Keys to Navigating 7 Stages on the Path to Marriage - Nick & Emilie Peterson

STAGE 1: Single Key Verse – Matthew 6:33 "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you." Focus – Becoming the right person, serving others, and running hard after Jesus.

STAGE 2: Considering Key Verse – 1 Corinthians 7:39 "A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is free to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord." Focus - Know what’s biblical, essential, and optional, and don’t settle for less.

STAGE 3: Initiating Key Verse – Proverbs 15:22 "Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed." Focus - Intentionality and Clarity

STAGE 4: Dating Key Verses – Ephesians 5:1-3 "1 Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. 3 But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints." Focus – Keep Christ your main focus and don’t neglect others. Focus – Intimacy needs to follow commitment.

STAGE 5: Compromise Key Verses – 1 John 1:8-2:6 "8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. 2 1 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 Whoever says "I know him" but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: 6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked." Focus/Principle – In Christ, God’s grace is greater than our sin and motivates us to a holy life.

STAGE 6a: Break Up Key Verses Matthew 7:12 "So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets." Proverbs 16:28 "A dishonest man spreads strife, and a whisperer separates close friends." Focus (for the one breaking it off) – Be clear, honest, and kind. Focus (for the one being broken up with) – Be forgiving and discreet.

STAGE 6b: Pre-Engagement Key Verse – Proverbs 11:14 "Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety." Focus – Moving forward toward Marriage or toward Break-Up

2 Great Resources 1. Should We Get Married? 5 Pre-engagement Questions to Ask Yourselves by David Powlison and John Yenchko (from The Journal of Biblical Counseling) 2. Questions to Ask when Preparing for Marriage by John Piper

STAGE 7: Engagement Key Verse – Ephesians 5:21-33 "21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband." Focus/Principle – Keep God’s big picture in mind.