Good morning lovelies and happy new week. I hope your week kicked off on a good foot.
I’m so sorry for my silence for a while.
I won’t bore you with how stressful, time taking and hectic school has been.
I was going through my devotional this morning and something caught my eye so I thought I’d share.
I copied and I’m going to paste, so whatever is italicized is directly from the devotional.
The topic of the devotional is “A closer walk with God. iHunger”
Y’all can check it out.
I’m making a summary after the post, in case you don’t get to read the whole post, you can go through the summary down ↓
FASTING PART 1
…and fasting
God has given us many powerful tools to be successful in our Christian walk. One tool that we access the most as Christians is the power of prayer. One of the least used, most underestimated weapon is fasting.
Have you ever met two powerful people who become a couple and become even more powerful? That is the perfect example of how prayer and fasting go together. In fact, I would even venture to say that prayer must be coupled with fasting in order to be effective. You may be wondering what the fasting thing is all about. Let’s explore fasting.
Fasting is more than the act of abstaining from food and/or drink. Fasting is a spiritual discipline, along with prayer, reading the Word of God, service and worship, just to name a few. While there is no scripture that says explicitly that the believer must fast in order to see God, fasting is essential for the believer seeking more of God. There is no doubt that you can grow in God without fasting, but Mark 9:29 reminds us that there are some things that we can access only if we have given ourselves to prayer and fasting.
Fasting is both arduous and advantageous to the believer. I like to parallel Christ’s suffering to fasting. Though the cross was hard to endure Jesus endured the cross because it would benefit us, His children. Like Jesus, though fasting requires pain and discipline we must endure it because of the benefits to us. One benefit of fasting with sincerity is that it will bring us closer to God. Fasting causes us to deny ourselves and put down our own will in exchange for the will of the Father. We see one of the greatest examples of self-denial in Jesus’ prayer at the garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22). He prayed, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” Wouldn’t you like to be so close to God that you can feel what He feels and see what He sees? Another benefit of fasting is that we begin to rid ourselves of our willful and sinful nature. It is after we strip ourselves of our nature that God begins to purify us so that our spiritual senses are heightened, causing us to become more sensitive to His spirit.
Today’s Challenge
Food. Social Media. Unnecessary conversations. Secular Music
Fast from something that really mean a lot to you. Start with something you feel like you can not live without. God will show you that you can. Here’s a tip: when fasting gets hard, don’t think of how much it hurts. Think of how much its going to help!
FASTING PART 2
First the enemy does everything he can to distract and deter us from fasting and second abstaining from natural food has supernatural results.
Fasting and purification is like the process of refining silver or gold. When silver is first found in its purest form it is filled with dross or impurities…..dirt if you will. With the natural eye it is even hard to spot in its most natural form. The silver is then taken through the process by the refiner. In short, the process consist of the silver being placed in the fire. The interesting part about the process is that once placed in the fire the impurities that were once hidden rise to the top, so that they can then be scrapped off to produce pure silver.
The Refiner knows that the process is complete when he can see his reflection in the silver. Just like this process, during fasting issues that you have hidden or issues that you may have thought you were over will arise during fasting. It is in these moments that God deals with YOU; the moments where He brings you face to face with your issues . Can I encourage you and let you know that God is bringing some things up to take them out? The scripture reminds us that “when He tests me, I will come forth as pure gold (Job 23:10).” The more purer we are the better the reflection of the Refiner.
Lastly, another benefit of fasting is that fasting has the ability to move the hand of God faster. Fasting does not manipulate God but can cause Him to speak and move quickly, when we do so with a pure heart. There are many examples of fasts in the Bible, but we see a few in the lives of Esther, Ahab, and of Jesus Himself.
Esther called a fast in order to find favor with God and the King (Esther 4). The evil king, Ahab, moved the hand of God to spare his life from judgment (1 Kings 21). Even Jesus Christ fasted at the beginning of his public ministry and to provide a model for how we should deny our flesh (Luke 4). If Jesus fasted to accomplish what He was sent to do then so should we. I challenge you to give yourself to prayer…and fasting!
Today’s Prayer Father I want to be closer to You than I’ve ever been before. I really want to make prayer and fasting a way of life. I want to turn down my plate for a change – in my thinking, my attitude, and my character. Bring change in my thinking, change in my attitude and change in my character. Lord change ME! Amen.
SUMMARY :
It’s quite a long post so I’ll bring out essential points in case you couldn’t read it all.
- Fasting is very essential
- Fasting is a powerful tool
- Fasting empowers your prayer life
- Fasting has both spiritual and physical benefits
- There are things that are impossible without fasting
- Fasting isn’t just about food but other fleshy fulfilments, things you think you can’t do without e.g social media, secular music, unnecessary conversation etc. Take a break from them.
- Don’t think of how much it’ll hurt, think of how much it’s going to help.
- It’s during fasting that God deals with you and brings you face to face with your issues (Reminds me of something my daddy says “As you get closer to God, more of your filthiness and dirtiness is revealed to you”
- Fasting refines you and makes you shiny. Just like the refiner knows the process of refining is complete when he sees his reflection on the precious stone, God knows you’re good to go when he sees himself in you(Job 23:10)
- Fasting moves the hands of God faster
Have a blessed week bunnies.
