HIGH-TECH PRAYER BREAKFAST = A STUPID WASTE OF TIME
By: Todd Miechiels
Tags: Management And Leadership, Technology News, High Tech, Leadership, Technology

That’s what I thought 15 years ago. I was the co-founder of Medium Blue, a B2B Search Engine Agency. Sure I was a nice guy. I served people, tried to do the right thing. I loved networking as much as the next guy, but a “prayer breakfast”? Come on. That’s what the Holy Rollers, Bible Thumpers, Street Preachers, and Jesus Freaks do.

High Tech Ministries is hosting their annual prayer breakfast October 12th in Atlanta.

You may be attending, you may have been invited, or you may never have heard of it.

Either way, I wanted to share my story about it.

Bo Simmons invited me to my first one 15 years ago. I wasn’t interested in Jesus, I had fallen away from the church after middle school, but the networking seemed like it would be good.

The next year Kathy Jaques invited me and I heard a great speaker, saw some friends I haven’t seen in a while, and went back to work.

The next year Andy Williams invited me to sit at his table. They gave each of us a little pocket-sized Gospel of John, which I politely put in my suit pocket. It would stay there for another two years until I found it while taking the suit to the dry cleaners.

I was depressed, lost, hopeless, and looking for a way out. I had been essentially forced to sell my share of the agency, had more money in the bank then I ever thought I’d have, and went from being with people 50 hours a week, to sitting completing by myself with the shades lowered in a tiny room for months after the sale.

I was searching for answers. Zen, Wayne Dyer, Oprah, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff, meditation, you name it. While reading that Gospel of John in my hand on a front stoop of a building in Tucker, searching HARD for an answer or way out of my misery, I felt an almost PHYSICAL rush go through my body, like a freight train passing me by. I had never experienced anything like it before or since. At that moment in tears, and quietly, but outloud I said “God it’s yours. I’m yours. I’m tired of running from you. I’m tired of hiding from you. I’m tired of trying to do things my way, to please others. I surrender.”

It wasn’t just that book, or those invites to the prayer breakfast. It was my parents and so many others raising me in a loving Christian home and church, it was God putting guys in my life like Kevin Shaw, Art Foster, Dale Huff, Dan McDade, that took the time to answer questions I had, or demonstrate the love of Christ. Looking back I realize God was pursuing me along.

Being a Christian has been no bed of roses, I have more questions now then when I started.

Why are “christians” so full of hate, selfishness, divisiveness? Why don’t ‘christians’ act and sound more like Jesus? Why are so many churches ran like businesses and enterprises? Why does our country have so much when, others have so little, when our country has all but turned our backs to God?

Following Jesus can feel like walking on a tightrope with a 100 MPH wind and no safety net. Having a personal relationship with the living Jesus, is the ONLY thing that keeps me going. And it’s only in Him that I’m content and satisfied and at peace in NOT knowing the answers to all the questions.

If this all sounds like rubbish and nonsense. I completely understand. It would have to me too. All I can tell you is when I sought Him, He found me. When I knocked, He answered.

It wasn’t the knock of a curious thinker, or a cynic or a skeptic, or someone looking for a magic bullet, I had knocked all those ways over the years. It was the knock of a broken and empty heart who finally admitted that he needed a Savior.

If you’re still reading this, it’s probably because you were meant to, it’s no accident.

If you can make it to this year’s breakfast, DO IT. Whether you think it’s stupid or not. Whether you think you’re too busy or not. And if you are a follower of Christ and reading this, there are people in your life you know don’t have a relationship with Jesus, PLEASE invite them. They may think it’s stupid, but they won’t think you’re stupid, only that you care enough about them to have invited them. YOU may be one that God wants to use. Don’t worry about what happens, you may never know the outcome or result in this lifetime.

I’m grateful that through technology and testimony, I can witness and give thanks to some who took the time and care that led to not only my salvation, but my calling to ministry (and that’s whole other story).

What is it that God may be wanting you to know about this? Turn away from the screen, take 3 deeeeeepp breaths and ASK Him. Even if that sounds stupid :)

Peace and love,

Todd