Fasting is like surgery
I wanted to write about fasting last night but didn’t have time before sleeping. Interestingly, I ran across this post on the Resurgence site this morning.
It seems most Christians today view fasting is a ritual from the Old Testament, right up there with ash and sackcloth and sacrificing goats. Or it’s viewed as something you do before surgery. I think this second thought is more accurate.
As told by Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples “when you fast.” He says “when” and not “if.” And, as told by Mark, Jesus explains that when he’s no longer on the earth, his disciples will fast. These two passages, together with many instances of fasting in the Old Testament convince me that fasting is still an act of obedience.
Fasting allows us to understand others’ pain. Our stomach never forgets it’s hungry. A North American stomach knows it will receive food from above about three times a day. The stomach takes the food for granted. From where does our real thankfulness for this food come? It’s similar to Emily Dickinson’s surmising that those who don’t often succeed enjoy success more than those who succeed all the time. Can a satisfied stomach emphasize with one that hasn’t been filled in days?
So maybe fasting isn’t only to allow God to grow our faith, but it gives us a faint glimpse into the eyes of those who are suffering.
Fasting allows us not to be slaves to our body. We spend many hours heeding our body’s demands–think about all the time you spent this morning in the bathroom before going to work or school or to the store. (One of the awesome things about God is that we don’t need to pretty up for Him. Actually we can’t clean ourselves up enough before approaching His throne. Instead, we just need to drag our crap with us to His feet and ask His help.) Denying yourself food frees you from one of these bodily commands and opens you for God’s words. Leaving our fleshly demands and moving toward serving God is a step toward not caring about the physical things of this world and instead striving to glorify God.
And back to my fourth sentence that fasting is surgery preparation. Fasting shuts out one of our main human desires–food. When you go without food, the stomach empties. In the same way, we need to empty ourselves of all our earthly desires, all selfishness and arrogance. It is only when God helps us drop these tangled encumbrances that we are free to run to Him, to rest in His acceptance and to rely on His all-knowing judgment. And it is in this time spent with God that molds us and shapes us into vessels that can serve Him. In this process, many things, mostly involving our selfishness and arrogance, need to be cut away if we are to be God’s instruments.
We must become less if God is to become more in our lives. We can’t serve both ourselves and God. By weakening ourselves through fasting, we rely on God to help us through the day–His words (the Bible) can shape us better because we become more desperate for them.
