Advice

I met my good friend for a walk the other day. While talking about life, we realized we both had been looking through "self-help" books and were rather disappointed with them. Leah, a new mom, had read in one book "rock your child to promote healthy bonding" while reading "do not rock your child". Another advised "interact with your child frequently" while another said a parent must simply observe their child playing from a distance. I lamented my own experience with books written for singles. One will say "get involved in children's ministry" while another will say "you'll never meet your spouse volunteering for children's ministry, there are too many women". One says "be involved with other singles" while another claims "you're single because you're selfish, you need to stop thinking about yourself and volunteer more without a spouse-ly motive". Sooooooo confusing!!! Sooooo discouraging!!!! My friend observed that her books were mostly written by nannies, not parents and I observed my books were written by women who had played their cards "right" and gotten married in their teens. What do these people know about being a parent or being single in your 20s and 30s? Yet, we buy their books. We search for advice. My good friend and I realized, if it was so important whether or not one rocked their child or if being single was selfish, wouldn't God have said it in the Bible? The Bible is the most important book of advice and on many topics, it is silent. Why? Well, on some topics, it may seem silent, but an underlying ethic is noted. But, let's face it, on some topics, such as rocking or what color to paint your living room, the Bible is silent because that is simply not important. There are more important things to life...like the fact that Jesus, a perfect person, died for us, imperfect people. The important thing is we should love one another because Jesus first loved us. Check out the Bible to see what is really important.