed to impact couples from all walks of life and in different stages of their relationships.  Whether a couple is dating, engaged, married, separated, divorced, or remarried; whether your marriage is sick and you want it to be super, or good and you want it to be great, the W.A.R. session offers a fantastic opportunity to discover God’s plan for marriage and family.

 

The sessions are interactive, energetic, and informative.  The Adams share tried and proven biblical principles on which to build a solid foundation and grow a strong marriage.  Solid and sound biblical teaching coupled with practical and personal experiences from their 24 years of marriage, allow Jim and Teresa to truly connect and impact with couples in all stages of a marriage relationship.  

 

The weekend’s itinerary also includes separate sessions designed specifically for Men and Women. We truly believe this is one of the best investments a couple can make in their marriage and our partner churches can extend to their member’s conference enrollment at half of the published session prices!

 

3. STRONG MARRIAGE & FAMILY MINISTRY AT LOCAL CHURCH LEVEL

 

A local Marriage and Family Ministry is a valuable asset to Pastors who are often overwhelmed by distressed marriages. Marriage Ministry Leaders are couples (at least 2) selected by the local Pastor as people with healthy, stable relationships with a passion to be positive role models for couples who lack competent relationship skills, and are spiritually mature and maturing couples.   

 

These Marriage & Family Ministry Leaders or Marriage Mentors become important sounding boards as couples face the inevitable challenges of marriage. Marriage mentors lovingly invest in the preparation, maximization, and restoration of lifelong marriages by walking alongside couples who are less experienced than their mentors.

 

We started and led the Marriage Ministry at New Hope Baptist Church- Jackson, MS for over 20 years, and Jim served full time on church staff for 7 years.  Weekly Worship service attendance averages over 1200 and weekly couples class attendance averages over 100! http://newhope-baptist.org  

 

We offer “train the trainer” services to our partner churches, including curriculum selection, programming ideas, and ways to successfully promote strong marriage and families in your local congregation.

 

4. PREMARITAL COUNSELING & COACHING 

 

It is our responsibility to raise the level of commitment in those considering marriage and those married couples who look for spiritual instruction. Couples who seriously participate in premarital education and counseling will have a better understanding of what marriage involves. An increased commitment to marriage preparation will result in the reduction of failed and failing marriages.

 

It is our responsibility to encourage couples to set aside time for marriage preparation. A wedding is but a day, while marriage is for a lifetime. The idea that couples will spend thousands of dollars, and countless hours preparing for a wedding, which lasts a day, with little to no investment in the actual marriage, which is designed to last a lifetime, must be reformed.

 

An effective marriage and family ministry includes an educational component during the preparation stages.  This component contains both an educational element and an assessment element.

 

5. PROVIDE ACCESS TO PROFESSIONAL COUNSELORS & MARRIAGE MENTORS

 

We Are Relationships works with local leadership to identify and equip couples to serve as marriage mentors in the local ministry and we locate counseling centers inside the local church making professional help both accessible and affordable.

 

6. PROFESSIONAL & CULTURALLY RELEVANT TOOLS

 

We Are Relationships’ Jim and Teresa Adams are the Co-Authors of the Amazon Best-Seller, Marriage- What to do Before and After You Say I Do. An excellent workbook (supplemented with podcasts) to use to prepare couples for marriage and/or work with married couples.  

 

 

Teresa holds a Master’s in Marriage and Family Therapy from Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, MS.  She is a Licensed Professional Counselor, and a National Certified Counselor.

 

 

We Are Relationships is also Certified as a “Train the Trainer” with Prepare-Enrich, https://www.prepare-enrich.com, certified facilitators with Prepare-Enrich, Certified Facilitators with S.Y.M.B.I.S. (Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts) https://www.symbis.com/ and Certified Smalley Marriage Intensive Coaches.

 

 

 

We Partner With the Local Church

The power of this ministry comes from the combined effort of our team and mentors in churches all across the country.

 

We share your desire to help couples improve their relationships. Imagine what it would look like in your church to have engaged couples entering marriage with a solid Biblical foundation, married couples taking their marriages from good to great and hurting, broken marriages made whole.