I Owe You Less Than Nothing, Dear Readers

by Michael Gregory Steele and Herman B. Hayes

I thought it would be a good idea to come back from my blogging hiatus and provide you, my faithful reader, with a firm but loving reminder. I just wanted to reiterate a simple point that some among you seem to have forgotten: I don't owe you anything.

This post though is about respect, more specifically the respect people should show me when they decide to correspond with me through email. No reader of this blog has the right to ask me to do more than I already do for all of you and yet emails like this pass through my mailbox regularly:

Michael? Herman? where are? I look to you for moral guidance. I feel lost without your words, please come back.

I wonder, if I allowed this same person to borrow my car would he then demand that I take it to the car wash and have it detailed first? I am doing you a favor, friend, by sharing my wisdom with you and yet you demand that I do it with more regularity? Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth -- or maybe you're biting the hand that feeds you, I'm not sure which.

Anyway, I just want to state again that I do not owe you anything and you owe me everything.

You see, in life everyone is faced with difficult ethical and moral dilemmas. It is the choices you make at these critical junctures that define who you are as a person and decide where you will ultimately end up in the afterlife. Often such choices are difficult to make and if you make the wrong one it can be nearly impossible to get yourself back on the right track. That's where I come in.

God has provided each of you with a map to show you the correct path in navigating through the jungle of life -- a map called the Bible. Sometimes though this map is difficult to understand and you need a rugged wilderness guide to help you through the rough patches with his machete of personal enlightenment. I am your guide, but sometimes even wilderness guides need some time off.

This particular wilderness guide also has the fate of his local economy resting upon his broad shoulders. This wilderness guide has been busy doing his job and continuing to make the world turns. But I don't feel I owe anyone here an explanation, in fact I owe you less than nothing.

My advice to all of you is to study your map and I’ll explain to you what it means when I'm good and ready. And finally when I do choose to answer your questions, be sure to address me with a little more humility and respect. Remember that the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. If you continue to anger me, the Lord might just taketh me away from you for good.