Roger Gibson Taps Relationships, Experiences to Build Church Marriage Ministry from Ground Zero
By Amy Morgan
Roger Gibson has been the Marriage and Family Pastor at Fellowship of the Parks since 2016. The multi-site church encompasses five campuses in the Fort Worth area. You may recognize the maiden name of his wife, Kari Smalley Gibson, as being the daughter of marriage ministry pioneer Gary Smalley. Roger and Kari met in middle school and became high school sweethearts. Roger’s passion for marriage was birthed by literally growing up with the Smalley family. Roger and Greg Smalley (now Vice President of Marriage and Family Formation at Focus on the Family) would run Gary’s book table at speaking events like Promise Keepers. Men would tell him, “I desperately needed that message,” or “That book changed my life.” “I realized that fun guy I liked to be with (Gary) made a big impact on people’s lives,” Roger said.
Roger majored in Finance in college but eventually joined the Smalley Relationship Center to oversee publishing, events, and operations. While working on content development Roger discovered Ted Cunningham’s marriage ministry work and connected him with Gary — a relationship that produced much fruit as the two began to speak at events together. Roger remains close with Ted, often selecting his material as curriculum and inviting Ted to headline date nights for Fellowship of the Parks.
In 2012, Kari and Roger took a sabbatical to spend 18 months on the mission field in Ethiopia, Haiti and Nicaragua. Upon their return, they felt called to become more involved helping churches create and implement marriage ministries. He joined the Assemblies of God Denomination National Office to help their 13,000 churches develop marriage ministry within their discipleship process. But Roger realized his heart was really for more personally leading marriage ministry within a specific church.
Fellowship of the Parks Senior Pastor Doug Walker recruited Roger to join his team. He stated the church’s three pillars: 1) Reaching spiritually disconnected people 2) Strengthening the home 3) Defending the Fatherless. Developing the church’s marriage ministry was Roger’s primary responsibility. He started from ground zero in 2016 with a blank slate and carte blanche support from the senior pastor, including a budget that now exceeds $60,000.
When asked how Roger enlists support from his senior pastor, he replied that marriage ministry is part of Fellowship of the Parks’ DNA. “It’s successful because Senior Pastor Doug Walker set it out to be successful. One of the three pillars of his vision is strengthening the home. I’ve just got to run the place. That’s why he brought me here.”
Before he began, Roger commissioned research to gauge public perception of church marriage ministry. The results weren’t encouraging. Of the 1800 couples surveyed, results were that marriage ministry was 1) boring 2) outdated 3) preachy 4) female-centric.
“When most people hear about marriage ministry, they run the other direction,” Roger said. “We had a battle on our hands.” He followed a strategy that he would recommend to any church implementing a new focus on marriage: Year one, launch with the idea of having fun. Get couples to just do date nights to overcome the four deadly assumptions. Don’t focus on setting up classes, just work on engaging as many couples as you can, then slowly go into classes.
He launched Fellowship of the Parks’ initiative with a fun date night featuring his longtime friend Ted Cunningham with a specific purpose of engaging people. They included a challenge for couples to go on 20 dates in 2016. They called it 20in16. Those who sent pictures of their dates to the #20in16FOTP hashtag were eligible to win monthly prizes to generate interest. One couple who completed the challenge then won the grand prize of a free week-long cruise.
More than 90% of the couples at Fellowship of the Parks participated in that first initiative, he reported. Feedback included people who said they hadn’t gone on dates for years. Throughout the first year, the congregation saw the power of dating – even some couples who had been separated started slowly building back their friendship. He heard comments from guys like, “This has been great to date my wife.” “I’d tell them, ‘Welcome to marriage ministry.’”
The next year, Roger began teaching eight-week marriage strengthening classes on Saturday nights – which filled past capacity the first time they were offered. Every week the class got bigger and bigger. That’s when word of mouth took off, he said. “We had Latter Day Saints, Catholic churches, and even Gateway, the largest church around, sending people,” he said. From 2017 – 2022, 16,000 people have been through Fellowship of the Parks’ marriage classes. Roger created curriculum for the church marriage education format from content derived from the Smalley Relationship Center’s marriage intensive model called Pursue Oneness. (Which he now is re-writing and titling, Undivided)
“Couples flat out don’t know how to have a great relationship,” he said. How do you successfully do marriage together so you can win together? “Some couples have the chemistry but don’t know the seven strategies to have a healthy, biblical, fulfilling marriage.”
As he taught, Roger identified couples from the marriage education classes who had a passion for marriage and targeted them to be leaders. He notices who is hungry for the information and tells his marriage leads to be listening for their conversations. Those are the ones we call “on the bench.” They are not in the game yet, but they are being discipled by the marriage leads.
Roger delights in shepherding his marriage team members, spending time teaching curriculum content and how to work with couples on a one-on-one basis. He also jealously guards their time to prevent them from burning out. He’s always on the lookout for the next couples to elevate to become mentors. He particularly seeks those who have a story to tell of restoration in their own marriage.
“I want those who are not perfect. People see the marriage pastor, and they don’t think we’re believable. No one wants to listen to Ken and Barbie,” he said. His marriage team, including a director at each campus who plans and executes events, and coordinates volunteers and prayer, all came out of the discipleship pathway. Six of the seven couples are in a second marriage.
When recruiting, some might confess a second marriage with shame. Roger tells them, “That’s awesome… you’re exactly the person I’m looking for. You have a story to prove these biblical principles really do make a difference and provide hope. Just be vulnerable and transparent. Talk about your past. Nobody wants to hear about perfect. You are believable. When you are believable, people will lean in to you.
“They’ve learned it and live it out,” Roger said. “Now they are able to come back and say, ‘In my previous marriage, I blew it, but when I learned these things, it changed my life and trajectory of marriage.’” He looks for those who embrace their story of how God turned a negative into a positive. “God allowed them to grow so they can share and minister to others.” He’ll tell them, “Don’t allow Satan to hold that and make you feel disqualified. God wants to move you forward in ministry.”
Along with the advent of marriage classes in 2017, Fellowship of the Parks also implemented a simple texting program that they publicize at date nights and from the pulpit. People are encouraged to sign up for a weekly text message that sends out marriage encouragement and a connection challenge every Thursday afternoon. An example was a Zippers and Wallets challenge, that suggested couples talk for 14 minutes about three sex or money questions every day for 14 days.
Couples respond that they have not had that quality of conversation in so long. “They are not going to have those conversations in a small group. We set them up for those conversations at home. Now we are setting them up for success,” Roger said. “It’s not so much what happens on the campus that matters. If you can create opportunity for connection at home between husband and wife that creates value, that’s where the real win happens.”
Roger said adding a text to join component is simple, easy, cost effective and effective. The software is free, and phone numbers go right into a data base when someone joins. All the pastor has to do is write the content and send. “It takes very little effort from the staff person with very high return,” he said. “It is little things like that that can make marriage ministry win.”
While it’s easy to track the number of people signed up, it is more difficult to track personal growth. Roger and his marriage team notice and hear from conversations that many who join the texts then sign up for date nights and marriage class.
Fellowship of the Parks began offering date night events on the campuses their second year of marriage focus. Each campus now hosts at least two a year, which adds up to 10 across the campuses. Event attendance can soar up to 2000 for the more popular speakers like Gary Thomas, Montel Jordan and comedian Yacov Smirnoff. Roger selects a high energy, marriage minded speaker and includes contemporary music from groups like Guns and Rose to Coldplay rather than worship songs. One event titled Love and War included a boxing ring on stage.
“We want people to laugh and have fun,” Roger said, “and we’re always thinking about the unchurched.” That’s why the experience is such a big deal, we want unchurched couples to engage with each other, not sit at a table and eat with strangers or go to a small group. He tracks metrics and notes between 18-34% who attend Fellowship of the Parks’ date night events claim no church home.
Before people leave, Roger closes with a next step – enroll in the text message, do a challenge. “We have people in our data base who don’t come to church but come to date nights on a regular basis,” he said.
Many people request marriage mentors as they engage with Fellowship of the Parks’ programs – so much so that the volume was beginning to overwhelm Roger’s marriage team. He created a marriage mentoring central hub called Marriage Boost that has morphed into a weekly, mid-week marriage service. “It’s becoming like the new student ministry in the adult format,” he said. “A lot of adults want to have fun, they want to connect, communicate, learn and have a place where they can pursue Jesus together.” Marriage Boost started in person during the pandemic and soon Fellowship of the Parks found they couldn’t handle the need. What began with 12 people now fills the main auditorium. “Couples really do want that place where they can come every week and be encouraged in their marriage. It’s that mid-week accountability of putting into practice what they’re learning.”
Fellowship of the Parks launched Marriage Boost with content from Ted Cunningham’s Helping Couples Win with the expectation that people would move into small groups. But they found people didn’t want to leave the Marriage Boost environment. Roger expanded curriculum to include the Seven Strategies to Making Love Last Forever from Pursue Oneness including topics like gaslighting, passive aggressiveness, PTSD, depression, loneliness in marriage, sex, and questions like, What does having a Christ centered marriage mean? The evening starts with trivia games and worship, then settles into teaching and time to discuss specific questions.
Fellowship of the Parks’ marriage ministry has grown to include efforts targeted to other specific audiences.
They created Launch to appeal to seriously dating or engaged young adults.
In addition to the date nights, text groups and Marriage Boost, they tailor content specifically for Young Couples groups (like buying your first house or preparing for the new baby) for those with children under ten.
They also have groups to address the needs of Blended families.
When asked how he selects curriculum for his programs, Roger mentioned being very specific about using a common vocabulary across all platforms, so that when they talk about something like communication, they are using the same definition.
Fellowship of the Parks uses SYMBIS assessment for premarital couples as well as Les and Leslie Parrott’s Better Love assessment.
He’s been pleased with Ted Cunningham’s Helping Couples Win as well as Gary Thomas’ Cherish.
Roger also modifies content from Pursue Oneness to fit needs.
On the topic of needs: The biggest gap Roger reports seeing in church right now is the difference between men’s and women’s marital satisfaction, with women being much more unsatisfied than men. “We want to help men win at home. Many churches have a men’s ministry structure. How can they have conversations about what it means to be a successful husband? Men are still behind.”
When couples are in crisis, Fellowship of the Parks has two programs: one-on-one direct marriage mentoring and a Marriage 911 group couples can work into as their relationship improves.
Crisis couples will fill out an intake and meet with a mentor couple to discern the disagreement and whether they need to separate for a time as they work on things. They’ll pinpoint what is getting in the way of the relationship they want. (addiction? affair?) The second stage is to develop a plan toward restoration individually and as a couple. Then, the mentors disciple, shepherd, and keep the couple accountable.
Roger notes his mentors are not professional counselors, so part of a restoration plan might be for one or both of the crisis spouses to meet with a professional counselor from a vetted list or an addiction specialist or attend a marriage intensive. They’ll get a specialist in the area involved so that the trained professional can be the gatekeeper to whether a person can return to the home. In the beginning, the husband of the mentor couple might meet with the crisis couple husband separately, and the wife likewise, until they progress to a place where they can begin mentoring together.
Once a couple has demonstrated success with the one-on-one mentoring process, they can be invited to join Marriage 911, a small group of other highly conflicted couples who meet with a mentor lead. The one who’s trying to win back their marriage really wants to work their way into the Marriage 911 group, Roger added.
Another one of Fellowship of the Parks’ pillars of focus is Defending the Fatherless, which includes Orphan Care. Roger notes his wife, Kari, spearheads the church’s effort in that area. The Gibsons have three children, including an adopted daughter from Ethiopia.
