How can the Christian community offer a grace filled message that honors scripture in the area of human sexuality? That’s been the mission of Michael Sytsma, Ph.D., an ordained minister, Licensed Professional Counselor, certified Christian sex therapist and co-founder of Sexual Wholeness, Inc. (www.sexualwholeness.com), a Christian non-profit dedicated to training, equipping, and certifying professionals in human sexuality.

He also founded Building Intimate Marriages (www.intimatemarriage.org), where he provides marriage and sex therapy and training. Dr. Mike has worked with couples since 1987, blending insights from his pastoral, counseling and research backgrounds to develop a teaching and counseling style that combines practical knowledge with a Christ-centered worldview to address marital sexual therapy in a relevant and grace-filled manner.

Dr. Mike originally planned to study medicine, but “God had other ideas” and called him into the pastorate. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Christian Ministry from Indiana Wesleyan University, then a master’s degree in community counseling from Georgia State University and a diploma in Christian counseling from Psychological Studies Institute. Early on, he sought out pastors and asked them what they would do differently. He found a consistent theme to be lack of understanding about addiction. Dr. Mike spent two years studying addiction counseling and another five years working inpatient with addicts, which proved revelatory. During that time, he worked as a pastor in starting churches. He said he saw so much pain, and couples often asked him questions for which he had no good answer.

Dr. Mike saw his first sex addict in 1990 and realized his work with alcohol and drug addicts could be translated to the sexual arena. He also developed a passion for helping couples with their marriages, seeing marriage as God’s first intervention in helping us become like Him. His increasing comfort in working with sexual issues with addicts translated into a comfort in working with marital sexuality.

Dr. Mike subsequently earned a Ph.D. from the University of Georgia in Child and Family Development/Marriage and Family Therapy, where he specialized in marital sexual therapy. His dissertation topic was “Sexual Desire Discrepancy in Married Couples.”

“My mission is to bring the message of the Gospel to where people are hurting,” he said. “Sex is an area where people are hurting.” Now he brings the strengths of his varying fields of expertise as well as his years of experience and study to help couples and inform professionals and graduate students about human sexuality through a lens of Christianity.

Dr. Mike teaches a half-dozen graduate courses a year in sex therapy and human sexuality as a professor at Asbury Seminary, Reformed Theological Seminary, Dallas Theological Seminary, Denver Seminary, and Richmont Graduate University. He often conducts in-person intensive courses that condense 38 hours of teaching into a week. Dallas Theological and the Institute for Sexual Wholeness allow professionals to audit his courses without enrolling in an entire program, he added.

One goal is to help pastors minister to their congregations. He explains some of the sexual brokenness they might not realize is experienced by those sitting in the pews. “They may have seen the impact of pornography, but they don’t know the kind of porn watched and how dark it gets and how quickly,” he said. “We help pastors wrestle with a variety of approaches the church can take. Our culture is pushing tolerance. How does the church speak a grace filled message that still honors scripture? As Christ followers, that’s important,” he added.

“Sin is invasive. It is infectious and messy,” he continued. “Christ was profoundly gracious and invitational, especially when it came to sexual sin. The woman at the well had five husbands and was not married to the man she was with. But something about the way he acknowledged that drew her to him. She kept leaning in and talking – then brought her family and friends. How do we be Christlike and love like he loved, so we can acknowledge somebody’s sin and shame in a way that draws them in and doesn’t push them away…. to be able to say, ‘I don’t condemn you, but something needs to change,’ and then and walk beside them as they change, rather than drive them away.”

Jesus’s commandment to “Love as I have loved,” supersedes all else, Dr. Mike emphasized.

In addition to graduate classes, Dr. Mike has created training for pastors and counselors through the Institute of Sexual Wholeness. Those interested can access the training site at sexualwholeness.com and find courses for marriage helpers. Topics include gender and sexual orientations within the church, an intro class on human sexuality and sex therapy, the theology of sex, basic anatomy and physiology. Dr. Mike also dispels myths that have persisted in Christian culture. One being that women are responsible to provide an outlet for men’s sexual needs as well as other areas in which people have felt shame pertaining to sexuality.

In addition to training and teaching Dr. Mike personally works with two dozen couples each week – many of those after an affair or in high crisis. When asked how a spouse can learn to trust one who has been unfaithful, he has created an illustration of a Trust Bucket, which describes as how an offender needs to understand the importance of absolute truthfulness and accountability once the one wounded has made a conscious decision to forgive, (https://intimatemarriage.org/trust-bucket/).

One of the most revelatory insights Dr. Mike’s found in his work with couples, which he discovered while completing his doctorate, is the existence of different types of desire. He explains that some people experience initiating desire, others receptive desire. Both are equally valid and can change due to circumstances (like having a baby, physical illness or work stress). But due in part to false narratives portrayed in Hollywood and cultural influences, people mistakenly believe their (or their spouse’s) level, type of desire, or frequency is wrong, inadequate or bad in some way, which causes conflict. In fact, Dr. Mike’s research found that in only 10% of couples do both spouses experience initiating desire, while in 25%, both had receptive desire. The remaining couples experienced a mismatch.

“The destruction comes in when we hold misbeliefs and resentment toward our spouse…. If they believe their spouse is broken, they don’t like them, they don’t want to be with them,” he said. Dr. Mike educates couples and helps them redefine their attributions.

“You never want sex,” when understood as receptive desire, could be better stated as, “I understand it’s not innate in you like it is in me. I need to get your spark going.” “They understand each other and move to the same side of the table instead of attacking each other,” Dr. Mike said.

He also found very little difference in marital and sexual satisfaction in couples with initiating or receptive desire – the numbers were almost identical. “I love it when research shows you something you didn’t expect,” he said.

He presents this information at marriage workshops and seminars for churches and groups. Feedback from couples often includes the relief that, “I’m normal! I’m not broken! There’s not something wrong with me.” “The simplest answer to some of their problems is they need to talk more,” he said.

Couples who’d like to access Dr. Mike’s courses and information in the privacy of their own home can go to https://intimatemarriage.org/workshops-and-seminars/ to find a Passionate Intimacy Workshop, Sexual Desire in Marriage, Intimacy Model, and God’s “Yes” to Sex, online teaching and videos, along with worksheets and exercises.

Dr. Mike contributed insights from his research and experience in the 2023 book, Secrets of Sex and Marriage: 8 Surprises That Make All the Difference, he co-authored with Shaunti Feldhahn.

The book’s content is research-informed and direct, yet discreet. “Most spouses truly care for each other. If you are in this camp, we have worked extremely hard to bring you a book filled with practical help for growing one of the core arenas of marriage.  … based on “Great marital-sex research and writing up the findings in a way that could enrich most marriages,” according to the authors.

Their goal: “Making sex good for both partners, and full in both body and spirit.”

Why? because, sex matters in marriage.

Dr. Mike puts couples at ease by explaining, “We are simply built differently. Your spouse is not broken – and neither are you.” The authors point out: There are “many wrong assumptions that lead us to wrong solutions. Many of us even have significant gaps in our knowledge about sex, blind spots, or flat-out misinformation that are getting in the way of the great intimate life we want.”

Couples who want to dive deeper, address areas of concern or have interest in leading others can find resources at secretsofsexandmarriage.com, including an assessment, resources for those in need, and tools to help pastors, churches, counselors, and other leaders.

In 2024 the authors released a small group guide based on the book called Unlocking an Intimate Marriage (also available on Right Now Media). The online course differs from the book and from many other online small group resources in that Dr. Mike drew from his years of experience to develop a way to help a co-ed group talk about sex safely. They specifically planned each teaching video clip to introduce a topic in just a few minutes, after which couples are invited to discuss the concept without relating it to sex.

For example, the concept of initiating desire is introduced in the context of a food, sport or activity for which someone might evidence it. “You talk about the desire in a group without the sexual context,” Dr. Mike explained.

If someone gets off track or veers into unsafe territory, the leader can redirect the group quickly back to the next video. Among the 33 videos in the eight-week study, the first half pertain only minimally to sex. The course is designed to allow groups or couples to decide to opt in or out after the first four weeks depending on their comfort level.

Dr. Mike’s overarching message is a philosophy of grace. “We extend grace by choosing to see the best in each other, despite all the very real ways we mess up.” He encourages people to see their spouse as the person God created.

“Too often we see things that irritate us, and we vilify our spouses,” Dr. Mike said in an excerpt from an article in Today’s Christian Woman that shares an example of his counseling style and the way he encourages those with whom he’s working to move away from negative perceptions of their partner.

“For instance, a spouse may believe that his wife doesn’t want to have sex with him not because she’s tired or because her desire’s different from his, but because she’s a mean, withholding person.”

Or one may misunderstand the other’s motives.

“Kathy’s husband, Rick, is a highly focused individual. He’s slightly ADHD, passionate in his work, and he rarely gets home on time for dinner,” from the article.

“’He knows dinnertime is important to me,’ she told Dr. Mike bitterly. ’If he truly loved me, he’d make it happen.’

“He said, ‘So you see him as a mean, withholding, angry individual?’

“She sat for a minute, stunned, because that’s who she’d just described.

“’Is that who you’re married to?’ I asked. ‘Is that his character, really?’

“You could see the wheels spinning as she tried to process my question.

“’Are you the kind of person who would marry a mean-spirited, punishing individual?’

“’No,’ she finally admitted.

“’Then how can we focus on the goodness of his heart?’ I challenged her. ‘How can we see him for who he is and not use the behaviors that irritate you to label him as bad? Do you really believe you’d marry somebody who’d intentionally do the damage you’re attributing to him? Or is this an expression of his personality that, granted, may really need to be reined in?’

“When I presented Rick in this light, Kathy was able to understand his behaviors weren’t really about her, and she was able to distinguish between the irritating behavior and the good person God created.”

Dr. Mike helps couples realize changing their spouse is not their goal; their discipleship is. “Your spouse reveals places where you are selfish,” he said. “Be Christ for your spouse even in an area where they are not doing what you want. I’m still a pastor who is fighting for individual discipleships. All of these issues just reveal pathways.

“Sex is designed as God’s object lesson. Healthy sexuality is reflective of him,” is a core philosophy that permeates Dr. Mike’s resources and teaching. “Christ is fully spirit and fully body. If Christ is incarnate, then healthy sex is going to be fully spirit and fully body. When we understand how God created our physiology, we can steward it.

“Our bodies experience profound pleasure. I’ll ask women what they like, and they’re not sure. That’s not ok!” Infusing hope and grace allows them to pursue true intimacy in an arena with profound potential. If both spouses can lean into each other’s spirit and body, they can have a profound connection that is a reflection of Christ.”

Marriage champions, professionals and couples alike can benefit from Dr. Mike’s trailblazing work that opens the door to understanding and restoration in such a sensitive, yet vital area.