Fasting: For The Purpose of Godliness

Fasting is a believer’s voluntary abstinence from food for spiritual purposes. Other types of fasting, despite the benefits they may produce for the mind and body, could not be classified as fasting for a believer in Jesus Christ, and fasting by an unbeliever obtains no eternal value. It is for believers in Jesus Christ, for the Discipline must be rooted in a relationship with Jesus Christ and practiced with the desire to become more like Him. Believers should fast according to biblical teaching and with purposes that are God-centered. 

It is voluntary in that fasting should not be coerced. And fasting is more than just the ultimate crash diet for the body; it is abstinence from food for spiritual purposes. Let me address first the fact that, strictly speaking, fasting is abstinence from food. There is an often-overlooked view of fasting in which, for spiritual purposes, a person abstains from or denies themself the enjoyment of something other than food.

We may perceive the need to “fast” from involvement with other people, or from the media, from a sport or hobby, from talking, from sleep, from sex, and so on. The reason might be that we sense the activity is exerting too much influence on our hearts or our time and we need to fast from it to regain a more biblical perspective. Or it might be simply that we want the freedom to become more absorbed in a particular spiritual focus. To understand fasting for spiritual purposes, realize that the Bible distinguishes between several kinds of fasts. 

Although it doesn’t use the labels, that we frequently use today to describe these fasts, each of the following fast may be found:
1) A “normal” fast involves abstaining from all food, but not from water. 
“Jesus Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan River. The Holy Spirit led Him into the desert, where the devil tempted Jesus Christ for forty days. Jesus Christ ate nothing during that time, and when those days were ended, He was very hungry.” {Luke 4:1-2}

2) A “partial” fast is a diet restriction, but not abstention from all food. 
“Daniel said to the guard, “Please give us this test for ten days: Don’t give us anything but vegetables to eat and water to drink.” {Daniel 1:12}

3) An “absolute” fast is the avoidance of all food and liquid, even water. 
“While Ezra was there, he did not eat or drink, because he was still sad about the unfaithfulness of the captives who had returned.” {Ezra 10:6b}

4) A “supernatural” fast. There are two instances of this kind of fast. When Moses wrote of his meeting with God on Mount Sinai, he said, “I remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water” {Deuteronomy 9:9}. First Kings 19:8 may be inferring that Elijah did the same thing when he went to the site of Moses’ miraculous fast: “And he arose and ate and drank and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God.” 
This fast required God’s supernatural intervention into the bodily processes and are not repeatable apart from the Lord’s specific calling and miraculous provision.

5) A “private” fast is the one referred to most often in this lesson and what Jesus Christ meant in Matthew 6:16-18, when He said we should fast in a way not to be noticed by others.

 
6) A “congregational” fast is the type found in Joel 2:15-16: “Blow the trumpet in Zion; consecrate a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Consecrate the congregation.” At least a part of the congregation of the church at Antioch was fasting together in Acts 13:2, as evidenced by Luke’s words: “While they were     worshiping the Lord and fasting . . .”

7) God established one “regular” fast in the Old Covenant. Each year, every Israelite (the descendants of Jacob) was to fast on the Day of Atonement  {Leviticus 16:29-31}.

8) The Scriptures mention an “occasional” fast. This fast occurs on special occasions as the need arises. This was the kind of fast that Jehoshaphat {in 2 Chronicles 20:3}, as well as Esther {in Esther 4:16}, called for in view of their circumstances.

Fasting is expected 
To those unfamiliar with fasting, the most surprising part of this lesson may be the discovery that Jesus Christ expected His followers to fast. Notice Jesus Christ’s words at the beginning of Matthew 6:16-17: “And when you fast. . . . But when you fast . . .” (emphasis added). By giving us instructions on what to do and what not to do when we fast, Jesus Christ assumes that we will fast.

Fasting is to done for a purpose

There’s more to a biblical fast than merely abstaining from food. Without a spiritual purpose for our fast it’s just a weight-loss fast. Having a biblical purpose - reason for our fast may be the single most important concept to take from this lesson. 

The scriptures set forth many reasons for fasting. For this lesson, I have condensed them, only listing ten. Please notice, none of the reasons mentioned are to earn God’s favor. It is useless to fast as a way to impress God and earn His acceptance. 

It is our faith in the work of Jesus Christ that makes us acceptable to God, not our efforts, regardless of their intensity or sincerity. Fasting has no eternal benefit for us until we have come to God through repentance and faith {Ephesians 2:1-10 and Titus 3:5-7}. Only after we come alive to God through Jesus Christ can we engage in fasting that pleases God. As believers, we must ache and yearn, and fast, to know more and more of all that God is for us in Jesus Christ. However, only because He has already laid hold of us and is drawing us ever forward and upward into “all the fullness of God” {Ephesians 3:19}.

As believers, whenever we fast, we should do so for at least one of these biblical purposes:

• To strengthen prayer {Erza 8:23}.
• To seek God’s guidance {Acts 14:23}.
• To express grief {2 Samuel 1:11-12}.
• To seek deliverance or protection {2 Chronicles 20:3-4}.
• To express repentance and the return to God {Joel 2:12}.
• To humble ourselves before God {1 Kings 21:27-29}.
• Biblical purposes for fasting continued:
• To express our concern for the work of God {Nehemiah 1:3-4}.
• To minister to the needs of others {**Isaiah 58}. 
• To overcome temptation and dedicate ourselves to God {Matthew 4:11}.
• To express love and worship to God {Luke 2:37}.

Before we fast, we must have a purpose, a biblical - spiritual God-centered purpose. However, even in our best fasts, we do not deserve what we desire, and we cannot force God’s hand. So, let’s balance that truth with the incontestable promise of Jesus Christ in Matthew 6:17-18: “But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

** Isaiah chapter 58, is the most extensive passage in Scripture dealing exclusively with fasting, God emphasizes fasting for the purpose of meeting the needs of others. 

Spiritual Disciplines: “Growing in Godliness While Being Conformed to the Image of Jesus Christ" (continued)

Worship: For The Purpose of Godliness

To worship is “to ascribe worth or value to something or someone.” 

In worship we focus and respond to God our Father; we magnify His worthiness of praise; we approach and address God as He is worthy; as the Holy and Almighty God, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe, the Sovereign Judge to whom we must give an account, He is worthy of all the worth and honor we can give Him and infinitely more. The more we focus on God, the more we understand and appreciate His infinite worth. As we understand and appreciate this, we can’t resist - help it, we must respond to Him. 

How does the invisible God reveal Himself to us here on Earth that we might focus on Him?

1) God reveals Himself in a general way through Creation {Romans 1:20}.

2) God has flawlessly revealed Himself through His written Word {Romans 2:14-15; 2 Peter 1:20-21} and His incarnate Word, Jesus Christ {John 1:1,14,18; Galatians 4:4-5; Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:1-2}. So, in response to God’s revelation of Himself, we should seek God by means of Jesus Christ as revealed in the Bible, and as we do so, God opens the eyes of our understanding, and we see God revealed in Scripture and respond in - with worship.

Romans 1:20 (NLT2): For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see His invisible qualities - His eternal power and divine nature. So, they have no excuse for not knowing God. 

Romans 2:14-15 (NLT2): Even Gentiles (those without God), who do not have God’s written law, show that they know his law when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.

2 Peter 1:20-21 (NLT2): Above all, you must realize that no prophecy in Scripture ever came from the prophet’s own understanding, or from human initiative. No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God. 

Our worship of God, be it public, family or private, should be based upon and include God’s Word – the Bible; God’s Word reveals God to us so that we may focus on Him, and to the extent we focus on Him we will worship Him. So, if there’s little revelation of God, there is little focus on God. And if there is little focus on God, there is little worship of God. Conversely, much revelation of God fosters much focus on God, which in turn evokes much worship of God. Bible reading and preaching are central in public worship because they are the clearest, most direct, most extensive presentations of God in the gathering. For the same reasons, Bible intake and meditation are the heart of private worship. 

Since worship is focusing on and responding to God, regardless of what else we are doing we are not worshiping if we are not thinking about God. We may be listening to a biblically sound sermon, but if we aren’t mindful of what it says about God or from God to us, we aren’t worshiping God. We may be singing “Holy, Holy, Holy,” however, if we aren’t thinking about God while singing it, we are not worshiping God. We may be listening to someone pray, however, if we aren’t praying with him or her and thinking of God, we aren’t worshiping. We can say that all things done in obedience to our Lord, even everyday things at work and at home, are acts of worship. 

Worship often includes words and actions. However, it goes beyond them to the focus of the mind and heart. Worship is the God-centered focus and response of the soul; it is being preoccupied with God.

Worship is done “in spirit and truth”

The most profound passage on worship in the New Testament is found in John 4:23-24. There Jesus Christ said, “But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Before we can worship in spirit and truth, we must have within us the One who is the “Spirit of Truth” {John 14:17}, that is, God the Holy Spirit. He lives only within those who have come to Jesus Christ in repentance and faith. Without Him true worship will not happen. As 1 Corinthians 12:3 declares, “No one can say Jesus Christ is Lord except in the Holy Spirit.” That doesn’t mean a person cannot speak the words “Jesus Christ is Lord” apart from the Holy Spirit, for anyone who can talk - speak can utter the phrase. Rather, it means no one can say “Jesus Christ is Lord” as a genuine confession of their “worshipful submission” to Jesus Christ apart from the regenerating power and indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit - God.

The Holy Spirit reveals God to us and testifies of Jesus Christ; He convinces us of our sin against God; Holy Spirit makes Jesus Christ and His saving power irresistible. Holy Spirit opens the mind to the truth of Scripture and awakens the heart that were dead toward God. He causes souls that were cold in worship to burn with passion for Jesus Christ. 

To worship God in spirit involves worship from the inside out. It also necessitates sincerity in our acts of worship. No matter how spiritual the song we are singing, no matter how poetic the prayer we are pray, if it isn’t sincere then it isn’t worship, it’s hypocrisy. The balance to worshiping in spirit is to worship in truth. Worship in truth is worship according to the truth of Scripture.

We worship God as He is revealed in His Word - the Holy Scriptures, not as we might want Him to be. We worship Him according to the truth of who He says He is, a God of both mercy and justice, of love and wrath, who both welcomes into heaven and condemns into hell. 

Secondly, worship according to the truth of Scripture means to worship God in the ways to which He has given His approval. In other words, we should do in the worship of God what God says in His Word - the Bible. We must worship in both spirit and truth, with both heart and head, with both emotion and thought. If we worship with too much emphasis on spirit, we will be mushy and weak on the truth, worshiping mainly according to feelings.

Worship in the spirit:

Originates from within, from the heart; it must be sincere, motivated by our love for God and gratitude for all He has done; our worship must be infused with heartfelt commitment, faith, love and zeal. Our worship must also be infused with our emotions and affections; true worship engages the heart, the affections, the totality of our being - everything we are and have. Worship that lacks heart - a real love for God and devotion to Him, is worthless.

In Romans chapter 12, Paul an apostle of Jesus Christ tells us what “spiritual worship” is: “So, brothers and sisters, since God has shown us great mercy, I beg you to offer your lives as a living sacrifice to Him. Your offering must be only for God and pleasing to Him, which is the spiritual way for you to worship. Do not change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but, be changed within by a new way of thinking. Then, you will be able to find - follow - decide what God wants for you; you will know what is good and pleasing to Him and what is perfect (without error or mistake, flawless, complete, absolute, free from any need, short of nothing, completely fulfilled).”

The text of Romans chapter 12 teaches that the believer is to be devoted to God. Everything he or she is – has, must be dedicated to the worship and service of God. Anything less than total devotion is short of God's glory: it is sin. Therefore, when discussing the believer's relationship to God, Scripture is strong in its exhortation. Without equivocation, God’s Word urges total devotion. Therefore, because of the mercies of God (all this that God has done for us), we must devote ourselves to God. We must dedicate and commit ourselves to Him. 

Spiritual Disciplines: “Growing in Godliness While Being Conformed to the Image of Jesus Christ"

1 Timothy 4:7-8 (ERV):
“People tell silly stories that don’t agree with God’s truth. Don’t follow what these stories teach. But teach yourself to be devoted to God. Training your body helps you in some ways. But devotion to God helps you in every way. It brings you blessings in this life and in the future life too."

1 Timothy 4:7-8 (MSG):

“Stay clear of silly stories that get dressed up as religion. Exercise daily in God - no spiritual flabbiness, please! Workouts in the gymnasium are useful, but a disciplined life in God is far more so, making you fit both today and forever.”