Marriage Support

Marriage resources

2×2 Merge Mentoring

Here at FBC we believe that God has the best design for relationships and marriages, and we are committing to helping others live it out faithfully.  Merge Mentoring helps seriously dating and engaged couples understand God’s purposes for marriage, evaluate your relationship, and receive encourage from a experience mentor couple.   

This 8-session process will be hosted in mentor’s homes and will include topics such as communication, expectations, intimacy, and finances.  Couples will receive curriculum with weekly homework along with a 45–60-minute teaching videos.  Mentor couples will arrange for sessions with couples that work with their schedules. 

Cost for Merge Mentoring is $50 and includes 2 workbooks and access to the online video teachings.  For more information, please contact Chris Schultz at cschultz@4fbc.org

 

Marriage Enrichment Programs

  • ReEngage – Marriage Enrichment Program designed to help renew, refresh or resurrect your marriage. Large Group teaching and testimony and small group connection and community – open every Monday at 6:30PM at Mission Hills Church

Counseling

 Full Counseling List

Relationship Assessments

  • Prepare & Enrich– The leading relationship inventory and the skill-building program is used nationally and internationally.  It is built on a solid research foundation and significantly improves a couple’s relationship.  
  • SYMBIS – The world’s most practical relationship assessment.  Gives you a personalized road map to making your marriage everything it was meant to be.  
  • FOCCUS – A pre-marriage and marriage enrichment inventory that helps couples assess and appreciate their unique relationship while learning more about themselves. 

Retreat Centers

  • Weekend to Remember– Practical, biblical, and authentic encouragement to follow Christ and grow relationships.  Counsel for both premarital and married couples.   
  • Marriage Getaway– Take a step back from the busyness of life with a weekend away designed to enrich, refresh, and re-energize your marriage at a Christian marriage retreat at Glen Eyrie Castle.  Through both group discussions and unstructured time together as a couple, you’ll be encouraged by God’s presence and the grandeur of the setting to unwind and invest in your marriage.
  • The Marriage Hub – “The Marriage Hub” seeks to provide Biblically-based marriage-building experiences for couples of all ages and stages. Our bold vision is to see divorce and the pain and suffering it causes eradicated from our society.
  • Scott River Lodge – Nestled in the beauty of Northern California, Scott River Lodge is designed for couples to find rest, refreshment, romance, and renewal.  Experience a place where guests can renew their souls and enrich their marriages.  
  • Hope Restored – A marriage-intensive experience program put on by Focus on the Family that will be able to address your needs around a variety of topics including communication, infidelity, intimacy, sexual issues, financial strains, blended families, children, and career conflicts. 

Recommended books and resources on marriage

  • Love That Lasts by Gary and Betsy Ricucci – Marriage is a profound and marvelous mystery established by God for his glory-and that is for our good. So many marital relationships never reach their greatest potential because they have the fatal limitation of being focused on one another. When our focus is solely on God, our marriages have the potential to thrive and not merely survive.
  • Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas – What if God designed marriage to make you holy instead of happy? What if your relationship isn’t as much about you and your spouse as it is about you and God? Best-selling author Gary Thomas uncovers the ways that your marriage can become a doorway to a closer walk with God and with each other. Join over one million others who have already uncovered Thomas’s tips for fostering a sacred marriage.
  • The Meaning of Marriage by Tim Keller – Few subjects are as compelling-or as endlessly variable-as love and marriage. The Bible is filled with references to husbands and wives, from the story of Adam and Eve to advice in the New Testament, each open to interpretation. Scripture is used to show readers what God’s call to marriage is, and why this is such a powerful call.
  • Marriage: 6 Gospel Commitments Every Couple Needs to Make by Paul David Tripp – In this rebranded edition of What Did You Expect?, popular author and pastor Paul David Tripp encourages couples to make six biblical commitments to the Lord and to one another. These commitments, which include a lifestyle of confession and forgiveness, building trust, and appreciating differences, will equip couples to cultivate thriving, joy-filled marriages built on Christ.
  • Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel by Ray Ortlund – Marriage is so much more than a human institution. The Bible teaches that marriage was created by God and reveals an eternal mystery – the mystery of the Gospel. In this way marriage paints a picture of our salvation in and through Jesus Christ. Book traces the Bible’s teaching on marriage from Genesis to Revelation – revealing how marriage stands at the center of God’s redemptive purposes for the world.
  • Love Talk by Les and Leslie Parrott – The first steps to improving this single most important factor in any marriage or love relationship are to identify your fear factors and determine your personal communication styles, and then learn how the two of you can best interact. In this no-nonsense book, “psychobabble” is translated into easy-to-understand language that clearly teaches you what you need to do – and not do – for speaking each other’s language like you never have before.
  • A Lasting Promise by Scott Stanley, Daniel Trathen, Milt Bryan – For more than fifteen years, Scott Stanley’s A Lasting Promise has offered solutions to common problems―facing conflicts, problem-solving, improving communication, and dealing with core issues―within a Christian framework.
  • When Sinners Say “I Do” by Dave Harvey – Marriage is the union of two people who arrive at the alter toting some surprisingly large luggage.  The Bible calls it sin and understanding its influence can make all the difference for a man and woman who are building a life together.
  • Married Sex: A Christian Couple’s Guide to Reimagining Your Love Life by Gary Thomas/Debra Fileta – A unique, comprehensive guide to sexual intimacy for Christian couples in every season of life.  Including the stories of real-life couples, research results from hundreds of comprehensive studies and professional perspectives.
  • Sex in a Broken World By Paul David Tripp – Sexuality is a fundamental part of what it means to be human, part of God’s beautiful design when he created all things. And yet, we’re all affected by sexual brokenness in some way or another due to our own sinful nature and the sinfulness of our fallen world. In this honest and life-giving audiobook, best-selling author Paul David Tripp helps us see the transforming grace of Jesus Christ that has been made available to all people.