The Fundamentals of Fasting IV

 Although you will find various lengths of time when it comes to fasting throughout the Bible, the three-day fast is the longest you will find wherein fasting from both food and water is mentioned. As I said, the two exceptions were Moses and Jesus, Jesus being Jesus, and Moses being in the presence of God, sustained by Him supernaturally. If you’re thinking to yourself that you may not be Jesus, but you could pass or Moses, then Godspeed. Elijah was also mentioned as having fasted for forty days, but it is unspecified whether water was a component of his fast.

We know that Daniel fasted for ten days, consuming only vegetables and water; Paul fasted for fourteen days, drinking only water; Samuel fasted for seven days, although what he consumed is never specified; and Daniel, once more, fasted for twenty-one days, consuming only water, vegetables, fruits and nuts.

They all had something to do with masticating, swallowing, ingesting, and digesting food, water, or both. Make of that what you will; I’m just telling you what the Bible says if you think you’re fasting from doing laundry or washing the dishes in the sink as unto the Lord. Better still, you can go on a fast from fasting; I know, a Eureka moment if ever there was one, but that’s not biblical either.

If the fast you choose only impacts the flesh but does not resonate with the soul, it will never produce the fruit you expect it to. It goes beyond just skipping a meal, or two, or ten. It goes beyond abstaining from food or drink. Your focus must be such that it’s an intimate experience with God rather than a rumbling tummy.

Psalm 69:10, “When I wept and chastened my soul with fasting, that became my reproach.”

In a broader context, David is crying out to God because the reproach of those who reproached God had fallen on him, and anything he did was despised and looked down upon. You may think times have changed since David penned his psalm, and they have, but people haven’t. If you insist upon biblical precepts, if you insist upon practicing those things that the Word of God insists you must in order to call yourself a child of God, you will suffer the same reproach from those who desire a halfhearted commitment at most.

The lukewarm aren’t threatened by you specifically; they are threatened by your desire to press in, grow, and mature. They’re threatened by your being hot while they are lukewarm because, deep down, they know what God said and what their ultimate end will be.

If you’ve ever wondered how much of a pull the world or the pleasures of the flesh have on men’s hearts, even though they know that the lukewarm will be spewed out of God’s mouth, they still try to justify their state and insist that though God says He will do a thing, He didn’t really mean it.

Some will even have the temerity to point out their halfhearted worship and tertiary knowledge of Him, claiming that they prophesied in His name, cast out devils, and did mighty works in His name, and still, He will command them to depart, for He never knew them.

To this day, men are walking about, thinking that their service to God will make up for their shortfall of faith, devotion, commitment, and righteousness. Faithfulness in one thing will not make up for the shortcomings in all the others. God will not demand of anyone that they neglect their family in order to grow their ministry. That’s their desire for greatness pushing them on, not the will of God.

Your fast, however long you decide to make it, should be accompanied by prayer, supplication, and a singular desire for more of God’s presence in your life. The men we read about having fasted in the Word were all men who had a long-lasting and profound relationship with God. They didn’t just stop drinking and eating; in the midst of their fast, they beseeched God, communed with Him, and fellowshipped with Him.

Fasting without fellowshipping with God is like making the drive to church and spending all your time in the parking lot. Technically, you went to church, but you did not avail yourself of any of the benefits of being in fellowship with fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.

Joel 2:12-13, ‘“Now, therefore,” says the Lord, turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning.” So rend your heart, and not your garments; Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness; and He relents from doing harm.”

It’s not the heathen God is beseeching to turn to Him with fasting, weeping, and mourning. It’s His own, His people, His wayward children. Of the three, God counsels His people to pursue fasting first, followed by weeping and mourning. It is God’s prescription to refreshing and renewing a relationship with Him.

Fasting establishes the environment. Once the environment is established, it must be followed with prayer, or mourning, or weeping, or a time of fellowship with the Almighty wherein you feel His presence more profoundly than ever before. Fasting is a piece of the puzzle, a slice of the pie, and not the whole. Consequently, if a piece or a slice is missing, it’s noticeable and something that cannot be ignored. Fasting is not the end all and be all of the Christian experience, but it is an integral and necessary component. That’s not me saying it; it’s Jesus. As readily as He instructed us how to pray, He said when you pray, He instructed us how to fast and said when you fast.

The question of whether fasting works or not is answered by the fact that throughout the four thousand-year history that spans the Bible, barring the prophecies of future times, fasting was a common practice. If one generation practiced it without any noticeable benefit, then a second, and a third, how many generations in do you think it would have taken for the practice to fall by the wayside and no longer be something so widely practiced that even Jesus and all His disciples did it?

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.