Thoughts On Fasting

THOUGHTS ON FASTING

From Brokeness by Mickey Bonner

(Compiled by Roger Hollar)

Fasting is a process that God uses to bring the believer into being set free from bondage. It is not a thing used by the believer to manipulate or change the will of God; to force God to do something. Fasting is for the believer to be brought into brokeness. In the process the “flesh” is broken and consumed by the Holy Spirit that it might be presented back to God as a living sacrifice, ready for His will to be done.

Isaiah says fasting is not to be instigated by convenience but through brokeness over one’s own sin. It is promised that through this process God will bring change to the life of the believer. We are not to fast for strife and debate (ISA 58:4,5) or to make our voice heard on high. Fasting is not God’s doorbell. It is an inward desire to bring our bodies into subjection, that we might present them as living sacrifices back to the Lord.

Fasting brings through you the ministry of the Spirit of God to others. As your spiritual vision clears you begin to see what God sees through the eyes of the Spirit (EPH 1:8). From there you begin to live by the Holy Spirit regarding others. Biblical fasting brings the light of God exploding in your heart. Isaiah says, “It comes like the morning.” While in that transformed position, your own flesh or personal life is no longer thebroken, contrite spirit of denial of the body’s fleshly desires your will begins craving the will of God, having been able, in a state of self-denial, to hear from God in your spirit man. Your prayer, under those conditions, becomes the will of God as you, in essence “seek first the kingdom of God” and say, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

consuming desire of your being. From that

God promises, as a result of fasting, His life in you and His ministry through you, in agreement with His will and purpose for your birth upon this earth (EPH 2:10). He further promises to be your guide, and in the midst of all tribulation He pledges to make the way of escape. In His daily presence you will be like “ a spring of water whose waters fail not, as springing up within you is the fountain of life that has its source in eternity (JHN 4:14). Then, through your life, God shall bring restoration and will raise up the foundations of many generations. His ministry through you will be “the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in.” This is the promise to you in Isaiah 58 if you will involve yourself in the fast that God has chosen. Fasting will break the body’s (flesh’s) control over the soul, resulting in a union between your human spirit and the Holy Spirit.

So to be used of God we must first see what God sees in our lives. This is the reason for fasting. Denying food is not for the purpose of getting God involved in what we are doing, but to get us involved in what God is doing…His will, that we may be broken before the Lord. Fasting in its right perspective breaks the soul from submitting to the wiles of the flesh and submits it instead to the Spirit of God within (pg77). Brokeness…is the means by which God conveys maturity and develops character. His discipline in the lives of believers brings each into abandonment of self to God in prayer (pg29).“The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise” (PSM 51:17).

FAST FACTS

Fasting expresses dependence upon God in times of trouble

(2SA 12:16-22; 2CH 20:2-4)

Fasting expresses depth of feeling in times of grief and mourning

(1SA 31:11-13; NEH 1:4)

Fasting expresses repentance

(JON 3:5-10; JOE 2:12)

Fasting expresses the desire to know God's will

(ACT 13:2; 14:23)

Fasting in the Bible usually lasted one day, from sunrise to sunset

(JUD 20:26; 2SA 3:35), sometimes longer (EXO 34:28; MAT 4:2)

Fasting in the Bible usually involved abstaining from all food (2SA 3:35; LUK 4:2),

sometimes refraining from just certain kinds of food (DAN 10:2,3)