Weddings
If you are planning a wedding and are looking for a church or pastor, here's what you need to know about how we approach marriage at LCC.

I. Booking the Church Facility
Booking the church facility and booking a pastor to perform your ceremony are two different issues. You may book our facility, if it is available, and have another pastor or marriage commissioner perform your ceremony. A booking form which includes suggested donations can be picked up at the church office. If you are looking for a pastor to perform your wedding, please continue reading.

II. Booking a Pastor
We do not believe it is part of a pastor’s job or calling to perform wedding ceremonies. However, it is a part of the call of pastors and churches to help build strong families. If our involvement in performing a wedding ceremony can help build a strong family, then it fits into our purpose for existence.

Strong families do not happen by chance. They happen through a conscious effort and deliberate process beginning before the wedding, and continuing through the ceremony into the years of marriage. Premarital counseling is a way to start on the right track. It is important, in our confused society, to take time during the engagement to think through exactly how a strong family is built. This is why premarital counseling is required when our pastors are involved in a wedding.

III. Premarital Counseling
Some purposes of premarital counseling are:
1)  To provide you with information about married life.
2)  To help you get to know each other better.
3)  To explain how Jesus Christ can help your marriage succeed.
4)  To aid you in making the final decision about whether or not to go ahead with your plans.
5)  To help the pastor discover if he can and should perform your wedding.

Our premarital counseling process consists of a thorough questionnaire and approximately 4 one hour sessions. There may be occasional homework assignments as well. We prefer to know about a wedding four or more months in advance so we don’t need to rush this process. A final decision to perform the wedding ceremony will not be made until there has been one or two premarital counseling sessions.

Some things that might prevent a pastor from performing your marriage include:
1)  You are in the process of trying to dissolve a previous marriage.
2)  Your planned marriage is clearly a "rebound" or pressure situation.
3)  You want rites or rituals as part of your ceremony that we cannot endorse.
4)  You and your fiancée have different spiritual values.  For example, one of you is a professing Christian, one is not.
5) You are pursuing same sex marriage.
6) Another pastor from Lake Country Church has already decided not to perform your wedding, for a reason other than scheduling conflicts.

This is not a complete list, but gives you some idea of why we might choose not to be involved in your wedding.  If we feel we cannot perform your marriage, we will do our best to let you know as soon as possible.

IV. The Spiritual Aspects of Marriage
We believe that
•Marriage is God’s idea
•The marriage ideal is monogamous lifelong union of one man and one woman
•Marriage is a visible expression of a spiritual reality
•Marriages and families are made stronger when each member has a relationship with God through Jesus Christ
•Divorce is the breaking of a covenant and a departure from God’s purposes
•Remarriage after divorce is biblically permissible in some, but not all cases
•Sexual purity prior to marriage helps build a strong foundation for marriage

V. Conclusion
If you have further questions or want to look into booking the church facility, please call the church office at (250) 766-4433 or email lakecountrychurch@telus.net

If you want one of our pastors to perform your wedding, please book an appointment through the same number or email.

God’s best to you as you seek to build a strong family!