Smalleys Spearhead Focus on the Family’s Marriage Ministry / Curate Resources for Marriage Champions

Apr 10

It’s no secret that Focus on the Family has long carried the standard for marriage and family. Marriage champions have relied on Focus as a valuable source of resources they can trust for decades. As Vice President of Marriage and Family Formation at Focus on the Family, Greg Smalley, Psy.D., develops and oversees initiatives that prepare individuals for marriage, strengthen and nurture existing marriages and help couples in marital crises. His wife, Erin, serves as the strategic spokesperson for Focus on the Family’s marriage ministry and is also a licensed professional counselor with a private practice. The depth and breadth of resources available at Focus is extensive and include an array of those Greg and Erin created that empower champions to support marriages in all ages and stages.

Reconnected, a book the Smalleys published in 2020, was born out of a common concern voiced by couples they’ve met while speaking at various marriage retreats and events. “I’d hear again and again, ‘I’m committed to you. I love you. But it feels like we are just married roommates,’” Greg said. “Couples have a lot going on,” he continued, “kids, hobbies. They get busy, and it’s easy to drift apart and feel disconnected. Often, the only time they talk is to administrate something. They feel unknown and unseen by their spouse. They are trying to run a family and a marriage, and it takes a lot.

“While the ‘board meeting’ conversations happen naturally, couples need to learn to be intentional about making time every day to talk about their inner life – highs, lows, what’s stressing them out, what they are dreaming about,” he said. The Smalleys identified 10 common reasons couples might feel disconnected and counter with some easy and practical steps to reverse course. The book starts with an assessment, so busy couples can find out where they are missing each other and then read chapters to address those problems first.

“This book is super easy and super practical,” Greg said. Content from Reconnected appears in their live marriage event called Resist the Drift, which is reinforced by a seven-session follow-up small group experience couples can access online. “Reconnected helps address one of the two broad issues every married couple has to figure out,” Greg said. The first – how they will stay connected in the midst of all the busyness. The second – how they will repair conflict.

Repairing Conflict

Greg, along with Dr. Robert Paul at the Focus on the Family Marriage Institute, wrote the book 9 Lies That Will Destroy Your Marriage that models how to repair conflict. Conflict happens because some emotional button has been pushed, and they react, which in turn, pushes the other person’s buttons, causing them to react, which then pushes the first person’s buttons again, and they are spinning in a reactive cycle, which doesn’t work, Greg explained. Conflict shuts hearts down. “My job as an individual is to go to the Lord and get my heart back open, then we can find solutions that work.”

9 Lies offers a system of repairing conflict, including skills to help couples stay connected. (See more at a previous blog post here!)

Are you having conversations vs letting conflict build and start to close hearts? Greg confessed God showing him he can be guilty of not pursuing conflict restoration even in his relationship with Erin. “I’m learning how to do that better, taking ownership of feeling a disconnect and being the one to jump us back in.”

Sometimes couples need more help than a book or class can offer. Focus on the Family’s Hope Restored Marriage Intensives rest on the legacy of the Smalley Relationship Center (now Focus on the Family Marriage Institute) created by Greg’s father, Gary Smalley, a pioneer in marriage and family ministry.

Thousands of couples in crisis have found restoration through Hope Restored.

“The reality — marriage intensives succeed where other methods fail. More than 11,000 people have taken the step to participate in one of Focus on the Family’s Hope Restored Marriage Intensives. After completing the three to five-day intense counseling experience, 81% of participants were still married and ‘significantly happier’ two years later,” as reported in ministry follow up.

Greg credits the high success rate of Hope Restored to several factors “People are able to get away and be sequestered, they are treated to amazing hospitality, and they work with licensed therapists who specialize in how to address their problems.”

Greg noted two distinct categories of crises that can catalyze a rift in a marriage. An acute incident, which can include a death of a family member, infidelity, revealed addiction, something where the couple feels “discombobulated, and they don’t know what to do,” he said. “Intensives can help get an understanding as to what’s really going on and provide tools to go forward.”

Another case is the chronic couple. “They’ve been in a bad place for years and years,” he said. They are disconnected and have buried stuff they should have dealt with before. Now they are in crisis because one of the two is done. During the intensive, counselors will help them get to the root of what’s going on and give them the skills and tools to progress. Greg noted weekly counseling aftercare is a critical component of the Hope Restored program.

A trend he’s noticed that seems to underlie problems facing couples today: “We don’t do a good job as individuals knowing how to be whole, full, healthy and well cared for so we have something to give. We get married and think, ‘Finally, I’ve found the one who is going to love me the way I need to be loved! Now it’s their job to give me something.’ It’s not their job to make us feel successful. It is our job to get the help we need so we have something to give to them.” Self-care includes taking time for personal health and wellness. He noted he supports Erin’s morning spin class as he knows how much more energy it supplies her to expend on and be a good example to their family of six.

“My first and foremost responsibility is before the Lord,” he said, “but then I need to take care of myself, so I have something to give my wife and kids. The world is full of a lot of broken, worn out, exhausted people. In math, two negatives make a positive, but in the world, we don’t know how to do that.”

New Crisis Marriage Resource for Marriage Champions

Those who long to learn the skills and tools taught at Hope Restored Marriage Intensives now have their wish granted. Focus on the Family will release the Smalleys’ Marriage 911 in June 2023. The resource takes content from the intensives to create a 16-week program to train mentors so they can walk with a couple in crisis. “It’s loading everything we’ve learned in 20 years of intensives into resources a mentor can use. Marriage 911 includes full training so a mentor can feel confident how to provide immediate help for a couple in crisis. This is a game changer!

“In any church 24% of couples are in that really hurting crisis zone,” Greg continued, “They are far more likely to reach out to someone at church before a counselor. We are recognizing the vital role that the church plays with couples who are struggling. Someone will find out, but they don’t feel equipped to know what to do. Finally, we can give churches training to equip their mentors and feel confident the content is backed by 20 years of a marriage lab called Hope Restored.”

The Smalleys have been piloting Marriage 911 with 20 mentor couples at Woodland Hills Family Church, where they recorded a 90% success rate in marriages saved. “The church is so perfectly positioned to help couples in crisis,” he said. “They have small groups, people ready to come around them. We can’t replicate that anywhere.”

Marriage 911 ties back to support provided by Focus on the Family and the Smalleys themselves. Marriage champions can order Marriage 911 right from Focus, where they’ll receive workbooks, training videos, and additional videos taped by therapists on common topics accessible via QR code. Champions or mentees can call Focus and consult with one of the counselors if they feel stuck. “We can be their wingman,” Greg said. “You are not a counselor. You don’t have to delve into the past. Just stick with the program, and we’ll support you as you mentor.” The ministry has even developed a website just for champions to find information - https://www.focusonthefamily.com/marriagechampions/.

Ready to Wed

No marriage ministry would be complete without outreach to premarital couples to help them start on the right foot. The couple co-wrote Ready to Wed in 2013, and Greg continues to lead the program himself at his church in Colorado Springs. While he stands by his content, which starts with an assessment that helps couples identify a snapshot of their relationship, Greg confesses he believes the real value of a premarital program for engaged couples is that is sets a precedent that it is ok to get help.

“They’ll start off by learning some things, and they’ll recognize they don’t know it all,” he said. The good experience will help them reach out when they need support someday.

Greg shared what he would tell his engaged self if he could go back to when he was 23. “You have to deal with your stuff. Your baggage is going to create such pain and heartache for many years. Don’t look for the perfect person, become the perfect person.” Greg referenced an article he wrote, “12 Questions a Dad Should Ask His Future Son-in-Law.” “My favorite question is, ‘Would you marry you?’ It so stumps them. I know you have baggage. I know you look at porn. Are you telling me you are at a place, honestly, where you would give your daughter permission to marry you?”

The Smalley Story

Marriage Champions familiar with the name Smalley might wonder how Erin and Greg became motivated to follow the footsteps of Greg’s father into marriage ministry. The two met as sophomores at Grand Canyon University in Phoenix and became friends after Erin pranked Greg when he fell asleep in an early morning Old Testament class. They worked as camp counselors at the same place but never dated until they ended up on the same cruise after graduation, which sparked their romantic interest.

Greg described what it was like growing up in the home of one of the original marriage advocates. He and his siblings often accompanied their father to marriage events, working the book tables, or just tagging along, a practice he now replicates with his four children. In fact, if Erin can’t join him at an event, he always includes one of their children to safeguard their marriage. “Some ministry leaders try to bifurcate work and family,” he said. “How we integrate that makes such a big difference.”

While Greg loved what his father did for marriages, it was Gary’s trademark authenticity Greg mentioned first, “My favorite thing is that he was the same person at home as he was on stage.” Although he admired his father’s work, Greg initially wanted to pursue a law degree. When he wasn’t accepted at his first-choice school, mentor Dr. Gary Oliver suggested he do some graduate work at Denver Seminary. Once Greg started the counseling program, he fell in love with it and continued to obtain a doctorate degree in clinical psychology from Biola University. He joined his father at the Smalley Relationship Center while Erin began studying for her own master’s degree in clinical psychology at Evangel University.

People would often tell Gary that they loved what he was saying, but they had a hard time applying the concepts and wanted to meet with him personally, Greg said. “Guys would show up in RVs at the door and say, ‘I’m not leaving until Gary speaks to me.’” Greg, Erin and Dr. Robert Paul saw a need to expand the Smalley Relationship Center to meet this need and started creating the multi-day intensive for couples in crisis that became Hope Restored.

The pace of leading intensives weekly combined with speaking at marriage events on weekends became grueling, and the couple felt called to leave the successful program in the capable hands of Dr. Paul (now Vice President of Focus on the Family Marriage Institute) and Mark Pyatt (now Chief Family Ministries Officer at Focus on the Family). The Smalleys were executing marriage programs at John Brown University in northwest Arkansas when a divine appointment at the same gate in the Dallas airport connected Greg with Jim Daly, Focus on the Family’s President. Jim had just been at a meeting discussing the idea of asking Greg and Erin to head up Focus’ marriage department. The couple took that position and relocated to Colorado Springs 12 years ago.

Over the years they have written dozens of books, including, Crazy Little Thing Called Marriage, created assessments and curricula, and speak at marriage enrichment seminars. Erin co-hosts the Focus on Marriage podcast and is a frequent guest on Focus on the Family’s “Daily Broadcast,” as well as many other radio shows, including Live the Promise with Susie Larson.

You can find the Smalleys at Focus on the Family at focusonthefamily.com or on social media platforms.