Fasting: Is It For The Church Today?

Fasting…really?  Do people still fast?  Why?  I thought that ended with the Old Testament?  These are all questions posed by the church today and they are valid questions, especially in our culture where sacrifice is seen as weakness and success is measured on possessions rather than character.  Perhaps the question of fasting is even more critical today, as Satan progressively deceives us into ineffective living with materialism and busyness.

Though fasting is not an exclusively Christian activity, it can be traced throughout the Bible.  Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego are an Old Testament example of those who fasted to honor God (Daniel 1:8-16).  In the New Testament we see Jesus fasting (Matthew 4:2) and the early church (Acts 13:2-3, 14:23).  In the sermon on the mount, Jesus addresses the proper way to fast with the expectation of when they would fast, not if (Matthew 6:16-18).  So maybe the question is not if we should fast, but what is fasting, why and how should we do it.

The basic definition of fasting is to abstain from food.  It is a voluntary denial for a purpose.  For a Christian, it is a voluntary denial in order to seek God.  It is a humbling of ourselves and declaring our utter dependence on God.  “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Matthew 4:4)  We offer ourselves to God for His glory.  We hunger more for the fullness of God than worldly pleasures.

We fast to awaken our soul.  “ ’Everything is permissible for me’ – but not everything is beneficial.  ‘Everything is permissible for me’ – but I will not be mastered by anything.” (1 Corinthians 6:12)  Fasting reveals to us the things that control us, whether that is food, entertainment, or unhealthy emotions.   Richard Foster in his book, The Celebration of Discipline, says, “We cover up what is inside us with food and other things.  Anger, bitterness, jealousy, strife, fear – if they are within us, they will surface during fasting.”  Of course the reap and sow principal applies…what you put into will determine what you get out of it.  Don’t misunderstand, it is not declaring that these things are bad, neither is it a matter of self-mastery, which leads only to pride, but it is experientially knowing that we hunger for God above all else.  And though breakthroughs will undoubtedly come as a result, we must see the reward of fasting as God Himself.  We can neither earn favor nor manipulate God to answer prayer through fasting.

Fasting is foremost about the condition of the heart.  If we are unrepentant and unchanged afterwards, then it was simply a diet.  And so, it can take different forms as the Holy Spirit calls us individually.  The most common form is abstaining from food.  This can be one meal a day, one day a week or an extended period of time and can be either a partial or complete fast.  A partial fast is abstaining from only certain foods, such as Daniel did in the third year of Cyrus.  For three weeks, while he mourned, he ate no choice food, meat or wine and used no lotions. (Daniel 10:2-3)  A complete fast is eating no solid food and drinking only water or juice.  As we see in the above illustration of Daniel, fasting from food can be accompanied by abstaining from other things as well.  In modern society, even more important than food, might be fasting from TV, the internet, shopping, or a consuming hobby.  The essential thing is your motive and that you spend the extra time humbly seeking God.  God is looking for broken and contrite hearts, who seek Him and not just His gifts.  (Hebrews 58:2-4)

I have limited personal experience with fasting, but recently I did twenty days of a Daniel fast.  What I now know, is that it isn't about the deprivation, it is about the battle for my soul.  It is not giving up something...it is giving myself up to someone.  A giving up of the temporal for the eternal.  Humbling myself before one who is greater than I.  Yearning for what I cannot produce or control.  Surrendering myself to God.  This fast made me acutely aware of my choices.  I could no longer just "go with the flow", doing whatever comes naturally.  I had to measure each decision against what I had committed to and see if it measured up.  I discovered the importance of setting my mind.  Whichever direction we set our mind to that is what we will follow through with, no matter how much we argue with ourselves to the contrary.  (Romans 8:5-9, 12-13)

 Would you not be willing to give up something of far lesser value in order to gain a treasure that is beyond what you could ask or imagine? Since Adam and Eve, we have fought sin and its destructive consequences.  But no consequence has been greater than our broken relationship with God.  We lost not only the beauty of the garden, but everything He is.  Pride replaced trust; blame replaced love; sorrow replaced joy and worry replaced peace.  "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36)  When we take this epic struggle to our solitude with God and deal with it there, we emerge with compassion, peace, joy, kindness, etc. (Galatians 5:22-25)  Only then can we meet the world’s needs, for the fruit of the Spirit is precisely what the world needs.  If we do not face it in our solitude and fasting, then we take our struggles with us to our encounters with others.  We have little if anything to offer and usually end up inflicting harm.  A monk from 1100 A.D. was reported to have said that as a young man he wanted to change the world, but found it difficult, so as he got older he decided instead to change his community, but as an old man he realized he should have started with himself.  Our transformed lives ought to be our compelling witness, so we need to draw near the glory of God and be set ablaze to burn with His light.

 I have been a believer for 30 years, but am confident that I have been missing out on much that is freely offered by God, because I have sought him on my terms...not his. Even in my fasting I must come to him rightly.  I do not fast in order to trade for what I want or persuade God to act on my behalf.  I fast in order to seek Him.  I come to be changed.  I am on a journey to the heart of God.  Will you join me?

Lent is March 5 - April 19

Lent means forty - 40 days of preparation for Easter.  It also comes from the Anglo-Saxon word meaning "to lengthen."  Just as the sun is lengthening the days of spring, so it is a time of spiritual lengthening, stretching and growing in Christ.  Keep in mind that it is the Son who does this lengthening in us.  Lent is not to be an added burden, but a time of reflection, repentance and seeking to return to our first love.  Lent prepares us so that upon Easter's arrival we can joyfully celebrate and give thanks for all it means to us in Christ.

A part of Lent is the practice of fasting - a giving up of something.  This fasting is a grace that helps us focus.  This is a great opportunity to exercise a spiritual discipline that will draw us closer to the One who is our salvation.