A Lost Discipline

A Lost Discipline

Read: Matthew 6:16-18

“When you fast . . .”

Matthew 6:16

“Fasting is the voluntary denial of a normal function for the sake of intense spiritual activity.”

—Richard Foster

IN WORD Fasting is a lost discipline, for most. It certainly isn’t a requirement of our faith—nowhere in the New Testament does Jesus or His apostles urge His followers to fast as a condition for spiritual blessing. And there are certainly many wrong reasons to fast: pagan ritualism, unspiritual worship of the physical, hypocritical righteousness, and political protest, to name a few. It can be done in prideful self-reliance and it can be done as an attempt to manipulate divine favor. But the abuses do not make the practice wrong. If they did, Jesus would have forbidden it. He clearly does not. He expects that His followers will have occasion to fast.

What better way is there to demonstrate a desire for eternal truth over temporal satisfaction? What better way is there to claim that our citizenship is in heaven, not in this world? Fasting plants our feet in an eternal kingdom and uproots them from the essence of this world. By denying one of the most basic desires of our flesh, we clearly cast our lot with the Spirit. We will return to food soon enough; but in the meantime, we declare an affinity for things greater than our bodily sustenance, as legitimate as it may be. We demonstrate a craving for the spiritual at the expense of the physical. And there’s something about that statement that inclines God toward us in an unusual way.

IN DEED There is no clearer way than fasting to say, “Lord, I need Your answer as though my whole life depends on it. I would rather die than not hear from You.” By fasting, we define ourselves as spiritual beings—those who really understand that humans do not live by bread alone—when we abstain from food in order to talk with God.

And God hears. He does not honor false motives, but He honors true desperation. He answers those for whom hearing His voice is so obviously important. Fasting will do many things for you—point out your false loves and bring to the surface your character flaws, for example—but nothing is more important than this: hearing the voice of God.