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The best devotional for couples is one the less eager of you will still agree to, which for most couples means a weekly book and not a daily one. My first pick is Gary Thomas’s Devotions for a Sacred Marriage, with 52 readings, one a week. If you want something daily, Timothy and Kathy Keller’s The Meaning of Marriage: A Couple’s Devotional has the most substance.
Below are eight couples devotionals sorted by where you are: dating, engaged, newly married, or twenty years in. There is also a free seven-day plan, so you can find out whether the habit suits you before you buy anything.
A quick definition first. A couples devotional is a short reading for two people: a Bible passage, a reflection on it, a question or two to talk over, and usually a prayer.
How to choose a devotional for couples
Three questions settle most of it, and none of them is about the author.
Weekly or daily? A daily book asks two people with two schedules to meet 365 times. A weekly one asks for 52. I think most couples overestimate themselves here, and a dated daily book soon becomes forty unread pages of guilt on the nightstand.
Who is the reader in the house? In most couples one person likes this kind of thing more. Choose for the less eager one. Short entries and good questions matter more to that person than depth does.
What stage are you in? A dating couple and a couple with three teenagers need different books. Several devotionals below are written for one stage only, which is a strength.
Answer those three and the list gets short quickly.
8 of the best devotionals for couples
The picks are grouped by stage. Each one notes the format, because format decides whether you finish.
For married couples
1. Devotions for a Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas: best overall. Fifty-two weekly devotions, published by Zondervan as the companion to Thomas’s book Sacred Marriage. Each one gives you Scripture, a reflection and something to talk about, built on the idea that marriage is a way of loving God as well as each other. One sitting a week is a pace real couples keep.
2. The Meaning of Marriage: A Couple’s Devotional by Timothy and Kathy Keller: best daily devotional for couples. A full year of daily readings, published in 2019, that grew out of the Kellers’ book The Meaning of Marriage. Every day has a Scripture, a short reading and a prayer prompt. Pick this one if you both read and want to be made to think.
3. Night Light by James and Shirley Dobson: best for the end of the day. Six months of daily entries, first published in 2000 and still in print with Tyndale. Each evening pairs a story with a Bible passage, then adds discussion questions and a prayer. It is written for the evening, which makes it a good fit for couples who only see each other after nine.
4. The One Year Love Language Minute Devotional by Gary Chapman: best for busy couples. 365 entries, each short enough to earn the word “minute” in the title: a verse, a brief thought on how to love your spouse well, and a prayer. If The 5 Love Languages helped you, this is the daily version of the same idea.
5. Moments with You by Dennis and Barbara Rainey: best traditional year-long book. A year of daily readings for husband and wife, from Baker Publishing Group. It is the plain, steady choice for couples who already pray together and want a page to start from.
6. A Little God Time for Couples: best as a gift. A 365-day devotional from BroadStreet Publishing. Each day brings a short insight, a Scripture, a question and a prayer, drawn from several Bible translations. It is light in tone and easy to give at a wedding or an anniversary.
For engaged couples
7. Preparing Your Heart for Marriage by Gary Thomas: best devotional for engaged couples. Written for the months before the wedding and published by Zondervan in 2018. It covers trust, differences, intimacy, teamwork and money, and it has a section on the vows themselves with meditations for bride and groom. Read it instead of one more article about seating plans.
For dating couples
8. Together With Christ by Chelsea Damon: best devotional for dating couples. Fifty-two weekly devotions with Scripture, stories and questions on communication, forgiveness, family, work and finances, plus things to go and do together. Weekly is the right rhythm when you do not share a home yet.
No list like this is complete. These eight cover the common situations, and each one says plainly who it is for.
A free 7-day couples devotional to try first
Before you buy a book, try a week. Each evening, one of you reads the verse aloud and you both answer the question.
It takes ten minutes. The verses are from the King James Version.
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Ecclesiastes 4:9-10. “Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow.” Ask each other: where did you carry me this month?
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Proverbs 15:1. “A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger.” Which conversation this week needed a softer answer from me?
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Ephesians 4:32. “And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.” Is there something small I am still holding against you?
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Philippians 2:4. “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.” What is on your plate right now that I have not asked about?
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Ruth 1:16. “For whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” Ruth said this to her mother-in-law, which is worth remembering. Whose family needs more of our patience?
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Song of Solomon 8:7. “Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it.” What flood have we already come through together?
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Matthew 18:20. “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” Two is enough. Finish the week by praying one sentence each, out loud.
If the week went well, you have your answer about a longer book. If it was awkward, that is normal for a first week, and a weekly devotional will be easier than a daily one.
Book or app: devotions when your schedules do not match
A book on the nightstand works when you go to bed at the same time. Many couples do not. One travels, one works nights, or the baby decides the evening.
Apps solve the distance problem. Bible apps such as YouVersion carry free reading plans for couples that each of you can read on your own phone and talk about later. Our guide to the best daily devotional apps compares the main options.
Still is not a couples devotional, and it would be a stretch to list it as one. What it does is read Scripture and short prayers aloud at bedtime.
For two people that can be the last ten minutes of the day: lights off, one phone on the nightstand, a psalm read slowly while neither of you has to perform. Download Still on the App Store.
If evenings are your shared slot, bedtime devotions for adults has readings short enough for tired people.
How to keep a couples devotional going
Buying the book takes five minutes. What decides whether it lasts is smaller and duller.
- Fix the slot before the book arrives. Sunday after lunch, or Wednesday once the kids are down. A devotional without an appointment loses to the laundry.
- Let one person read and the other choose the question. It keeps either of you from becoming the teacher.
- Keep the prayer to one sentence each. Praying aloud in front of your spouse is harder than praying in church. If you are new to it, how to pray starts from zero.
- Skip without ceremony. Missed a week? Open to the next reading. Nobody catches up on devotionals, and trying to is how books get abandoned in February.
If you each want something of your own as well, we have separate lists of devotionals for men and devotionals for women.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best devotional for couples? For most married couples, Devotions for a Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas, because its 52 weekly readings are a pace two people can keep. For a daily book, choose The Meaning of Marriage: A Couple’s Devotional by Timothy and Kathy Keller.
Is there a good devotional for dating couples? Yes. Together With Christ by Chelsea Damon was written for dating couples and has 52 weekly devotions. Engaged couples are better served by Preparing Your Heart for Marriage by Gary Thomas.
Are there free couples devotionals? Yes. The seven-day plan above is free, and Bible apps such as YouVersion offer free reading plans for couples.
How long should a couples devotional take? Ten to fifteen minutes is plenty: two or three minutes to read, the rest to talk and pray. If it regularly runs past twenty, one of you will start to dread it.
Should we do a devotional daily or weekly? Weekly, unless you already have a daily habit together. A weekly reading you finish does more for a marriage than a daily one you quit in March.
Not the verse you were looking for? Draw a random Bible verse →
Conclusion: the best devotional for couples is the one you finish
A couples devotional is a modest thing. It is ten minutes, a verse and a question, and its whole value lies in the two of you being in the same room for it.
So choose for the less eager reader, choose weekly if you are unsure, and try the free week before you spend money. Then set the first appointment tonight, while you are both still thinking about it.
For a wider shelf, our round-up of the best Christian devotional books covers the classics you can read on your own.