She is seeking a cowboy to ride off with in the sunset. He must be sincere, devoted and like children.  No games –
period.  The only thing needed is love.  Friendship first and hopefully much more.

He is old-fashioned, good with words and creative.  Did he mention that he also is old-fashioned, good with words
and creative?  He wants to cuddle up with that special lady and look into her eyes while watching a little football.
“You’ll come first, and that’s a promise.”

Those dating service ads are, well, interesting.  On a bad day lots of people may imagine riding double on a horse
heading due west toward a sinking giant red ball.  The problem with needing only love is that 50 percent of all
marriages end in divorce.

Reading through the February issue of “Christianity Today,” the flagship magazine in the U.S. for conservative
evangelicals, I saw an ad for a reasonably priced online matching service called eharmony.   An accompanying
black and white picture shows a handsome, young dog putting a ring on the finger of a pretty, smiling woman.
There are 29 critical matching dimensions in every marriage, according to the ad.  It states that eharmony
(eharmony.com) is substantively different from any other matching service.

Dr. Neil Clark Warren, with a doctorate in psychology from the University of Chicago, founded eharmony.  To his
academic credentials Warren adds 7 books, 30 years of counseling, two happily married children and his own
45-year marriage.  After seeing hundreds of failed marriages and the damage caused to children and family, Warren
began dissecting these failed marriages.

He concluded nearly every failed marriage had people who should have never been together in the first place.
Warren simultaneously began to uncover a set of principles that consistently appear in successful marriages.  After
testing it on more than 5,000 married people, Warren’s organization now helps singles nationwide make the right
choices and build successful relationships.

eharmony connects people based on predictors of success that Warren has found in more than 30 years of
counseling.  The first step is completing 500 questions in an online relationship questionnaire.  This creates a
personality profile.  Warren wants to understand a person’s character, constitution, personality, emotional makeup
and family values.  The questionnaire identifies beliefs, attitudes and characteristics that determine compatibility
between people who use eharmony.

The eharmony database then suggestions several potential matches.  The idea is for singles to meet and get to know
each other from the inside out.  People meet through a sequence of carefully guided, online interactions that yield the
kind of “go/no-go” information that enables intelligent choices.

Warren’s model is not influenced by a person’s likes or dislikes -- she likes roses; he likes chocolate shakes.  In
fact, members do not even exchange photos until they have exchanged lots of information through eharmony’s
process of supervised acquaintanceship.  Of course pictures finally are exchanged.  But psychologist Warren says
the photos are released only after people have discussed at length what he knows to be the indisputable truths
about healthy relationships.

            I once heard a pastor say that engaged couples need to talk about their beliefs and values for endless
hours.  “In the end, knowledge like that might just keep their marriage together,” he said.

            Years ago I took that to heart and put together a premarital counseling course that made couples look at
common values, beliefs and emotionally stability.  Many couples who took the time to really build healthy
foundations in their relationships are together to this day.

            On Valentine’s Day back in 1978, I was dizzy over my damsel’s beauty, humor and intelligence.  After 25
years of marriage, I feel exactly the same way towards her.  Proverbs 30:19 says it is totally impossible to
understand or describe how a man falls head over heels for a woman.

            It certainly happened to me.  Without chemistry, you won’t have much a relationship.  That’s for certain.
Still, my wife and I have built our marriage on good character, curiosity, common interests, adaptabilility, conflict
resolution, kindness, and spirituality.  Thousands of people are discovering that understanding those foundational
building blocks is what eharmony.com is about, and that’s why I like their approach.

            Ultimately, the best marriages are very hard work.  This is all the more reason to get matched with a person
with whom you have a chance of success.  Just the other day my wife whispered into my ear, “You’re still the man
of my dreams.”

Whew!  It ain’t bragging to say that I am a highly successful and unbelievably fortunate man.

Don Follis is an Urbana pastor and member of Vineyard Christian Fellowship.  His column appears on Fridays.
Copyright 2003 by the Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette.