21 Days of Prayer // A Guide for Fasting

We're gonna talk about the spiritual rhythm of fasting.

Who in the room has ever fasted for health purposes?

For health purposes.

Maybe you didn't fast for Jesus, but you fasted because Jesus I told you to.

All of us have probably fasted at some point for something.

Maybe you had blood work done or you had a medical procedure.

Maybe you had the dreaded colonoscopy.

Some of you know what I'm talking about.

The rest of you just got nervous for no reason at all.

And the reality about fasting, at least for me, is fasting's hard.

Because if you're like me, I love to eat.

Is there anybody else in the room that loves to eat?

Oh my somebody just cut so cuppy, I'll raise both hands in the air, right?

The idea of not eating can feel like cruel and unusual punishment for those of us that love to eat.

But geez, she agrees, yes.

But did you know that Jesus actually talked about fasting?

And while there's a lot of ideas around fasting, Jesus spoke about fasting and he actually expects his followers to fast.

You're just gonna be all like, oh man.

He does.

In Matthew chapter 6, this is what Jesus says speaking about fasting.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

He says, whenever you fast.

Notice he doesn't say if.

I wish he would have said that.

He says, whenever you fast, don't be gloomy like the hypocrites.

For they disfigure their faces.

So their fasting is obvious to people.

Don't be gloomy.

You know, like the eeure syndrome.

Oh yeah, huh?

Don't be gloomy.

They fast with gloominess so that's obvious to people.

Truly, I tell you, this is Jesus.

He says, they have their reward.

But talking to his followers, he says this in verse 17.

But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that your fasting isn't obvious to others, but to your father who is in secret.

And your father who is in secret will reward you.

Jesus here is talking about spiritual fasting.

This isn't just fasting because you're trying to do the intermittent fasting thing and lose some weight, right?

This is fasting for spiritual purposes.

So what is spiritual fasting?

Here's what it is spiritual fasting is depriving yourself of something you desire because of your dependence, desperation, and need for God.

It's depriving yourself of something you desire because of your dependence, desperation, and need for God.

Fasting is for anybody that's a Jesus follower that realizes how much they need God, that realizes that we are desperate for God to work in this situation, in our personal lives, in the life of somebody else.

And those of us that say, I need God to work, that is who fasting is for.

That is what fasting is.

And really, you can fast from anything.

You can fast from social media.

You can fast from the news.

I got the rest of y'all.

I didn't get you on the social media one.

You can fast from secular music, you can fast from many types of things.

And here's what I want us to do today: I want us to get a biblical understanding of why we should fast on the power of fasting.

And I want you to see some examples in the scripture, in the Bible, of people that fasted and why they fasted.

But before we do that, you have to see first of all what fasting is not.

We have to see number one, what fasting is not.

In verse number 16, if we can get the next slide up there, in verse number 16, Jesus said, When you fast, don't be gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces.

So their fasting is obvious to people.

Here's what fasting is not.

So people will look at you and say, Wow, you're so spiritual.

You see, the hypocrites in this passage and the Pharisees, they were all about doing the religious external things.

So everybody would look at them and say, Look at what you've done.

You're so spiritual.

You do this, you do that.

They would walk around when they would fast, all gloomy and down.

So people would say, You're like, they're so holy.

But you would look at those guys, you wouldn't be like, they're holy.

You would think they need a sandwich.

And all of their spirituality was just to be seen by other people.

If you walked into my room when I was a sophomore in college, you would have seen a dresser just to the right, and on the dresser, there was a whiteboard, and it was one of the calendar whiteboards that would have the days of the week Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

So you can kind of write out your schedule kind of a deal.

And what me and my roommates would do is we would write where we read in the Bible on that day.

So we would say, Sunday, I read these chapters or these verses, Mondays, you know.

And I really enjoyed reading the Bible.

I enjoyed reading the Bible.

But I really enjoyed when people would walk in the room and see how much of the Bible I read.

And while I wanted to know God, I also wanted people to know how much I wanted to know God.

And my motives were less than 100% pure.

Have you ever in your life ever done something spiritual, but the motive was so somebody will look at you and say, You're so spiritual.

I haven't either, but I've heard of people that do, right?

Here's why the Pharisees fasted.

So people would say, You're so spiritual.

Fasting is not something you do to be praised by people.

Fasting is not something you do that will make God love you more, make God love you less.

God is gonna love you regardless.

Fasting is not something you do to earn God's favor.

It's like, man, if I do this, then man, God, He just, you know, He owes me stuff.

I'm extra accepted by God on that day.

No, no, no.

That is not what fasting is.

So then you might be thinking, why should we fast?

Number two.

Why should we fast?

Like if it's not about people thinking that I'm spiritual, if God's not gonna love me anymore or accept me anymore, like I have all of that in the gospel in Christ, then what is my motivation for fasting?

And verse 18, this is what it says.

At the end of verse 18, it says, Your father who sees in secret will reward you.

You say, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Reward?

I like rewards.

But it's very dangerous in our American mindset because when we think of rewards, this is what we often think about money, position, power, better job, stuff.

So if God's gonna reward me, I'm gonna get one of those things.

It's kind of like this.

Any of you guys growing up, you get an allowance.

We get an allowance growing up.

Nobody got an elite.

He's like, what's that?

I got an allowance for a short time.

But I got, y'all ready for this?

I got ten dollars every two weeks.

In the 90s when I was like eight years old, I was ball in.

Bring the ice cream man through.

Let's go.

My parents would say, hey, if you do these different things, you cut the grass, you make up your bed, I'll give you$10.

We'll reward you with that.

I was like, I do stuff for you, and like you get I get money.

Like, man, this was the moment I realized that capitalism works.

And sometimes we can think that if we do stuff for God, then God owes us these monetary rewards.

That God owes us more money, that God owes us more this or more that.

And God sometimes blesses us in those ways.

He loves to bless his children.

But sometimes the reward, and oftentimes the reward, is not monetary things, but oftentimes it's spiritual things.

It's seeing God answer a prayer with a yes.

It's seeing a spiritual breakthrough in your life.

And for a long time you thought your problems were physical, you thought your problems were with this person or that person, but after a season of fasting, you realize your problems were spiritual.

You had a time of fasting praying for that person, and they were going through something, and they made it to the other side, and God rewarded that fasting by breakthrough and healing in that person's life.

Maybe there's a legitimate need that you have in your heart, a legitimate need in your life, and you decide to set some time aside to fast and pray and seek the Lord, and the Lord meets that need.

Fasting is for people that are desperate enough to seek the Lord and He will reward us.

I'm gonna be honest, a lot of us in this room are far too satisfied in our walks with Christ.

A lot of us in our in our in our spiritual life, in our life, we just think like we're good.

You know, Netflix is working, fridge is full, nobody's mad at me, at least not too mad at me.

I mean, the 49ers lost, but other than those things, like I'm okay spiritually.

Hear me, friend, some of us need a spiritual awakening in our life.

Some of us are like the church at Laodicea in the book of Revelation that we're not hot, we're not cold, but we are lukewarm.

And we are lukewarm and we're loving it because life is comfortable and life is easy.

And what's happening in our life is we are at a place where we're like fasting.

Why in the world would I do that?

That's only for the super Christian.

Why in the world would I fast independence and desperation for God?

I mean, I needed God for salvation, but I got that.

I'm good now.

And what's happened is we have become spiritually apathetic in our spiritual life, and we are missing out on what God wants to do in our lives if we will desperately seek Him.

There's a man in the Old Testament, his name was Nehemiah.

Everybody say Nehemiah, ready?

Nehemiah lived a good, comfortable life.

He lived in the king's palace, so that means he got to eat the king's food.

Try tip whenever he wanted.

He had a good life, but he heard about something.

He heard hundreds of miles away in the city of Jerusalem, representing God's power, God's presence, God's faithfulness.

The city was in disrepair.

The walls had been broken down.

God's presence was no longer there.

There was nothing happening spiritually in the city.

This was the place that was supposed to be a spiritual, thriving place.

Nothing.

Walls broken down, lights going all over the place.

And Nehemiah, living in the king's palace, heard about that, and Nehemiah said, That ain't right.

God needs to do a work in that city.

Something needs to happen there.

He saw the state of the city and he had a burden for the city because he wanted God's glory to be restored in that city.

So, in the midst of his comfortable life, where he had cable TV and Netflix, this is what he did.

He fasted and he prayed and he sought God, and miracle after miracle after miracle happened.

And in 52 days, an entire wall was rebuilt, a team of people came together, God's glory was restored, God's power worked, and God's faithfulness was put on display so all the nations could see.

Why?

Because one man said, Yes, I'm living in the palace, but I'm not comfortable here.

I want to see God work there.

And here's what happens.

Some of us in our lives, if we would get uncomfortable and realize that God wants to work there in that person's life, in our church, in this place, and we would desperately seek him, God might just do something above we can ask above what we can ask, think, or imagine.

Ephesians 3.

There was another time in the book of Acts where it wasn't just a dude named Nehemiah, but it was an entire church.

They came together seeking the Lord because they knew how much they needed him.

And the entire church community filled with normal people like us realized how much they needed God to work in their community, in their area, and they prayed and fasted, and a powerful thing happened.

The church was in a city called Antioch.

Everybody say Antioch, ready?

Spelled just like the Antioch down the road from here.

And watch what happens in Acts chapter 13.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

I want you to see this because we literally are still feeling the effects of what happened in Antioch nearly 2,000 years ago.

It says in Acts 13, it says, as they were worshiping the Lord and they were fasting, church community.

This isn't just Nehemiah, this isn't just one person, church community.

The Holy Spirit said, Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul.

Any Bible students in the room, you guys know who Saul is.

Saul's the guy, his what's his name?

Paul.

This is Paul.

Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work which I have called them.

Then after they had, what's that word?

After they had prayed and laid hands on them, they sent them off.

You think, okay, no big deal.

No, no, no.

This is a big deal.

At this point, the gospel was only in a small region.

The death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus Christ being the Lord of all, the Messiah, had only been known in a small region.

Jerusalem, Judea, small little place.

In this region, this area, a little north of there, the gospel had gone to a city of Antioch.

Antioch, followers of Jesus, they believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

They were fasting, they were praying.

And in the midst of their fasting and praying, the Holy Spirit said, I see these people are dependent on me.

I see these people are seeking me.

I see these people are hungry for me, and they're more passionate about me than they are about their hobbies and their activities and everything else.

So I am going to work in this place.

And the Holy Spirit called out Saul, the Holy Spirit called out Barnabas to go to all these different cities in the known world and spread the gospel.

You say, big deal.

Here's why it's a big deal.

That was 2,000 years ago.

If we were to trace back how we heard the gospel, we could trace it all the way back to one of Paul's missionary journeys, which could be traced back to Acts chapter 13, when a group of people fasted and prayed, and in the midst of their fasting and praying, the Holy Spirit worked and raised up leaders.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

We are sitting here because a church filled with people were committed and dependent on God, and God said, I'm gonna meet you right there in your fasting.

I I wonder, I wonder, what would it take for us to be awakened from our spiritual apathy?

What would it take for us to say, like the light bulb for us to go on to be like, wow, we're in a community between Fairfield and Sassoon, Travis, of like 140,000, 150,000 people, and there are so few Jesus followers, so many people need Jesus.

When will that burden our hearts?

When will the state of people's spiritual souls grip us?

When will the fact that people are hopeless and people need Christ and people think the answers and all of these other places, but their answers in Christ, and we have the hope.

Like, when will that grip us?

Why should we fast?

Because God works through fasting, spiritual renewal happens through fasting.

People are raised up, leaders are raised up for through fasting.

This Thursday night is our night of worship and prayer.

And we are going to do exactly what this church did in Acts chapter 13 this Thursday night.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

We are going to pray together, we're gonna worship the Lord through song, and we're gonna expect that God is going to meet us there.

Amen.

Number three.

Specific reasons why people fasted in scripture.

Specific reasons why fat people fasted in scripture.

If you're still with me, would you say amen?

When we look at scripture, there are multiple reasons why people set themselves apart for a time of fasting.

I just want to bring some reasons to our minds so some of you can see that there's multiple different reasons why you can fast.

One example is a man named King David.

He fasted in repentance.

So David had done something he shouldn't have done, and then he justified his actions.

Have you ever justified your actions before?

I know, like one time in your life.

When you were nine years old.

We've all done it.

You know how justification works.

I did this, but the reason I did this is because they did that.

If they wouldn't have done this, I wouldn't have done that.

I deserve it.

I work really hard.

After all, everybody else is doing it.

What's the big deal?

Justification.

And King David had justified having an affair.

And he was confronted by a friend that loved him enough to tell him the truth.

That loved him enough to tell him the truth.

And when his friend confronted him, he finally admitted his sin.

And out of an expression of sorrow for what he did, he fasted in humility before God and said, God, what I did was wrong.

Restore my relationship with you.

King David fasted in repentance.

A man named Ezra led an entire community of Jewish exiles to fast for protection.

In Ezra chapter 8, verse 21, it says this, I proclaimed a fast by the Ahaba River, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask him for a safe journey for us, our dependents, and all our possessions.

Ezra 8:21

Ezra is leading a group from Babylon 900 miles back to Jerusalem.

Now here's the thing: this was a treacherous trip.

Have you ever been somewhere where maybe it's a dark alley and you like got your head in a swivel the whole time?

It's treacherous.

You know what I'm saying?

You ever walk through the tenderloin in San Francisco?

Oh here, what's happening is they were going on a long trip for 900 miles, and Ezra's like, we need protection from God.

And he calls everybody, the entire group, to fast for protection.

Daniel, another example.

He fasted to hear from God.

He fasted for 21 days.

We talked about it a couple weeks ago.

And there will be times in your life when you need to hear from the Lord.

When there's a situation in your life where you're going through a hardship, where you don't know what to do.

And it's in those moments and in those times where we specifically fast, saying, God, I don't want anything from you.

I just want to hear from you.

I don't want you to do anything for me.

I just want to know what do you want from me?

Fasting to hear from God.

Jesus Himself.

He fasted in preparation for his ministry.

For 30 years, Jesus walked on this earth and he lived a pretty normal life.

Before he started his public ministry of preaching and teaching the gospel and teaching about the kingdom of God and healing people.

And before he went into that ministry that changed the world, he first started by fasting.

Think about this.

Jesus said, Before I'm gonna do something for the Father, I want to fast and spend time with the Father.

You know, I wonder how many of us are maybe leading groups or coordinating groups or we're leading ministries.

And I wonder how much of what we're doing is being done in our own strength and in our own knowledge.

And I know I'm supposed to do this, I'm not supposed to do that, I gotta make sure I check planning center, I gotta plan this meeting versus saying, okay, I want to seek the Father, I'm gonna fast, and out of the overflow of my fasting, of the overflow of my dependence on God, everything is gonna flow from that.

And some of you at a place where you're leading ministries, I'm talking to leaders here, you're leading ministries, you're leading different things, you're leading groups.

I I would encourage you when you're in a season where maybe some things are happening, or maybe you're starting something new.

Can I just say start by fasting?

Start by seeking the Lord and fasting and say, God, your will, your power rest upon me, your work in me.

So because I want to see you do great and mighty things.

Examples of people that fasted.

And here's what I'm gonna do this morning.

I'm gonna invite everybody in this room to fast from something sometime this week.

Some of y'all just got really uncomfortable.

You think I picked the wrong Sunday to come next week?

But I want to teach you lastly, how do you fast?

How do you do this?

Bill Bright talks about how to fast.

And in there he says, when you fast, first of all, you need to set an objective for your fast.

You need to step one, you need to set an objective for your fast.

So the question is, why are you fasting?

We can get the next slide up there.

Why are you fasting?

Are you fasting for guidance?

Are you fasting for a spiritual breakthrough in somebody's life?

Are you fasting for a situation?

If you know why you're fasting, it will give you clarity and intentionality for how you can pray more specifically.

We decide our objective.

Number two, we decide on our fast.

So, what kind of fast are you doing?

Are you gonna fast from food?

Or are you gonna fast maybe from something else?

You really can fast from anything you want.

You can fast from a type of food, you can fast from whatever.

What kind of a fast are you fasting from?

How long are you going to fast?

Is it gonna be one meal, one day, one week, several weeks?

What what's the plan?

You have to decide on what is my fast going to be.

Number three prepare yourself spiritually for the fast.

We don't go into a fast saying, Alright, God, I want guidance from you, give it to me.

Pastor Nate said that I should fast.

I ain't very happy about it, but I guess I should probably do it because I need guidance.

Show me, God.

We don't go in a fast like that.

We don't go in a fast saying, all right, God, my family member, they got some issues, and I'm fasting, so they will wake up because something's going on in them.

No, no, no, that's not how we enter into a fast.

We enter into a fast with humility, saying, Lord, before I seek you about this over here, I want you to show me places in my life that are not surrendered to you.

I want you to show me places in my life that are not right.

Lord, is there somebody I need to forgive?

Lord, is there a place in my life where you don't have control over?

And before I come before you asking you for something, I just want to come and say, Lord, would you reveal to me what isn't right in your sight?

Would you show me a place that that I'm not trusting you?

Would you show me a place where my mindset's wrong?

Lord, would you open my heart to you?

And before I ask anything of you, I want to stand before you with purity of heart and purity of motive.

That's it.

I want to prepare myself spiritually, and then step four, prepare yourself practically.

Prepare yourself by planning practically.

And you can plan as little as you much or as much as you need.

The idea of fasting is instead of partaking in something, I'm gonna spend this time seeking the Lord.

So if I'm gonna do that, I need to plan a little bit.

For some of us, if we're thinking about fasting from food, it'd be a good idea to consult with a doctor.

Like, are we able to fast from food?

For some of us, we're fasting from food, okay?

So instead of eating, what am I gonna do?

Am I gonna go take a prayer walk?

Am I gonna go sit in my car, listen to worship music, and on my lunch break?

What am I gonna do instead of eating at this time?

When I get home, and usually my go-to is to get that snack.

What am I gonna do instead?

Am I gonna try to really meditate on scripture as I'm praying?

Well, I'm gonna try to memorize a verse about God's power in this time.

What am I gonna do?

I'm gonna get a plan.

And then what I would encourage you to do is share your plan with somebody else.

Because this will give you accountability.

So maybe it's somebody in your family, maybe it's somebody on your served team, maybe it's your growth group leader, your growth group coordinator, your ministry coordinator.

Share it with somebody.

So when you're tempted to drink that cup of coffee, when you said you're fasting from caffeine, she ain't fasting from that.

She might think about that one.

Yeah, oh, yeah, oh, hey, I told them it's it's not caffeine.

I'm not having caffeine for three days.

Yes, I have the jitters.

What what you get tempted, the accountability is like, oh, I I told them that.

And ask them to pray with you for that.

Fasting is powerful.

And prepare yourself for fasting.

I I end with the with a story about my journey with fasting.

When I got into college, fasting was definitely not a part of my life at all.

That was not a spiritual rhythm that I had.

I had some other spiritual rhythms.

I spent time in the Word, I prayed, but I did not fast because I love to eat.

But I was challenged to fast.

I was challenged from a pastor, much like I'm challenging you, to fast and pray.

I read some books on it and I learned some things, and I said, Well, I mean, Jesus talked about it, so I probably should do it.

And in college, I started fasting and I started seeing amazing answers to prayer.

And God coming through in like supernatural ways of my life, and God growing me.

And as I was starving my flesh and feeding my spirit, like it was like God's, it wasn't that God wasn't speaking before, but I was like so much more in tune with God's voice.

Fast forward the clock.

I remember right before I came to be the pastor here, I had talked to some different pastors in Fairfield and Sassoon, and they had said, bro, get ready.

Because Fairfield is super hard.

Sassoon is super hard, like all the churches are dying, people aren't open to the gospel, it's so difficult to pastor here.

Buckle up.

How's that for a young pastor to hear that?

Oh, very encouraging.

I came here and I talked to some wonderful people, and they had just shared with me that the church had seen some better days.

And I did something I'd never done before.

I did a three-day fast from food.

I fasted for God to work in this community, this church.

I fasted for unity in the church.

I fasted that people would come to Christ.

I fasted that God would raise up workers and leaders in his church.

And many times since then I've fasted for specific things in this body.

And the amazing thing that's happened is so many of the things that I've fasted for have come to fruition.

In the last couple years alone, we've seen almost a hundred people baptized.

We have right now over 200 people that serve on serve teams.

That's more than double of how many people came to church totally, right?

We have incredible leaders that God's raised up.

God has put together an amazing staff.

We've been able to update and renovate almost every single room in this building.

And I don't say that to say, look at me.

No.

I say that to say, look at what God can do if we will just seek after Him.

Look at what God will do if we will just be desperate and we will just be dependent and we will just realize that God is not done, that God is all powerful, that God can change lives, that God can change families, that God can change communities.

If we will believe and we will be dependent and we will fast and pray, we will see what only God can do.

We will see that, but we have to be people that are at that place where we're desperate and we're dependent and we're awakened out of our spiritual apathy and we're awakened out of uh not seeing what God can do.

And if we will believe and we will trust and we will fast and we will set ourselves apart, we will see God do great things.

This is one reason why this coming Thursday night we're having our night of prayer and worship.

Where we're gonna gather together, we're just gonna seek the Lord and pray together.

We're gonna pray for healing in people's lives, we're gonna pray for spiritual breakthrough in people's lives, we're gonna pray for specific things to happen in this body, just like they did in Acts chapter 13.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

I'm gonna invite you to come to this.

And I'm also gonna invite us this week to fast personally from something, like I said a minute ago.

For some of you, it might be one meal, for some of you, it might be one day, for some of us, it might not be food, it might be something else.

But I'm gonna invite you to fast from something.

So here's what we're gonna do.

If we can get the next slide up on the screen, I want us to think through those steps of fasting that we had on there just a minute ago.

And I want us to have a moment with the Lord and think this week, what can I fast for?

This week, what kind of fast am I gonna do?

And then this week, let's be hungry for God and let's seek after him and let's be desperate for him and see him do what only he can do.

Let's all bow our heads and close our.