IntroductionOne day my husband, Greg, brought home the book
Every Man’s Battle, tossed it at me, and with a straight face said, “I think you ought to write
Every Woman’s Battle.”
My immediate response was, “Yeah, right!” Not that I didn’t feel qualified to write such a book (having graduated from the school of hard knocks when it comes to recognizing and overcoming sexual and emotional temptations), but I had already been trying to publish a manuscript on these exact issues for over a year. Time after time I heard publishers say, “Women don’t deal with sexual issues enough that a book on that topic would really sell.”
Meanwhile,
Every Man’s Battle was climbing to the top of the best-seller list. I wondered how people could be so naive as to think that sexual integrity is strictly a man’s issue. Both men and women were created by God as sexual beings, weren’t they? It takes two to tango, and for every man who falls prey to sexual temptation, there is a woman falling with him. While many men limit their affairs to what they take in lustfully through their eyes, women also submit longingly to mental fantasies or emotional affairs.
Some compare their husbands to other men and become disillusioned by their husbands’ failure to measure up. So many of us fail to recognize how we compromise our sexual integrity, how we rob ourselves of what we long for most—true intimacy and fulfillment.
Curious as to why my husband felt so strongly about
Every Man’s Battle, I read it through voraciously. I kept thinking,
Many of these issues are not common just to men, but to women also! They simply manifest themselves differently!
Stephen Arterburn was hearing the exact same thing from so many women that he believed the need was undeniable. Little did I know that within a few months God would, in fact, divinely bring Steve and me together on this project (thanks to my friends Ron and Katie Luce, our literary agents at Alive Communications, and the visionaries at WaterBrook Press).
So take heart and know that your cries for help have been heard. This book is a training manual that will help you avoid sexual and emotional compromise and will show you how to experience God’s plan for sexual and emotional fulfillment. I also wrote a comprehensive workbook to accompany
Every Woman’s Battle. It will help you learn more about what God has to say on this subject and will help you examine your own personal life so you can develop a practical plan for victory in your own unique battle for sexual and emotional integrity.
Do you want to be a woman of sexual and emotional integrity? With God’s help you can. Let’s get started.
Copyright © 2008 by Shannon Ethridge. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.