A Call To Fast

“And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.”
Luke 2:36–38

I will be the first to admit that even though I grew up in church, fasting was not at all apart of my life growing up. I was not familiar with the practice, nor do I recall seeing it or hearing of it being practiced in the Christian circles I grew up in.

My first experience fasting was a powerful one. Common teaching today says start small and work your way up. That’s just simply not how I do things. I’m either all in or I’m not. When it came to my first fast, I was all in. I did a three day fast, water only, and the Lord really met me in that fast. It was powerful.

Fasting in the Bible is a bit of a strange topic. There’s no explicit teachings on how, when or why to fast. It’s just assumed that you will fast. Part of the reason for this, was that it was so ingrained in that culture that teaching on it was not needed.

We live in a culture, however, where excess reigns and teaching on fasting is sorely needed. We ignore fasting as a relic of the past or we look at it with a superstitious eye trying to figure out if there is some sort of new age magic associated with it.

So today I want to give you some food for thought as we head into the new year. Our church will be participating in a church-wide fast from January 2nd to the 4th. This is not meant to be a legalistic experience but an invitation. You are invited to join with us as we fast and pray to start the year.

You may be asking, why would I want to fast? I really enjoy eating, this sounds like the opposite of something that I would enjoy doing. And you may be right. Abstaining from food is not fun, I won’t dress that up. It can be painful. Your body will likely tell you that what you are doing is wrong and you need to stop. You will be tempted to cut your fast short, if you start it at all. Temptation of the flesh is real and its strong. Make no mistake about it.

Jesus assumed his disciples would fast. He says in the Sermon on the Mount, “When you fast…” (Matthew 6:16). His assumption was that we would fast and continue to fast though cultures and society’s would change. Jesus himself fasted. He spent forty days and forty nights fasting in the wilderness before he started his ministry. If we are to follow his example, surely fasting should be a part of our life, as it was apart of his.

Fasting in scripture means abstaining from food. Today’s society has softened fasting to mean abstaining from anything you really want. While that can be a great practice, it isn’t fasting. Fasting is abstaining from food. That’s it. Nothing fancy. You can abstain from your cell phone or from television for a season, but that’s not what the Bible refers to as fasting. There are many benefits from abstaining from technology or other things, but confusing that with fasting is not helpful.

Back to the question of why do we fast? I think first and foremost the main reason we fast is found in the passage above - we fast in anticipation of meeting with Jesus. Anna had spent her years in a unique place compared to many of us. She spent her life in fasting and prayer, waiting to see the redemption of Israel. She had been a widow for most of her life and perhaps it was because of that, that her longing to see the Bridegroom only intensified throughout her life. She longed to meet Jesus and God heard her heart’s cry and answered it.

Jesus would echo this same idea when he was asked in Mark 2 why his disciples didn’t fast. He answered, “As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast” (Mark 2:19b). Jesus would then tell the crowd that when the bridegroom is no longer here, then his disciples would fast. Again, Jesus had an expectation that we would fast. He also echos the sentiment of Anna, that we would fast because we want to be with the Bridegroom, Jesus.

I believe that is the primary reason we fast, because we have a longing to be with Jesus or a hunger for God, but I don’t think that is the only reason. Let me mention a few more reasons to fast. The next reason we fast is for repentance. When we have sinned, fasting and prayer is a common response to that sin. We don’t fast as a form of forgiveness though. Our forgiveness was purchased on the Cross, our fasting adds nothing to that. We fast because we want to put the flesh into submission and cultivate a hunger for God.

“Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;”
Joel 2:12 

Fasting is part of the process of repentance. That’s a great reason to fast. If you have sin in your life and your heart is for repentance, consider adding fasting, weeping and mourning into your process of dealing with your sin.

The next main reason we may fast is to grieve. Grieving is lost in our culture. We don’t grieve well. When someone dies, we don’t even do a funeral anymore, it’s a “celebration of life”. While I get the sentiment, it’s not a healthy way of processing death. When someone dies, it’s ok to be sad, in fact, it’s expected. Sadness is not a sin. Sadness is normal. When someone dies, our first job is not to simply “get over it.” That’s not a proper way to process death.

This applies to all aspects of grieving. Some of us are not grieving a death, but the loss of something major in our lives, maybe a job or a dream. Those things are to be grieved as well and one of the ways that we can learn to grieve well is through the act of fasting.

“And they mourned and wept and fasted until evening for Saul and for Jonathan his son and for the people of the Lord and for the house of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword.”
2 Sam 1:12

Fasting in a time of grief can be very powerful and comforting. In fasting we are ultimately showing that our trust is in the Lord. By with staining from food, we are showing that our bodies are subject even to the mercies of God. He is the one that sustains us.

So to recap, the reasons we fast are for spiritual growth (we want to grow closer to Jesus, we want to meet with God), repentance (we have sinned and fast to see our flesh brought into submission) and for grief (we fast knowing that our trust is in God despite our circumstances).

The next question you have may be when or how often should I fast? That’s a great question and the Bible doesn’t give us a clear answer on this, but if we look into church history, we can see what others have done and perhaps it will inspire us as well. In the time of Jesus, Jews typically fasted two days a week. They would fast from sun down one day until sun down the next day, a 24-hour fast. According to tradition, they fasted on Mondays and Thursdays.

The early church on the other hand, wanting to distinguish itself from the Jewish people of that time decided to change the days up. They still fasted two days a week, but instead of fasting on Mondays and Thursdays, they fasted on Wednesdays and Fridays. According to traditions, they chose those two days for very specific reasons. They chose Wednesday because that was the day that Jesus was betrayed and they chose Friday because that is the day Jesus was crucified.

This is obviously not something to get legalistic about, but it does give us some insight into how important fasting was to the early church and to those that lived during the time of Jesus. We can also see how far our culture has fallen from the tradition of fasting as we don’t see it done as often as the early church.

My suggestion is to fast with regularity. For me, I have a tendency to procrastinate or totally forget to do things, unless they are scheduled. If I were to wait on the right time to fast, it would never get done. That’s why I resonate with the early church’s tradition of fasting on scheduled days. It’s much more likely to happen if you schedule it.

So as we approach the beginning of a new year, where is your heart? Are you willing to try something new? Are you looking to grow? Where is the Holy Spirit prompting you to change? In order to be a people who are spirit-led, we need to seek the Spirit and ask Him what he is inviting us into this coming year.

Will you take the beginning of this next year and fast? Perhaps you have something to grieve over or perhaps it’s a sin issue that you need to repent of or maybe you want to meet with Jesus, whatever it is, the invitation is for you to fast with us as we start 2024. We will be fasting January 2nd to the 4th, looking forward to a year of growing closer to Jesus. I hope you will join us.