Why Does Fasting Take Forever?

Why Does Fasting Take Forever?

Sermon on the Mount Series: Matt. 6:16-18

            What’s the first thing you think of when you think of fasting? Most of you probably think of going all day, or even days at a time without eating. That is one type of fast. In fact, what’s the first meal of the day? Breakfast—break-fast. You are breaking your fast—not eating since dinner the day before.

            A fast is an avoidance of doing something for a specific period of time for spiritual reasons. There is really an infinite amount of ways that you can fast. The only thing that limits you is what you can think of. The common traditional Jewish fast was from sun up to sun down. Someone keeping this fast could rise early and eat breakfast, and then eat a late supper and still keep the guidelines of that particular fast. When Jesus went into the desert to fast, He did not keep the typical fast because He didn’t eat anything for forty days or forty nights.

            Who sets up the guidelines? That is between you and God. Two people might be fasting on the same day. One person might be fasting from midnight to midnight. Another might be only doing sun up to sun down. One might only drink water. Another might drink Gatorade or fruit juice. It all just depends on the restrictions you set on yourself. Now if you make a vow between you and God to only drink water, and you breakdown and drink a Powerade late in the afternoon, what have you just done? You broke your fast. Is it a sin to break your fast? I hope not, but in James 4:17 it says, “Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.” But in Romans 3:23 it says, “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” Everybody has messed up. Shake yourself off and get back up and try it again. If you try to do something great and mess up, you are better off than the person who has never tried to do anything.

            What’s the purpose of a fast? The purpose of a fast is to get your mind focused on God and not on yourself. We cater to the wants, desires, and needs of our bodies so much and many times ignore our mind and soul. This becomes glaringly obvious when you do a food fast. Here’s a tip: I’m not a doctor but your body doesn’t need about 90% of the junk we are putting into it. There are special fasts called cleansing fasts where you only drink water allowing your body to get rid of all of the sugars and other junk stored in us. So going without food for a day won’t kill us, (Jesus managed to hold off for forty days somehow. It’s says He was hungry afterwards so it must not have been his divinity side taking over.) but when we miss a meal we’re like, “I’m going to die!” How many of you have ever said, “I’m starving to death”? For a designated period of time, you deny your body and feed your mind and soul.

            Now that’s just a food fast. There are other fasts designed to clear the junk out, too, but they’re designed to cleanse the junk out of your head. In January, K-Love was promoting listening to nothing but Christian music for a month. Barbara Unruh, the worship leader here, and I had a discussion before about listening to talk radio. We both like to listen to politically conservative talk radio shows like Glenn Beck, but we both agreed that after listening to it for a couple of hours we feel like throwing something, and that we have no hope, whereas, a couple of hours listening to Christian music puts us in a positive, lighter mood. Why is that? It’s because there’s trash, just like the sugars, and the fats going into our bodies, going into our brains and it affects us negatively. The reason why pornography is so dangerous and so addictive is because when it is viewed the brain releases a chemical into the body which is as addictive as heroin. That chemical is affecting the body, but the images you viewed are now stored in your brain forever. How do you beat your addiction to pornography? You have a pornography fast. Stop viewing it, which will stop the chemical flow. The problem is that the images stored in your brain occasionally are recalled which releases that chemical again. You can’t get rid of the images, but you can delude them with positive images until they’re hardly ever recalled again.

            Here are some other fasts that you can participate in.

Sex Fast: Every one of you non-married students listening to me should be participating in a sex fast right now. Remember a fast is the avoidance of something for a specific period of time, for a spiritual purpose. That specific period of time should be until your wedding night, and the spiritual purpose is to focus on God’s calling on your life, and keeping yourself and your future spouse pure. Men, you will be held accountable for how well you do at keeping your spouse pure (Eph 5). You could be feeding your spiritual lives with each other, rather than feeding your physical side, sinning against God in the process. It’s good to not have pre-marital sex for secular reasons (like not getting pregnant or diseases) but it is better to not have pre-marital sex for spiritual reasons. It’s not a fast, and you don’t get any “spiritual credit” if you are out looking to have sex but just haven’t stumbled upon it yet.

Media Fast: There have been people who stopped watching, and reading the newspapers didn’t get on the internet, listen to the radio, or watch TV. What did they do instead? Read the Bible, prayed, and spent time with their families.

Cell Phone Fast: Turn off your cell phone for a specific period of time. Pastor Brian says the silence of the cell phone is a spiritual discipline.

Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Fast: Take whatever R-PB Cups you have and give them to your youth pastor.

Soda Fast: I was inspired by Josh to cut down my soda intake. He didn’t drink soda for over a year and lost like 30 pounds. I was in the process of drinking way to much soda everyday and gaining weight every time I stepped on a scale. So after a few months of trying to quit drinking, and failing miserably I finally stopped the Saturday after Thanksgiving, and have lost around 5 pounds since Christmas.

Reading Fast: I failed miserably at this for reasons beyond my control, but I found myself finding time to read everything but the Bible. If I was sitting at the table for five minutes I would read the newspaper but not the Bible. I vowed to read nothing but the Bible for a few months.

Shower Fast: Don’t bathe for a month or two. Sitting by yourself at lunch and on the bus will give you all kinds of free time.

Beauty Fast: Pick out some hair or beauty products that you use, stop using it for a period of time, and take the money you would have spent on it and put it towards a mission project. Do you think God would ignore that?

            Let’s get into what Jesus had to say about fasting: Matt 6:16-18, “And when you fast, don’t make it obvious, as the hypocrites do, for they try to look miserable and disheveled so people will admire them for their fasting. I tell you the truth, that is the only reward they will ever get. But when you fast, comb your hair and wash your face. Then no one will notice that you are fasting, except your Father, who knows what you do in private. And your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.”

            I was going to wear some old clothes to make a visual image for you and act like I was fasting, but all of my old clothes that I would wear to make myself look disheveled would be clothes that I would normally wear anyways. I was concerned that no one would even notice. Then I became frustrated that you all think I dress like a disheveled slob.

            The point Jesus was making is to have your fast between you and God. Don’t go around telling everyone, or displaying how miserable you are about it. If you do, you are already getting your reward you were seeking—the attention of man. But if you want to be blessed by God, fast in accordance to the vow you set with Him, and use your free time to focus on Him. My rule of thumb with food fasting is that every time my stomach growls I say a prayer, and the half hour set aside for meals is used for prayer and Bible reading.

            All fasting is meaningless unless it is accompanied by prayer, and Bible reading. Prayer is useless unless you have someone to pray to. Praying to anything other than the creator God of this universe is useless. And for those prayers to be effective, you need to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. God loves you very much, but when you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ you are now considered a child of God. And as children of God, He has a greater desire to answer our prayers than people he doesn’t have a relationship with. In the same way that I am more willing to grant a request made by Carrie, Juliette, and Caleb, than I am by some stranger.