How to be Marriageable: Class 1

Several weeks ago I wrote a post entitled How to Be Marriageable. In it I laid out, at a high level, some key considerations and preparations a man should undertake to prepare himself to meet that special someone and to serve as the foundation of a happy and fruitful marriage. I even taught pretty much the same information to a men’s group, touching on all the points in about 30 minutes without going into a lot of detail for each.

My plan already was to develop each point into it’s own teaching and present it to a group of young men that I connected to. When I presented the idea to the lads there was a long silence as they considered the prospect. Finally, one of the guys (and a leader) said, “Ok, I’ll do it.”

Another of the young men said, “Yeah, I’ll do it; what could it hurt?” To which the first young man said, “Oh, it’s Mr. Stewart — it could hurt!” Nevertheless almost all of them gathered last week for our first class. I’ve posted here the “script” I used and followed (for the most part). There was a lot of discussion and some diversions where I used examples from my personal life to illustrate a point and those aren’t captured here. There should be enough to give you a good idea of what’s up, though. It starts very similarly to the original post but quickly moves into more detail than I wanted to provide initially. There’s also a link to a handout we’ll be using.

4 thoughts on “How to be Marriageable: Class 1

  1. Good points–one thought I have is that if we really want to counsel young people (or even the middle aged) towards healthy attitudes towards marriage, we really ought to teach the theological realities behind it and integrate that teaching into the points you’ve made. That is, there is a reason God uses marriage as a picture of His love for the Church and His people in the OT as well. My hunch is that at least believing young men would take care of a lot of the specifics better if we taught the overall theological significance of marriage better.

    Just my 2 cent suggestion, bargain at half the price. :^)

  2. So this “Marriageable” thing is interesting.

    I’d love to see someone do an “are you re-marriageable” class for all of us who’ve been through the grinder and might theoretically think about it again. In addition to all the usual “bachelor” stuff you get with never-married guys, you can add in everything from ambient anger to PTSD.

    (And no, I’m not thinking about it at the moment – but never say never, eh?)

  3. Q, I think a lot of what we cover in the future “Marriageable” classes (which I plan to post here) can be helpful for re-marrieds. A lot of what’s here are lessons from personal experience and the experiences of others; things that I and others learned (often the hard way) after we were married. With the added perspective and understanding of your own experiences, asking certain questions of yourself and understanding (not the same as moderating) your expectations could be very beneficial. Feel free to stop by and add your questions/comments as we go on.

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