Couples Attend Love & Respect Marriage Conference

Couples attend Love & Respect Marriage Conference at Walnut Creek Downtown on October 10 & 11.

One way Walnut Creek Church supports strong, Christ-like marriages and families is by hosting a couple’s conference every year. This year, the conference hosted 115 couples for a Love & Respect video conference on October 10 and 11.

Based on the groundbreaking principles taught in Dr. Emerson Eggerichs’ best-selling book Love & Respect, the conference taught couples how to achieve a brand-new level of intimacy as they learn to stop the crazy cycle of conflict, initiate the energizing cycle of change, and enjoy the rewarded cycle of new passion.

“My car needs a tune-up every once in a while. So does my marriage,” said Russ Cross of Walnut Creek South, who has been married to his wife JoDee for 32 years.

“It’s good to refresh,” JoDee added. “The Love & Respect conference is wonderful; very enlightening.”

Jeremy and Ashlyn Oberg of Walnut Creek Downtown have been married for three and a half years. They agreed that it’s important to set aside time to focus on their marriage, especially with having two young children and a hectic lifestyle.

“It’s good to listen to someone walk through examples and experiences who is well rooted in scripture,” Jeremy said. “What he’s writing about isn’t some secular author’s or psychology’s new fad. It’s God – the author of life and marriage – what he’s said the whole time.”

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By Tim Laehn 

Walnut Creek Downtown

Couples Sync Up

Couples listen to Chris Hogan speak at Walnut Creek Downtown

Couples from Walnut Creek Church gathered October 11 and 12 for Walnut Creek’s annual Couple’s Conference. With a theme of “Syncing Up,” this year’s conference featured speaker Chris Hogan, a marriage coach and president of Noble Call Institute. With a mix of personal stories and practical, biblical teaching, Hogan focused on how to connect to your spouse through a variety of conversation tools.

“I learned ways to go deeper in conversation,” said Rod Van Raden of Walnut Creek Windsor Heights. “After 30 plus years of marriage and attending countless conferences, I still take away something new every time.”

Learning something new isn’t the only thing that keeps Rod and his wife, Theresa, coming back to the Couple’s Conference every year. “When we had little kids, it was a chance to get away, just the two of us,” Theresa said. “It lets your spouse know this marriage is important to me and I’m going to invest time in it.”

Rod said his favorite part of the conference was the closing, when Hogan shared from his heart some stories about his own church family. “It reminded me of the importance of investing in your church family for the long term,” Rod said. “There are couples in the church we’ve known more than 20 years – I know they would be there for us.”

Noble Call Institute's mission is “to help men and women experience God’s pleasure as they discover their noble calling and become the men and women they were created to be: Noble men and women who make noble plans and carry out noble deeds of great faith as a person, partner, parent, provider and proclaimer of truth, to produce fruit that will stand the test of eternity.”