Become the right person—before you meet the right one
“Build your house on the rock — the rain falls, the floods come, the winds blow, and it does not fall.” — Matthew 7:24-25
Years ago God put a vision in my wife and me — to give our lives to Chinese marriages and families. But back then I wasn’t ready. I burned years on video games. Nothing in me had turned. I couldn’t say the words, and I couldn’t get anything off the ground.
Then the Holy Spirit did it Himself. He turned me around, and only then could I stand up and do the thing God had handed me long before. I’m not up front teaching you an idea — I’m telling you what happened to me.
In our churches, the single ones have a circle that’s too small. The years keep stacking up. They won’t be “unequally yoked,” so they just stay stuck. Others rush into marriage before they’re ready. And almost nobody walks the road with them.
We watched two people — both genuinely good Christians — marry, and then leave each other over who they were. Good people, and the house still fell. A bad witness out of two good hearts. It broke us. Lord, have mercy.
When a home is falling apart, can that person really sit still on Sunday and take in a sermon? Will they even come?
We’re more and more sure of this: building godly marriages and families is not a “side ministry” of the church. It is the ground revival stands on. When the home stands, the person stands. When the person stands, the word gets in. When the word gets in, the church thrives.
We don’t hand someone off once they’ve found each other. We stay to the end — single, dating, married, raising kids: someone is there for every stage. And spiritual growth runs through all of it like a single thread.
But the unit that does the walking isn’t a class. It’s a family. And when the 21 weeks are done, that family goes and walks the next one.
The curriculum is built: five seasons, seven gatherings each (six sessions plus one night of ceremony), 35 in all — every lesson plan and slide deck finished.
But finishing the material is not the same as proving the ministry. So we’re not rushing to open a class. We’re going through the Married Track’s 21 weeks ourselves, as students: doing the homework, holding all three ceremonies, writing three lines of notes after every session, and revising the slides that same week.
The first thing we want to say to every family we ever walk is “This is what we walked” — not “this is a course I made.” How much that sentence weighs is what decides whether they’ll open their mouths.
The past — a covenant is not a contract. Look hard at the vow you actually made, talk it all the way through, and set it deep. The last night is Covenant Night.
The present — responsibility, love languages, handling conflict, and the four mountains. On the last night you read your original vows again, and renew them.
The future — we’re not raising a résumé, we’re raising a soul. On the last night your kids are in the room and you lay hands on them. It is also the night of sending: now it’s your turn to walk a family.
For single young adults — no matchmaking. First put your life on Christ the rock, get rooted in “who I am,” and become the right person.
Discipleship for dating and discernment — no matchmaking, no setting people up, no pressure to marry. Just trade your lens on love for God’s.
The wise man built his house on the rock. The rain fell, the floods came, the winds blew — and the house did not fall.
— Matthew 7:24-25Put your life on Christ the rock first. Become the right person, and then you can do the right thing and meet the right one — and build a home that holds up in weather. Build your love on the rock.
One family walks with one family for 21 weeks — only one at a time.
When it’s done, that family goes and walks the next one.
The way in is dating and marriage. That pain is real, it has a clock on it, and nobody needs convincing to show up for it. It’s also a door people who don’t yet believe will walk through — the front door says “marriage”; inside the room is the gospel and discipleship. You don’t have to pick between mission and discipleship here.
The unit is a family, not a class. Marriage has to be seen — it can’t only be taught. So it isn’t one lesson a week, it’s one evening a week, in your home: eating together, the phone call out of nowhere, watching us get a little short with each other in front of you and then make it right. A small group can’t give you that, and it’s the only thing in marriage discipleship that actually changes anyone. The lesson is just one stretch of the evening.
We watch exactly one number: whether the family we walked is willing to go walk the next family. Not headcount. Not completion rate. Not how satisfied anyone felt.
Family to family looks like the slowest way and is actually the fastest — because it isn’t optimizing “how many can we carry,” it’s optimizing “will the ones we carried go carry someone.” The first is addition. The second is multiplication.
Rooted in the local church — never a parallel organization. We want the pastors to see it and to be in it with us. This sits under the church, and the pastor’s authority comes first. We’d rather go deep than go wide.
For the daily spiritual rhythm we use our own free app, iPray — daily devotions, praying for each other, and sixty seconds of silence at 10pm. It turns the phone from the thing that steals your time into the thing that pulls you toward God. But the tool always sits behind the relationship: what the family in front of us meets is a real family, not an app.
This is a ministry, not a business — rooted in prayer, growing one step at a time as God gives it.
We’d love you with us — coworkers who share this burden, pastors who shepherd the flock. Come see it, pray for it, and build it with us.
Lord, have mercy —
and lead this road You Yourself prepared. 🙏