Simple Rhythms: Fasting
Fasting is an exercise that has been practiced throughout history by people of faith. It’s often associated with abstaining from food, but it is a powerful tool for spiritual growth and intimacy embraced by individuals seeking deeper spiritual connection and clarity. It is not about starvation or punishment. Instead, it’s an intentional sacrifice teaching us self-control and dependence on God.
INTRO
This morning, the simple rhythm we are going to look at is fasting.
The simplest understanding of fasting is not eating food to seek God.
In all honesty, of all the spiritual exercises that we’ve looked at and will look at, fasting is the hardest for me.
It’s my least favorite exercise to engage in so I try to avoid it. In the church that I grew up in, fasting was on a quarterly rotation or so.
It was the first and last one I attended. In youth group, we participated in an annual event called 40-hour famine. We would fast together for 40 hours straight while praying, engaging in activities, and worshiping.
The event provided an opportunity for students to experience hunger with the goal to raise funds and help an organization working against hunger.
Confession time.
Of all the 40-hour famine events I attended, I think I was able to only fast through one of them.
If I’m honest, fasting feels like long and miserable period of time where I’m supposed to feel closer to Jesus, but feel hungry and that’s it.
In prepping this sermon and even now, I feel nervous knowing my personal struggle with fasting and food, but I think it’s absolutely necessary that we talk about it because fasting is a significant spiritual exercise in the Bible.
And while it was one of the most essential spiritual exercises in the Bible, it is also one of the most neglected exercises in the western church.
If we look at the impact fasting made in scripture, it makes us wonder why we’ve neglected it.
Fasting in the bible
Throughout the Old and New Testament, faithful followers of God fasted in situations of special need.
Here are some situations:
Moses is one of the first to fast.
After returning from Mount Sinai with the 10 Commandments, he finds the Israelites worshipping the golden calf.
Moses returns to God to ask for mercy because God was upset and wanted to destroy the Israelites.
In Deuteronomy 9, we’re told that Moses fasted from bread and water for 40 days and nights.
Idolatry was and is a serious sin against God, so Moses responded by fasting and asking for God’s forgiveness.
In Esther 4, Esther requested that all her fellow Jews fast for 3 days and 3 nights so she could approach King Xerxes about Haman who plotted genocide and had a plan to kill all the Jews.
God graciously answered and protected the Jewish people.
In the New Testament, Matthew 4 tells us about Jesus fasting for forty days to prepare for his ministry.
He also fasted to demonstrate his dependence on God’s power, not food to overcome the devil’s temptations.
In Acts 13, while the believers were worshipping and fasting, the Holy Spirit tells the believers to send Saul and Barnabas on the very first mission trip where the gospel is shared with others, churches are planted, and leaders are raised.
All of these individuals who fasted were greatly impacted so I think it’s worth us looking into why it’s important.
Fasting and the early believers
Fasting was a normal rhythm for the early Christians.
It was a religious rhythm in the Jewish religion that Christians adopted.
In Matthew 6 when Jesus teaches on fasting, he says “when you fast,” not “if you fast."
One of the earliest church writings outside of the New Testament was a church manual called The Didache (pr: did-a-kay).
In it, disciples were expected to fast weekly on Wednesdays and Fridays.
They did this to commemorate Jesus’ betrayal and crucifixion, which happened on Wednesday and Friday.
This was their way to identify and participate in the sufferings of Christ according to 1 Peter 4:13.
13 But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. 14
It’s kind of like how I like to wear Jordan sneakers.
I want to be great like Michael Jordan and one of Nike’s slogans is, “it’s gotta be the shoes!”
So, greatness means I wear the shoes.
Now, I know that’s not true, but that’s me getting suckered into a great marketing campaign!
Fasting was their way to be like Christ by experiencing Jesus’ sufferings on the night of his betrayal and when he was crucified.
But, fast forward to today, it’s rare to find western churches and Christians partake in fasting and I think it’s worth us revisiting because Jesus taught about it in one of his most famous sermons.
Matthew 6: Jesus teaches about fasting
In Matthew 5-7, Jesus preaches the Sermon on the Mount.
This is one of his most famous sermons.
And while it covers many important topics, the BibleProject summarizes that the Sermon on the Mount talks about “the power of God’s love, along with those who choose to embrace it, [and how it] will eventually outlast and overwhelm all evil everywhere.”
Fasting is one of the topics that Jesus covers.
So, I think we have to believe that there is value in fasting when we embrace it.
Let me re-read the passage again for us.
This is what it says,
16 “When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
17 But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18 so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
Like I mentioned earlier, fasting was a normal rhythm for Jesus’ earliest followers.
It wasn’t a matter of if you fast, but a matter of when.
The issue that Jesus addressed in this teaching corrected how some were incorrectly fasting.
Some publicized their fasting by drawing attention to themselves receive recognition for practicing their godly deeds.
They wanted others to know that they were fasting, so they put on their saddest and gloomiest faces. “Disfiguring their faces” meant they made themselves look miserable.
Instead of washing their faces and grooming themselves, they would skip the daily hygiene routine and sprinkle ashes on their head showing off to others what they were doing.
Fasting wasn’t to highlight the individual partaking in it.
Instead, Jesus corrects the understanding of fasting and instructs his followers to put “oil on their head and wash their face.”
If a person was fasting, no one should know.
They should go about it like any other day and the only person who should know is God.
And this is the important thing about fasting.
When we fast, the focus is on God and not ourselves.
What do I mean by this?
Food plays an essential part in our everyday life.
The most essential need that person must have to live, it’s food and water.
Food and water are essential to sustain life.
Now, from a Christian worldview, when we choose to fast, we are saying that God is essential to life.
So, we go without food and seek God because he is essential to sustain life.
Pastor, Rich Villodas, offers this perspective.
This is what he says,
“I like to look at fasting through the lens of how I have tried to soothe my pain in ways that have left God out of the picture and left others out of the picture. And in fasting I'm now stripping all of the ways that I have been dependent on something other than God and whether it is food whether it's social media whether it's work whatever it is and that how can I now throw myself once again at utter dependence upon God. So for me I think our lives are often oriented by self-soothing I think this is the nature of addiction. And I think the nature of also life and why fasting is so important because it reminds me once again I've tried to address my problems in very worldly ways and I've left God out of the picture.”
At the core, fasting is dependence on God.
Not us or things, but God.
Fasting is a quick way to humble us by reminding us how dependent we rely on food.
If I’m honest, my day revolves around meals.
If I miss a meal it can make the difference between a good or bad day.
Think about the last time you got hangry.
Our consumption or lack of consuming of food determines how we feel.
Scientifically, research has shown that when we eat fatty and sugary food, our body releases dopamine, a neurotransmitter that makes us feel good.
Food has a rule and reign over us that we might not be aware of or want to admit.
But when we fast, it reminds us that food isn’t our master.
God is.
I think that’s what Jesus means he says,
17 But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18 so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
That God is the reward when we fast.
That’s what Moses, Esther, Jesus, and the disciples experienced when they fasted.
They encountered God in their fast.
Simply put, fasting is turning away from to the most essential thing so that we can turn to the most essential person, God.
APPLICATION
So how do we go about fasting?
What are simple rhythms that we can implement when it comes to fasting?
I referenced a Nike slogan earlier, and I’ll reference another, “just do it.”
Just do it.
Fasting is not a requirement in our faith.
We aren’t saved because we fast, but Jesus fasted, and he invites us to follow him.
So do it.
There’s no set time.
In the Bible, fasts went anywhere from sun up to sun down, 24 hour periods, 3 days, 7 days, or 40 days.
Go without food for a period that you’ve determined and spend that time focused on God.
Fasting has shown to improve our physical and mental health.
Research has shown the fasting helps us be more aware of what’s going on.
Fasting also has spiritual benefits.
If we are more mentally aware, it can help us be in tune to God.
Emptying our stomachs gives us an opportunity to fill it with prayer where we communicate with God and listen to God.
Engage with scripture.
Food isn’t the only thing sustains us.
God’s truth sustains us too.
Now, there’s a caveat to fasting.
For any of us who experiences eating disorders, seek help with what you’re struggling with before you fast.
Take care of what you need before you engage in this exercise.
And if you don’t experience any eating disorders, but you find fasting difficult, start with abstaining from something that controls your life.
Similarly, abstinence can help us connect with God when other things demand our attention.
Determine a set time and abstain from whatever it is.
During that time, engage with God in prayer and scripture.
John Piper offers this thought that I’ve adapted.
Fasting and abstaining from things is a rhythm we can engage in allowing us to enjoy God’s gifts for us, but deny the unhealthy bondage when we forget that God is more precious than his gifts.
Let’s pray.