Marriage Score Facilitator Guidebook

COUPLE OBJECTIVES: Help each couple consider the nature and quality of their attachments or CORE Connection with each other. Is their Connection based on conditional human love (contract) or perfect love (covenant)? COREGROUP OBJECTIVES: Help couples within the group build trust with each other. This process may take a few weeks, but beginning to build rapport starts week one. Trust corresponds to safety. MINISTRY SKILL OBJECTIVES: Providing safety is equal to building trust. Model and practice confidentiality and vulnerability; both build relational safety and trust. Talk openly and directly with the couples about how information shared in the group is to be kept safe. Use concrete examples about how personal information will not be spread. Also, share directly about what the limits of confidentiality will be for the group. TRUTH Scripture teaches us that the ways of God are different than the ways of man. This is most obvious by noticing the way humans love each other. At its best our love may be noble and beautiful, but when viewed next to God’s perfect love, it pales in comparison. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” — John 3:16 TIP: THIS TYPE OF LOVE IS COUNTER CULTURAL. MANY OF YOUR COUPLES MAY NOT HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED THIS KIND OF LOVE. The quantity and the quality of God’s love are different than human love. Man doesn’t have the resources or the capacity to love all the people in the world simultaneously. Humans have a hard enough time loving just one person consistently. Yet, God’s love also seems to be strangely different in terms of the quality of experience. It is deeper. It is more. It is perfect. “...I will never leave you nor forsake you.” — Joshua 1:5 “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” — Romans 8:38-39 “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!” — 1 John 3:1 “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” — 1 John 3:16 Human love is tainted with selfish motivations and always produces an imperfect love. God’s love, however, is perfect — in its motivations, in its goals, and in its results. The nature of God’s love is unique. Love connections can best be understood and experienced as either a contract or a covenant. Contractual love can be satisfying at times, but in the end it is not strong enough to build a marriage on. Contractual love is contingent love. It is the kind of love that depends on certain conditions. If the conditions are not met the love does not happen. Contractual love is unreliable and not dependable. In a word, it is weak. This is what human love is like. On the other hand, covenant love is strong. It rises above the circumstances. It transcends conditions and is reliable and dependable. God’s love is like a covenant and this is the kind of love that is needed for marriage to work. You know what it’s like to be loved like a contract and a covenant…and there is no comparison. Covenant love wins every time. The goal for this first section is that you will realize the truth that human love alone is not enough for a godly marriage. It is lacking. The only way to be successful and have a godly marriage is with God’s supernatural love. Human love is limited. On its own it can never reach the fullness of God’s plan and desire for your marriage. Don’t let the dream for marriage that God has given you be compromised, diminished, or abandoned. Instead of abandoning or changing the dream of a godly marriage, may you be changed. May you experience the fullness of God’s plan, for you, your marriage, and your relationship with Him.