This article is an adaption from a Dig Deeper talk on Fasting that you can listen to here. There is also a list of biblical references to fasting that you can read here.
INTRODUCTION
‘When in Rome, do as the Romans do.’ You may have heard of that expression.
What does it mean? We often use it to justify stuffing our faces with lots of food – when in Rome, eat like the Romans.
But actually ‘when in Rome, do as the Romans do’ was originally advice about fasting, given by the Bishop Ambrose to Augustine and his mother, Monica.
Fasting. It’s probably not something we hear about much, talk about much, maybe even practice much.
In fact, I would go so far as to say that fasting is the most neglected of all spiritual disciplines.
This article seeks to readdress that imbalance.
I want to do this by looking at fasting from the storyline of the Bible – what we call a biblical theology – tracing the theme of fasting from beginning to end, starting at Genesis.
THE BEGINNING AND END
As we think about this, we might want to start with the very beginning and the very end of the Bible.
Where there’s lots of food.
At the beginning, God in Genesis 2 puts Adam into the garden of Eden and says you can eat from any tree – anything other than the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
To paraphrase Jared Cooper God gave them a whole paradise of yes, and one tree of no.
And Adam and Eve chose that one tree of no in Genesis 3. They chose to eat.
Paul Miller comments: ‘Food got us into the mess we are in, but it wasn’t really the food: Adam and Eve “saw”, “took”, and “ate” forbidden fruit in an act of rebellion (Gen 3:6). Fasting reverses that by saying no to desire’
But food also takes a focal point at the end of the Bible in Revelation – when we will sit and feast at the marriage supper of the lamb (Revelation 19).
So food is a gift, a positive thing given to us by God to enjoy.
In fact, feasting throughout the OT, especially regulated in the festivals – is equated with rejoicing. So, eating food and drinking is associated with rejoicing, as well as the means by which humanity fell.
MOUNT SINAI
Let’s keep that thought as we climb Mount Sinai together. And see the first occurrence of fasting in the Bible. It doesn’t happen in the patriarchal narratives in Genesis with Abraham, Isaac or Jacob. We have to wait until Exodus 34 for it to appear.
This is the high point of Moses on the top of the mountain after leading the people out of Egypt and through the Red Sea.
And here in this chapter we witness Moses glimpsing the glory of God, and that God is fundamentally a faithful God, one whose steadfast love and justice will never fail, v6-7.
And here we read whilst Moses is in the presence of God Exodus 34:28: ‘Moses was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights without eating bread or drinking water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant – the Ten Commandments.’
Though the word fasting isn’t used, this is the fundamental essence of fasting – denying yourself food and water.
Denying yourself the most essential things we need for life. That we cannot live without.
Some say that fasting is giving up any good gift from God for a time – John Piper would argue this in his book A Hunger for God, but I think fasting is fundamentally more basic than that – giving up TV won’t kill you – it is not essential for life – but food and drink is.
Moses makes a point of this amazing fact that he went without food for 40 days (which is medically possible though incredibly difficult) and water for 40 days (medically impossible!) twice more in Deuteronomy 9, when he’s reminding Israel of the events of Sinai at the rebellion with the golden calf.
He says in v9: ‘When I went up on the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant that the LORD had made with you, I stayed on the mountain for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water’
And then when he came down and saw the rebellion and broke the tablets he went back up and says in v18: ‘Then once again I fell prostrate before the LORD for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water, because of all the sin you had committed, doing what was evil in the LORD’s sight and so arousing his anger’
It’s always a good thing to take notice when the Bible describes or mentions something for the first time. For it is often significant.
And here in the three quotations about fasting in Exodus and Deuteronomy I believe we can say this.
Moses went without food and water for 40 days and 40 nights because he was in the presence of the living God – the God of life.
And in that time without food and drink how did he survive? He survived because it is a reminder to us that ultimately it is God who gives life. That the basic need of all humanity is to be in the presence of God – because he ultimately can give and sustain life.
And afterwards, Moses didn’t come down the mountain sick and pale and ill. He came down with his face shining, radiating the glory of God.
So, fasting makes us remember that true life is dependent, not on food and drink, but on the living God as we come into his presence.
But that second reference in Deuteronomy is a little different. Moses says doesn’t he in v18: ‘I ate no bread and drank no water, because of all the sin you had committed’.
As we’ll see, fasting is not only coming into God’s presence in dependence on him, but it is also closely related to the horror of sin, mourning for it, and repenting of it.
THE DAY OF ATONEMENT
I believe we see the concept of fasting again when both of these themes – the presence of God and sin – converge in Leviticus 16 when Moses says that the people of God must in v29 and v31 deny themselves, or afflict their souls. A few translations have a footnote, saying ‘or fasting’, which is the gist of what the phrase means.
One article says: ‘While neither the verb nor the noun for fast and fasting occur in this section of the Pentateuch, “afflicting one’s soul” equals fasting.’
So on the day of atonement – the day when the High Priest enters the Holy of Holies and comes into the presence of the LORD, and atonement is made for sin, the people are to fast in dependence and worship on the LORD to sustain them and save them.
Fasting is linked to coming into God’s presence and sin.
WILDERNESS
It will take a bit more time before we see fasting in the OT again. Because of cause, the Israelites spent a lot of time in the Wilderness, yes complaining they didn’t have enough food, but also because the LORD provided manna from heaven, and quail for substance through the wilderness.
But even then Moses reminded them in Deuteronomy 8:3 of this important fact. ‘He [God] humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD’.
Words that will reappear again in the context of fasting in the NT but give us the basic principle of fasting – we do no live on bread alone but on every word that comes from God. He is the one who ultimately sustains us and gives us life.
JUDGES
Then they entered the promised land in Joshua, the land flowing with milk and honey. The land providing plenty of food. They conquer it and begin to settle and live in it, letting the promised land sustain them.
So, when does fasting appear again?
Well, the first time it is directly mentioned is in the Book of Judges. In chapter 20:26.
This is nearing the end of a dark book that highlights human sin and Israel’s depravity. In the previous chapter a man’s concubine was viciously raped and killed by a bunch of Benjamite’s. Then the man cut the concubine into twelve pieces and sent them to (presumably the 12 tribes) by sending twelve pieces across the land.
This roused Israel to war against Benjamin – civil war. But Israel, though outnumbering Benjamin, were defeated, not once, but twice.
After the second humiliating defeat where 18000 were cut down, we read this in v26-28:
‘Then all the Israelites, the whole army, went up to Bethel, and there they sat weeping before the LORD. They fasted that day until evening and presented burnt offerings and fellowship offerings to the LORD. And the Israelites enquired of the LORD. (In those days the ark of the covenant of God was there, with Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, ministering before it.) They asked, ‘Shall we go up again to fight against the Benjaminite’s, our fellow Israelites, or not?’ The LORD responded, ‘Go, for tomorrow I will give them into your hands.’
The first time the word fasting is explicitly used in the Bible implicitly shows us it is within the context of sin and evil, but also that it brought them to Eleazar at Bethel and the Ark of the Covenant, into the presence of the LORD. Our two major themes continue to appear.
But this is where we learn two other things about fasting that again will help us understand its significance, themes we’ll see throughout the OT.
1: Fasting is connected with mourning, they were weeping after a heavy defeat
2: Fasting leads them to enquire of the LORD. Fasting leads them to turn to the High priest to talk to God.. So, fasting is closely connected with prayer and guidance.
And when that happens here the circumstances of the Israelites change. They win!
It begs the question – does fasting help bring about significant change in our circumstances?
We’ll refrain from answering that at the moment, but it is a question to keep in mind.
And as we do, let’s turn our attention to the references to fasting in the books of 1 and 2 Samuel.
1 & 2 SAMUEL
In 1 Samuel 7:6 we see the people of Israel, after Samuel confronting them about idolatry, fasting for a day and confessing ‘We have sinned against the LORD’. Fasting is once again, connected to mourning and confessing sin.
In 1 Sam 31:13 we see the people Jabesh Gilead proclaim a 7 day fast to mourn the deaths of Saul and Jonathan (an event also highlighted in 1 Chronicles 10:12). Something David and the Israelites do too, but only until evening when they find out about Saul and Jonathan’s deaths (2 Samuel 1:12). By David’s day fasting has become heavily connected to mourning and grief.
We can pause here and already see that there are different durations of fasting, with no command to tell us how long to fast and when to fast, other than on the Day of Atonement (see above). So far we’ve had 40 days, a day, 7 days, and ‘until evening’.
DAVID’S FAST
Let’s turn to 2 Samuel 12 next. Remember the story, David had slept with Bathsheba and had sent Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband to the front to be killed, so he could marry her and cover up the fact she was pregnant. But God through Nathan, revealed how this is a terrible thing, and the child will die as a consequence.
Let me pick up the story in v16-23:
‘David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and spent the nights lying in sackcloth on the ground. The elders of his household stood beside him to get him up from the ground, but he refused, and he would not eat any food with them. On the seventh day the child died. David’s attendants were afraid to tell him that the child was dead, for they thought, ‘While the child was still living, he wouldn’t listen to us when we spoke to him. How can we now tell him the child is dead? He may do something desperate.’
David noticed that his attendants were whispering among themselves, and he realised that the child was dead. ‘Is the child dead?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ they replied, ‘he is dead.’
Then David got up from the ground. After he had washed, put on lotions and changed his clothes, he went into the house of the LORD and worshipped. Then he went to his own house, and at his request they served him food, and he ate.
His attendants asked him, ‘Why are you acting in this way? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat!’
He answered, ‘While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, “Who knows? The LORD may be gracious to me and let the child live.” But now that he is dead, why should I go on fasting? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.’
What does this passage tell us about fasting? Why are the attendants surprised by David’s actions?
More than any other place in the OT so far, does this little story talk about fasting. Four times between v16-23.
And it shows us once again a connection to grief and fasting. But we also see for the first time fasting connected with sackcloth. David was lying on sackcloth, an outward sign of humility.
With this sign of humility, we also see David pleading for the LORD in fasting, just as Eleazar did for Israel in Judges.
But the attendants ask the question in v21 because David is reversing the cultural norms. As we’ve seen so far, you fast when you’re mourning for the dead. You don’t fast before that. David was doing things the wrong way round.
But David highlights a key point: ‘While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, “Who knows? The LORD may be gracious to me and let the child live’.
He hoped that through fasting, and pleading, showing humility, God would relent.
The fact that he didn’t should makes us pause and remember that fasting isn’t a failsafe way of changing circumstances. After all, God is sovereign over fasting and what happens. And we will see throughout the OT that God does not reward sin through fasting.
HUMILITY
But then sometimes he surprises us, like with the story of Ahab fasting and lying on sackcloth in 1 Kings 21.
After the whole scandalous Naboth’s vineyard incident (when Jezebel actually holds a day of fasting to stitch Naboth up and get falsely accused of cursing, so Ahab can have the vineyard and turn into a vegetable patch) – Elijah comes to Ahab and tells him that Ahab is going to be judged for this, he’s going to die and all his sons.
We’re told by the writer in v25-26 Ahab was evil and vile. And then v27: ‘When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly.’
Once again fasting is done alongside sackcloth, and it is God himself who gives us a commentary on Ahab’s actions. In v28 we read: ‘Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite: ‘Have you noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day, but I will bring it on his house in the days of his son.’
Humility of heart seen through the outward sign of sackcloth causes God to delay – to not bring the disaster in Ahab’s day.
We see something similar in Jonah. When Jonah finally gets to Ninevah via a detour in a big fish, and he preaches, we read in Jonah 3:5: ‘The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.’
Again mourning for sin is associated with fasting, as well as this outward show of putting on sackcloth.
Fasting should be accompanied with a humble, contrite heart.
Something seen in one of the three times fasting is mentioned in the Psalms, when David writes in Psalm 35:13 ‘yet when they were ill, I put on sackcloth and humbled myself with fasting’
The interesting thing after that, is David says he prayed and his prayers went unanswered. Which makes us stop and hopefully see once again, there’s no guarantee fasting will change our (or somebody else’s) circumstances, even if at times, like with King Jehoshaphat and Judah, he certainly can (see 2 Chronicles 20:3).
ISAIAH 58
But what happens when it just becomes a spiritual habit and discipline, a showy sign of holiness. It’s no longer an expression of the heart, but an outward display of self-righteousness?
Well Isaiah gives us the greatest OT warning against fasting in Isaiah 58:
Isaiah 58:1-9:
‘‘Shout it aloud, do not hold back. Raise your voice like a trumpet. Declare to my people their rebellion and to the descendants of Jacob their sins. For day after day they seek me out; they seem eager to know my ways, as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them. “Why have we fasted,” they say, “and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?” ‘Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarrelling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.
Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD? ‘Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter – when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the LORD will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: here am I.”
What is wrong with the fasting going on here and what is the solution?
This shows the hypocrisy and ritualistic formula of fasting, one done out of self-centred habit. A ritual that is simply outward facing, and is not accompanied by good works, or a change in heart towards each other and the needy around them.
As Alec Motyer states: ‘What was intended to influence God obviously brought out the worst in the human spirit, for one can easily imagine the edginess which would result if a basically unspiritual family spent the day together in increasing hunger!’
Fasting can be a real danger to religious pride and outward showy religiosity.
But at the same time, true fasting that is caring and showcasing holiness, and humility can be effective for ‘then you will call, and the LORD will answer’ (v9).
DANIEL 9
This is what we see generally in the prophets (if we went to Jeremiah and Joel particularly) is that fasting should be accompanied with repentance and a mourning for sin, not while you continue to sin.
And this true fasting, of having the right heart attitude before God and others, is perhaps most clearly seen in Daniel who before his famous prayer in Daniel 9, knowing the judgement would be on Jerusalem for 70 years did this in v3 and v4: ‘So I turned to the LORD God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed…’
Then Daniel prays his beautiful prayer of confession that shows us – once again the link between fasting and prayer, fasting and sin, and fasting and confession.
POST-TEMPLE ERA
And when we get to the post temple era, in Ezra and Nehemiah and Esther, we see fasting for (i) for mourning over sin and judgement, (ii) for guidance, (iii) in humility with sackcloth, (iv) and for God to act. But perhaps what stands out between the testaments is this outward showy ritualistic fasting with no heart change.
In fact, mourning seems to become a dominant theme in connection to fasting. Which we see in Zechariah for example, when we read in v2-5: ‘The people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-Melek, together with their men, to entreat the LORD by asking the priests of the house of the LORD Almighty and the prophets, ‘Should I mourn and fast in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?’
‘Then the word of the LORD Almighty came to me: ‘Ask all the people of the land and the priests, “When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?’
Fasting had become an outward ritual connected with mourning, rather than an inward expression of humility and dependence on God.
And yet in Zechariah we get a glimpse of what fasting might look like in the future –
In Zechariah 8:19 we read:
‘This is what the LORD Almighty says: ‘The fasts of the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months will become joyful and glad occasions and happy festivals for Judah.’
Fasting will not just be about mourning, it will be hopeful and happy.
THE GOSPELS
Fasting in the New Testament is limited to references in the Gospels and Acts, although some see allusions to it in 2 Corinthians 6:5 and 11:27.
But we’re going to camp in Matthew’s Gospel for the most part and look at three events and teachings of Jesus.
The first – it will not surprise you to read – is in Matthew 4 and the temptation of Jesus by the Devil.
‘Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting for forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.’ (v1-2)
Then we read in v3: ‘The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’
What is Jesus’ reply? Remember what we read back in Deuteronomy 8:3? ‘Jesus answered, ‘It is written: “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.” (v4)
Do you see the similarities with Moses on Mount Sinai? This time it explicitly says Jesus was fasting forty days and forty nights like Moses and was led by the Spirit.
Just before this episode we have Jesus’ baptism and the triune God coming together in the Father speaking, the Spirit descending on the Son. And then the Spirit leads Jesus out and he fasts.
Once again – we see fasting quite literally in the presence of the LORD. And we see one of the key principles of fasting – ‘man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God’ – God is the giver of life – we’re dependent on God for life.
SERMON ON THE MOUNT
We also see Jesus teaching on fasting in the Sermon on the Mount. Straight after his teaching on prayer, he then says in Matthew 6:16-18:
‘‘When you fast, do not look sombre 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. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 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”
Jesus (like we saw in Isaiah and Zechariah) is calling out the hypocrites who make a showy view of fasting so all can see. Instead, Jesus says, don’t make it obvious to others – and your Father in heaven will see you and reward you – showing us true fasting is not pointless – God sees and can reward.
But also notice that first word ‘when’. ‘When you fast’. Not ‘if’ – there is an expectation that Jesus’ followers will fast – he doesn’t command it. But he expects it to happen.
MATTHEW 9
And so do John’s disciples in Matthew 9. They ask in v14: ‘‘How is it that we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?’
Jesus answered in v15: ‘How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast.’
And continues to say in v16-17: ‘‘No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear worse. Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out, and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.’
This conversation is also in Mark and Luke – and John Piper says this is the most important text about fasting in the Bible.
Once again Jesus assumes his followers will fast, when he’s left!
Without getting into the details this is Piper’s argument – the old wineskin is the old fasting connected with mourning and outward religious ritual as a way to confess sin and seek God. This is what we saw as the dominant theme by the end of the OT.
But you can’t put new wine into old wine skins otherwise in their brittleness they’ll burst. They are not suitable. This means the old way of fasting is not suitable now Jesus is here. In fact, it is incompatible.
So new wineskins are needed for this new wine – which is Christ’s presence in us. This means there’s a new emphasis on fasting – changed by the gospel of Jesus – into a fasting that hungers for Jesus’ presence, that depends on him, that yearns for him. That feasts on him with gladness. That wants more of him, when he is gone, not needing to mourn for sin in fasting, for we can come to Jesus.
So, fasting is an expression of longing for more of Christ, more of his presence in our lives.
Piper says:
‘What then is new about the new Christian fasting? What’s new about Christian fasting is that it rests on all this finished work of the Bridegroom… The newness of our fasting is this: its intensity comes not because we have never tasted the wine of Christ’s presence, but because we have tasted it so wonderfully by his Spirit, and cannot now be satisfied until the consummation of joy arrives. The new fasting, the Christian fasting, is a hunger for all the fullness of God, aroused by the aroma of Jesus’ love and by the taste of God’s goodness in the gospel of Christ’
In other words, because we’ve tasted Christ’s presence in us through his Spirit, we want more, should hunger for more – and fasting gives us more.
The problem is we fill ourselves with other things that can stifle that hunger, we as Piper says, nibble off the apple pies of this world.
Piper adds:
‘If you don’t feel strong desires for the manifestation of the glory of God, it is not because you have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because you have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Your soul is stuffed with small things, and there is no room for the great. God did not create you for this. There is an appetite for God. And it can be awakened. I invite you to turn from the dulling effects of food and the dangers of idolatry, and to say with some simple fast: “This much, O God, I want you.”
Fasting isn’t commanded in the New Testament, but is assumed, and I think one of the reasons you don’t see a command is because you cannot command hunger. You are either hungry for God’s presence or not. Either way you will hunger for something.
Instead, we should give up the essential need for food (and drink) at times, to fill our hearts with the essential need for God’s presence. To be dependent on him, and feast on him, experiencing his presence in our hunger.
Man does not live on bread alone. But on the Word that became flesh.
FASTING IN ACTS
The last references to fasting are found in Acts.
We learn that Paul at his conversion in Acts 9 does not eat and drink food for three days, perhaps another link between the presence of God and fasting.
Then in chapter 13:2-3 we see the whole church of Antioch fasting and worshiping. We read: ‘While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off.’
From this reference we see fasting and worship going hand in hand. Fasting can be sign of piety and is not simply an individual discipline. The whole church fasts. And the fast leads to the Holy Spirit speaking to them.
And the Spirit tells them to set apart Barnabas and Paul for mission. A mission that has far-reaching consequences for the spread of the gospel. And it started through fasting.
After the Spirit talks to them the whole church fasts again whilst praying.
Something we see later on in Acts for the appointment of elders in Acts 14:23 – it was accompanied with fasting and praying. A specific issue was not only an occasion for prayer, but for fasting too. Presumably to seek guidance and help from the LORD.
CONCLUSION
Fasting in the Bible is abstaining from food (and sometimes food and water) for a certain period of time. Though we do not see fasting in the various letters by Paul and John and Peter, let us not use that to downplay the significance of fasting in the Bible.
As we conclude, here are 7 things about fasting that we have learnt.
We’ve seen in the Bible the danger of:
I: Pride – Pride is evident in fasting in the OT but even in the NT. Though we didn’t go to it – Jesus’ telling of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, when the Pharisee says among other things ‘I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get’ (Luke 18:12) shows us, once again, the dangers of fasting.
II: Presence – The aim of fasting is to spend time in God’s presence, knowing we do not live off bread alone, knowing food can dull our hunger and dependence on God.
III: Piety – Fasting can be done in humility and worship – whether as a church in Acts or as Anna does in the temple grounds in Luke 2. It shows our humility and dependence before the LORD. That fasting is a reflection of our humble heart towards God.
IV: Prayer – Fasting is closely linked to prayer and assumes that we seek God through prayer – petitioning God for specific things.
V: Penitence – In the OT specifically it is often associated with confession and repentance of sin. This may be linked to the old wine of fasting with sackcloth, though since it is not commanded either way, giving up food in grief to come to the LORD, cannot be judged as wrong. Again, it depends on the heart reasons for doing this.
VI: Guidance – Not as often as you might think, but certainly fasting is connected to asking for wisdom, for help to make the right decision.
VII: Grief – this last one is the old wine of fasting, mourning for death and sin and using it in religious ritualistic ways.
Fasting then, is very much a part of the NT church. Not commanded like prayer, or other spiritual disciplines, therefore not as central, but still practiced whether for a short period of time, a day, a few days, or many days.
And though there may be very good medical reasons for not doing it, I do not see spiritual reasons for not doing it – other than the fact we have become dependent on the material nourishment of food. May it not be said that our god is our stomachs, for our minds are set on earthly things (Philippians 3).
Instead of filling our stomachs with food, fill your heart with Jesus. And taste the difference.
