It’s wedding season, which for most soon-to-be-married couples means making final decisions and pulling together last-minute details for the big day.

For some, it also means going through the premarital counseling sessions many churches require. And although the mandatory counseling might seem like just another thing to check off a mile-long to-do list, those offering it hope it’s the thing on that list that benefits the couple far beyond their “I dos.”

“If God’s involved in their lives, blending the two as one, I don’t want to give them just the great wedding day,” says the Rev. Dennis Jennings, counseling pastor at Grace Evangelical Church. “I want to help them have a great marriage.”

Couples who want to be married by one of Grace Evangelical’s pastors attend a minimum of five sessions, he adds. During the first two, they take and then discuss the results of a 180-question temperament test that identifies weaknesses — such as depression, hostility or compulsive spending — that could negatively impact their marriage. Later sessions include discussions of issues such as children, finances and — at the top of the list — God.

“I want to see if they’re in the same place spiritually,” the Rev. Jennings says. “If I get a blank stare on the God question, that raises questions about their communication ... If you’re not talking about God, what are you talking about?”

But even for couples who may not have been prepared for the “God question,” the intent of the counseling is “very much to build them up, rather than to defame or insult them,” he adds. The intent also is to help them shed whatever baggage they might be carrying into marriage — which, sometimes, leads couples to postpone their weddings. This is one reason the Rev. Jennings suggests couples begin their counseling four to six months before their ceremonies, rather than trying to squeeze in all their sessions in a shorter period of time.

Of course, some couples may be dealing with the practical, day-to-day issues of marriage even before they’re married, which might affect the course their counseling takes or how much a couple gets out of it. Lacie Bell of St. Joseph and her husband, for example, lived together for two years before marrying and found that a lot of the issues that came up during their premarital counseling — such as finances and how housework would be divided — were things they’d worked out already.

“We didn’t really make any changes,” she says. “But I think premarital counseling is probably very helpful for people who haven’t already lived together.”

It can also be helpful for couples who are just beginning to contemplate marriage, says Vikki Crouch, a biblical counselor with the Center for Biblical Counseling at Frederick Boulevard Baptist Church. Although most couples who come to her for premarital counseling are within three months of being married, one of the most significant questions she asks them is one she hopes they asked themselves before getting engaged.

“I always ask if (marriage) is what God has for them,” she says. “ ... If it’s not his will, that’s certainly problematic, because what God wants is always what’s best for us.”

In the six to eight sessions Frederick Boulevard Baptist requires for couples who want to be married there, Ms. Crouch also covers why God ordained marriage, the roles and responsibilities of husbands and wives and issues such as budgeting, communication and ways to resolve conflict.

“The idea is to give young couples tools and guidance on how to have a strong, Christ-centered marriage,” she says. “They talk about things they wouldn’t even think to talk about otherwise.”

She adds that couples sometimes come in seeming unsure that the counseling will be valuable for them, but by the third or fourth session, she sees “a total turn-around. They’re talking more; they see that this is profitable.”

And given that most pastors require the counseling before they marry a couple, it’s obviously something they see as profitable, too, Ms. Crouch says — perhaps because the divorce rate is so high.

“I wonder if that has made pastors think, ‘Wait a minute; let’s do something to strengthen families before they even start,’” she adds. “ ...We want to help people, and we want their marriages to be as wonderful as possible.”

Lifestyles reporter Erin Wisdom can be reached at ewisdom@npgco.com.