Jaynes - Becoming the woman of his dreams / Sharon Jaynes

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. NIV. Copyright1973, 1978, 1984 by the International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Verses marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible , 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org)

Verses marked TLB are taken from The Living Bible, Copyright 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL 60189 USA. All rights reserved.

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Cover by Franke Design and Illustration, Minneapolis, Minnesota

Cover photo Streetangel / Getty

BECOMING THE WOMAN OF HIS DREAMS

Copyright 2005 by Sharon Jaynes

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

www.harvesthousepublishers.com

ISBN 978-0-7369-5995-7 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-0-7369-5996-4 (eBook)

The Library of Congress has catalogued the edition as follows:

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jaynes, Sharon.

Becoming the woman of his dreams / Sharon Jaynes.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-0-7369-1351-3 (pbk.)

1. Sex roleReligious aspectsChristianity. 2. MarriageReligious aspectsChristianity. 3. Man-woman relationshipsReligious aspectsChristianity. 4. Christian womenReligious life. I. Title.

BT708.J39 2005

248.8435dc22

2004015768

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This book is dedicated to Bruce and Mary Ellen Jaynes, whose marriage is and will be a legacy for generations to come.

This book would not be possible without the hundreds of men from all walks of life who shared openly and honestly about what they longed for in a wife. Thank you for giving of yourselves by filling out lengthy questionnaires and succumbing to tough interview questions.

A special thanks to so many of my friends who shared part of their lives with me in order to help build strong marriages. I am awed at your willingness to let others see the not so pretty parts of your lives. Bonnie Lillie, Linda and Buck Butler, Don and Jona Wright, Gene Vaughan, Jill and Jeremy Tracey, Ted and Beverly Greveyoure the best!

I am also grateful to the incredible staff of Proverbs 31 Ministries for your continued support and encouragement: Lysa TerKeurst, Mary Southerland, Lara LeQuire, Marie Ogram, Barb Spenser, Renee Swope, Micca Campbell, Ginger Plowman, Glynnis Whitwer, Laurie Webster, Shelly Chen, and Van Walton. It is an honor to serve with you in bringing Gods peace, perspective, and purpose to todays busy woman.

I am so blessed to once again work with my Harvest House Publishers team: editor Kim Moore, managing editor Betty Fletcher, and editorial vice president Barb Sherrill. A special thanks also to LaRae Weikert and Terry Glaspey. You are such a joy to work with!

Finally, I am so thankful for my husband, Steve. Thank you for reading and rereading, for sharing your words of wisdom, and for loving me through the process. You are the man of my dreams.

Contents

And they lived happily ever after.

Wait a minute. That is supposed to be the end of the story, not the beginning. Well, my friend, I think that has been our problem in marriage all along. To have a great marriage, we must begin with the hoped-for end in mind. Every word we speak, every decision we make, and every action we take will either move us closer to or take us further away from that end.

From the time a little girl first hears fairy tales of the damsel in distress being rescued by the handsome prince, captivated by his pledge of never-ending love, and whisked away on a white steed into the sunset, a dream begins to take shape on the stage of her mind. She hopes and prays that one day her prince will come. And thenone day he does! Oh, he may not look like the prince in the storybooks, or even like the one from her childhood imaginings, but he is her prince nonetheless. Will the words and they lived happily ever after appear before the final curtain falls? My dear sister, this is not just something we hope for. It is something we work toward. It is the goal, and you, fair lady, have been invited to play the starring role.

Have you ever considered that your husband had similar notions of what his dream wife would be like? As a little boy he probably didnt sit around reading fairy tales about becoming a princea warrior, maybebut not the neat-and-tidy young man who placed his lips upon Snow Whites to wake her from a cursed sleep. He most likely skipped the Barbie aisle where Malibu Ken stood with every hair in place on his plastic head and went straight for the G.I. JOEs. Our spouses probably didnt give much thought to what they wanted in a wife until their teen years. However, your husbands vision of a future mate most assuredly began to unfurl when he laid eyes on you.

Remember the courting days? Thats when we ladies put our best foot forwardin hopes that the glass slipper will fit. With a smile on our lips and a sparkle in our eyes, we somehow convinced this man that we are what hes been looking for his entire life! The woman of his dreams!

So we buy the beautiful dress, gather with family and friends, and walk down the aisle to say, I do. Then the organ blasts, and we walk out the door into reality. This is where the glass slipper meets the road. Can we do it? Can we be the woman of our mans dreams? Do we really even want to?

When I married my wonderful husband, Steve, I had no idea what it would take to truly become the woman of his dreams. Oh, he told me that I already was, but I had an inkling there would be more to having a happy marriage than the fact that I loved Steve and Steve loved me. Even on our wedding day, the most beautiful day of my life, I had a suspicion there was more to discovering what it meant to truly become one . It didnt take me very long to learn that I was right.