What if you could receive Sozo together with your partner?
What if, having dealt with your own issues separately, you could come before God together and discover greater freedom and wholeness in your relationship with Him — and with one another?
That is the heart of Sozo for Couples.
Sozo for Couples is a ministry we developed, together with our friend Liz Gregg, that enables a couple to receive Sozo together so that they can overcome problems specific to their marriage and enjoy greater freedom and wholeness in their relationship with God and with one another.
We are the originators of Sozo for Couples.
Why Sozo for Couples?
Every couple has a story, and every couple brings things into their relationship that can affect the way they relate to one another. Sometimes those things are obvious: disagreements, communication difficulties, conflict or patterns that seem impossible to break, but sometimes they are less obvious. The way we see ourselves can affect the way we see our partner. What we believe about God can affect the way we relate to Him — and to each other. Things that have happened in the past can continue to influence the present.
And sometimes a couple simply finds itself stuck.
Sozo for Couples provides an opportunity to bring those things into God’s presence together.
Receiving Sozo together
The distinctive thing about Sozo for Couples is in the name. You receive Sozo together. This isn’t simply two individual Sozos happening at the same time, it’s an opportunity for the couple to explore what is happening in their relationship, with God at the centre and with their spouse sitting alongside them.
Rather than one person being treated as the problem, both partners have the opportunity to participate. Rather than simply talking about what is wrong, what happens is that each of the couple hears their spouse being helped by the Sozo for Couples facilitator to go deep into the root cause of the behaviour that’s been getting in the way of their relationship. They discover that it’s not a question of fault but history. They discover what God wants them to know, and rather than trying to fix everything by themselves, they can invite God into the process.
Why do we ask each person to have an individual Sozo first?
Before taking part in a Sozo for Couples, we ask each partner to have an individual Sozo session, preferably with us. This allows us to begin getting to know each of you individually before we focus together on your marriage. It also means that when you come together, the Sozo for Couples session can concentrate on your relationship rather than being your first introduction to Sozo.
The individual Sozo comes first. The Sozo for Couples comes afterwards.
What might you discover?
Every couple is different, so there isn’t a predetermined list of things that a Sozo for Couples will address. You may come because you’re experiencing a particular problem; you may have found yourselves caught in a pattern that keeps repeating; you may have unresolved issues from your individual pasts that are affecting your relationship, or perhaps you simply want to discover greater freedom and wholeness together.
You don’t have to know exactly what the problem is before you come.
The purpose isn’t to arrive with all the answers.
It’s to create space for God to speak into your relationship.
God at the centre
At the heart of Sozo for Couples is relationship with God. The aim isn’t simply to make your marriage work better, it’s to help you discover greater freedom and wholeness in your relationship with God and with one another.
A couple can become very good at communicating, negotiating and solving problems without necessarily dealing with the deeper things that influence their relationship. Sozo for Couples gives God a central place in the process. In a Sozo you have the opportunity to hear from Him for yourselves and discover what He wants you to know.
What happens in a Sozo for Couples?
The session is facilitated by people who understand the Sozo tools and the dynamics of working with couples. You’ll be encouraged to participate and engage with God for yourselves individually and together as you explore those things that belong specifically to your relationship.
The facilitator’s role isn’t to tell you what the answers are. It’s to help you by using the Sozo tools and creating a space for you to discover what God is saying. Each session includes a time of asking for forgiveness from each other for unhelpful behaviour and ends with a time of coaching, in which you’ll be encouraged to make a plan for how things will be different moving forward.
What if we have serious problems?
Sozo for Couples can be particularly valuable when a couple recognises that something is getting in the way of their relationship, but it isn’t a magic fix, we don’t promise that every problem will disappear in a single session. Sometimes there is more to explore. Sometimes a couple may benefit from more than one session, and we also offer a range of ministries for couples.
Sozo for Couples is one doorway — not the only doorway.
If you want to explore your marriage more intensively, Going Deeper in Marriage combines Sozo, counselling and coaching, and if you’re preparing for marriage, our ‘Starting Out’ Marriage Preparation provides a different kind of starting point.
We also run marriage weekends, Marriage Lived God’s Way.
You don’t have to wait until something is wrong
Sozo for Couples isn’t only for couples in crisis. You may simply want to go deeper, or you may want to understand yourselves and one another better. You may want to strengthen your relationship with God together, or you may have discovered something in your relationship that you’d rather address now than allow it to become a bigger problem later.
Sometimes the best time to work on a relationship is before you have to.
A ministry we developed from experience
Sozo for Couples grew out of our own experience of working with people and couples through Sozo. We saw the potential of couples receiving ministry together and began developing ways of using the Sozo tools specifically within the context of a couple’s relationship. Together with Liz Gregg, we developed Sozo for Couples into the ministry it is today. It has become one of the most distinctive parts of Wonderfully Free Ministries.
And we’re still learning from every couple who comes through the door.
Is Sozo for Couples counselling?
No. Sozo for Couples is a Sozo ministry. It’s centred on prayer and relationship with God.
That doesn’t mean counselling isn’t valuable. It can be enormously helpful, and there are circumstances where counselling is precisely what a couple needs. If that is the case, we have other offerings that combine Sozo with counselling, but Sozo for Couples itself is about receiving Sozo together.
Is it for us?
Perhaps you’re wondering whether your relationship is “bad enough” to need something like this. Perhaps you’re wondering whether your problems are too small. Perhaps you’re not sure what you need at all.
You don’t have to decide any of that before you talk to us.
If you’re a couple who wants to overcome problems and enjoy greater freedom and wholeness in your relationship with God and with one another, Sozo for Couples may be a good place to start.
And if it isn’t, we’ll help you find the right place.
We’d love to help
You don’t have to arrive with the right words. You don’t have to understand Sozo. You don’t have to have worked out exactly what is wrong.
Just start where you are.
EXPERIENCES SHARED
What people have said
“I really want to share with you a testimony of our SfC session. My husband and I had the session on February 14th 2020. This Sozo session had a tremendous impact on me, my husband, our marriage, our attitude to ourselves and our relationship. I believe that was just an amazing start and I am very grateful to God. This summer we’re going to celebrate the thirtieth wedding anniversary. We have very close and good relationships and five wonderful children. When I was a teenager I was sexually abused and all my thinking, perception and reactions in this area were very distorted. I’ve never understood thatch sex could be beautiful and pure. I felt something was wrong with my reactions and it caused me confusion and disappointment. I did everything I could but nothing changed. My other problem was that I couldn’t give love to my husband without conditions, the love he deserved for and which he lacked very much. Well, I realised it but just couldn’t help it. During the Sozo for couples session, God touched my heart so deeply and healed my wounds and took away my pain. He gave me the truth instead of lies. He also helped me to let go all the grudges. I’ve accepted myself as a teengirl who was broken and rejected. I took off all the masks from my face, emotions and true essence. Jesus touched me with a kiss of Heaven, and now I can breathe, smile, cry and literally straighten my shoulders. But the most interesting thing I realized little bit later. It’s very personal but I want to share with you. Only God knows what that really means to me. The wonderful close moments with my husband after soozo became a discovery of new myself, my attitude to my body and my sexuality. I discovered that sex is good, clean and amazing. My perception of myself has changed, I finally believe I am worthy of love and respect. Now I can receive the very best God has for me. And a real breakthrough in another area of our family’s life took place after SfC session. Now we pray together as a couple, we pray with our children and spend time in God’s presence as a family. My husband started to take responsibility as the priest in our house. Now I know that just one touch of the God’s Spirit can change everything. Praise the Lord! And many thanks to the ministers who had such a sensitive and opened hearts, both to God and to us as a couple.”
“Rob and I had no idea what to expect in our demo and certainly no idea what would come up in a full session. The amount of freedom and revelation that was given to us was just crazy good. Papa showed us areas that needed healing and WOW, is all we can say! Personally, I thought I loved Rob with an everlasting deep, cheesy love but after our session I now know that I love him even more. How is that even possible? I understand him more and he does me. It’s crazy good…that’s all we keep saying. And we’re the couple that folks look at and say, “We want what you have. We want our marriage to be just like yours.” So if people are saying that BEFORE our session, I can only imagine what they’ll be thinking and saying now that we’re walking in even a deeper understanding of our relationship and love. Whoa!”
“I think people think Sozo is for when something is wrong. I think people think, you don’t go to Sozo until something is falling apart in your life. And that is so untrue! I mean there was nothing wrong with us. But the level God took us to after Sozo from where we were. It opened us up to a completely different part of our relationship that we wouldn’t have had without Sozo. Knowing it’s not him seeking God on his own and me seeking God on my own and then talking about what we each got from God. It’s coming together as a couple and finding out who Mario and Adelle are to Christ. So do it! It’s worth it!”
“Doing a couple’s SOZO was very powerful! We have been making the declarations over each other and it is amazing to experience the changes that have come along as a result. It was an enriching time that continues to bear fruit for us! Things that have brought frustration through the years are giving way to the truth that we received during our SOZO. God is so GOOD!”
“Tim and I had our first Sozo for Couples recently and found it to be a very intimate, vulnerable and healing time. Neither of us was aware of any areas that particularly needed addressing, however Holy Spirit gently guided us to issues he wanted to heal and restore. The session was sensitive and empowering, it felt a very safe place to be honest and open in. Tim and I feel closer and actually feel, even after 32 years of marriage like we know each other a bit better. I would highly recommend any couple to invest in this ministry to enhance their relationship.”
“My husband and I have been happily married for 47 years. We thought we knew everything about one another but with the aid of our Couples Sozo, the Holy Spirit revealed some stuff that we were not aware of. Now we are better able to deal with those few issues because we know why the other person reacts that way. I wish we could of had Couples Sozo available to us when we were first married.”
“I just wanted to share my experience with my Sozo for Couples experience. Darrell is so led by the Holy Spirit. He is wonderful, gentle, to the point and was a gift from the Lord. Not only did he leave both of us in a beautiful way, but I experienced breakthrough in areas where I needed freedom in my own personal life that will bless us as a couple in our marriage for the future. I am grateful for the Lord bringing them here to New Jersey.”
“Our Sozo was top of the line. Holy Spirit was present for both and spot on with breaking some chains. So, so good. Got us back to getting up early and being in His presence, feeding on the Word 💕☦️”
“Our Sozo for Couples was, in fact, wonderful! We were laughing before we even left the parking lot. Thank you very much! You were very professional and helped guide us well. God is so good.”
“Personally, I can share that our relationship has improved a lot in terms of communication and reaching agreements, considering the points of view as a marriage. During the health process, I have also seen a very special treatment and tender on the part of my husband, which I value very much. I see that he strives to continue growing by taking the tools of Sozo. It has made it easier for me to trust and be more effective with him. I know that it is a process that we started and still we are missing, but I think we have advanced. Thank God, thank you very much.”