Setting:13 years ago
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| Me; the Sunday before Marriage Prep-Course started :) |
Once upon a time, on 3rd August 2011, I received an email from my good friend and office colleague at the time, 'George Moza'. I forwarded the message to Efo and his response was this - "Ok...that's cool. The location and day are also good." So it was, that we signed up to take a Marriage Preparation Course, at a time when we were considering marriage but had no wedding date fixed yet. Church pre-marital counselling hadn't also started yet.
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| Forwarded email received form George(Aug. 2011) |
Actually, we got married almost a whole year after taking this marriage-prep course, and that afforded us the opportunity to relax and learn. At a discussion during a church meeting about two months ago, it came out strongly that many couples preparing for marriage don't place much emphasis on pre-marital counselling. In fact, for some, the event venue for the wedding reception is booked way in advance before making marriage-intentions known to Church counselling teams/Pastors.
There's also a group of people who don't believe in pre-marital counselling at all - and this post is not to disrespect or discredit any schools of thought on the matter. :)
This post is to:
1. Celebrate a married couple, "Kofi & Dor", who have dedicated themselves to the Lord in this ministry, and have impacted many marriages for more than 2 decades now. God bless you!
2. Share information about the (interdenominational) Marriage Preparation Course run in-person in Ghana, and highly recommend it.
What are the odds that barely five days after I had made a note to share how helpful the Marriage-Prep course was with others, I would hear from Rev. Kofi Ankama-Asamoah (Uncle Kofi)? We don't communicate often, and our last 'real conversation' was in May 2022, and then in March this year, I asked to know when the next marriage prep course would be, so I could share.
So this course is great! Trust me. :)
Q1: "If there are online opportunities to take such courses, why should we bother to commit to 5 in-person sessions?
A1: Well, you get the benefit of interacting with other people who are on the same journey with you - destination marriage for some. Caution: there have been a few couples who have gone through courses like this together, who noticed some reasons why they couldn''t /shouldn't go ahead with marriage, and went their separate ways. Good or bad info? :)
Q2: Would we still have to go through pre-marriage counselling and other requirements at our individual Churches/congregations after participating in this course?
A2: Yes! This course doesn't take the place of all you need to do at Church with respect to marriage-prep. This is an 'extra'. One Ghanaian proverb puts it this way, "a lot of meat does not spoil the soup".
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| 'Triangle page'- one of my favourites |
As a believer in ecumenism (interdenominational cooperation between different Christian churches), I recommend committing to these in-person sessions, and being open-minded about the entire experience. God loves it when we're teachable..."For [a]whoever has [a teachable heart], to him more [understanding] will be given; and whoever does not have [a yearning for truth], even what he has will be taken away from him.” Mark 4:25 (Amplified Bible)
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| Back cover of the book we used |
We took the 5 Sundays as 'date days' - going together to the venue on the Spintex Road, Accra,
and spending a couple of hours having meaningful conversations, asking each other hard questions, going through the course with the Class of September 2011 'mates', listening to the course facilitators share very-relatable stories and experiences, and then finally joining a special session which was reserved for '2-weeks-to-the wedding-date'. There were people who had some virtual/online sessions per their unique circumstances too. Summary - such a blessed experience!Contact Uncle Kofi on +233 24 466 4464 or via email on kofiatua@yahoo.com, whenever you or anyone in your circles is ready for this course. Keep this in mind and together, let's spur one another unto good works and great marriages, for God and country. :)
Selah.
