Wives and children often notice the change before a man can explain it; one family’s story shows what that transformation can look like at home.
DENVER, CO, UNITED STATES, October 7, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — Denver, Co. He made it as far as the parking lot. He had driven up the mountain for a Marked Men For Christ Phase 1 Experience, sat in his car, lost his nerve, and started back down. On the way, he called his wife to tell her he was coming home. Co-founder John Lager remembers her answer.
“You’re not coming home. Go back. Go back. You’ve got to be there.”
He went back. He stayed.
“A man can be in the same house and still be gone for years. You cannot heal him. You were never meant to. But you can put an opportunity for healing in front of him,” says Don Carey, Director of Development for Marked Men For Christ ministry.
When a man comes home from Phase 1 Experience, his wife and children are often the first to notice that something is different.
Lager says the first sign is rarely a speech or an apology. “The first thing they ask is: what happened to you?” His face is different. His presence is different. Over the months that follow, Lager says families may see “a much more conscious tenderness that the man has, that he maybe never embraced before.”
Erika saw that change in her own home. Her husband Brian went through a Phase 1 Experience about three years ago and now serves as Chief Operating Officer of Marked Men For Christ. In a video published by the ministry, she called the experience “absolutely transformative for him and for us.” He came out, she says, “on fire for Christ.”
What she noticed did not stop with him. It changed what they were experiencing together.
“We have gone deeper in our marriage. We have gone deeper in our faith together.”
Her summary of her husband is four words:
“A very changed man.”
For wives wondering what a husband is walking into, the founders are candid about what many men fear.
“The most common fear is thinking, I’m the only one dealing with this issue,” Steve “Spice” Spicer says. “After 24 hours, their greatest relief is realizing they are not the only one.”
Lager names another fear: “I don’t want to be seen weak or vulnerable.”
His answer is a standing promise from the men who lead the experience: “We will never ask you to do something that we are not already doing or have not already done.”
In Brian’s case, the change did not stop at home. He now serves in several ministries, including Marked Men For Christ and Christian Executive Fellowship.
“He just has such a heart for Christ and such a heart for people,” Erika says. “He is so open to the Holy Spirit.”
Healing does not end at home. Healed men get sent.
Marked Men For Christ ministry is ecumenical, welcoming men from Christian traditions including Catholic, Baptist, Pentecostal, Reformed and churches with no denominational label. No man is turned away for financial reasons. The ministry stands on the Apostles’ Creed.
A wife can encourage him toward the door. He still has to decide to walk through it.
Since 2001, more than 20,000 men worldwide have taken part in Marked Men For Christ experiences.
Lager says the message he wants each man to leave believing is simple: “I want each man to know that they are a gift. They’re a gift not only to this ministry, they are a gift to this world.”
If you are waiting on a man who has been gone for years while sitting in the same house, you cannot do his work for him. But you can remind him there is a door.
Find the Phase 1 Experience nearest him at markedmenforchrist.org/current-events, put it in front of him, and say what she said:
Go back.
About Marked Men For Christ
Marked Men For Christ is an ecumenical men’s healing and discipleship ministry founded in Colorado in 2001. Its mission is to build stronger men for Jesus Christ through ongoing transformative experiences and authentic relationships. Its flagship is the 44-hour Phase 1 Experience. In 25 years, more than 20,000 men worldwide have taken part. The ministry stands on the Apostles’ Creed and turns no man away for financial reasons.
Don Carey
Marked Men For Christ
+1 202-257-6749
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