We are still on our 21days of Annual Fast! We are now on our last week. How many of you are fasting?
This is my last message on fasting for now, but I want to leave you with a challenge, please try to fast at least once week.
If you say, “I will fast when God places it in my heart to do it,” you never will. You are too cold and indifferent to take the yoke upon yourself.
D.L. Moody
Fasting is a choice but also a way to show obedience. Jesus expects us to fast and in the same way He expects us to pray!
“ Jesus said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but by prayer and fasting.”” Mark 9:28, 29 NKJV
There are somethings in your life that are simply not going to happen until you fast and pray.
Prayer is reaching out after the unseen; fasting is letting go of all that is seen and passing.
Andrew Murray
Fasting is a spiritual weapon that most Christians do not make use of and because of that their spiritual lives are stagnant.
What is fasting: Fasting is abstinence from food for spiritual purposes. You can follow Daniel’s fasting, you can give up social media but you also need to give up food, not just change the kind of food you are eating.
Why is fasting is so powerful? Because fasting transforms and strengthens our Body, Soul and Spirit. Fasting expels toxins from our bodies and it also exposes transgressions in our souls.
“May your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
I Thessalonians 5:23 NKJV
Our Spirit is perfect, your Spirit doesn’t have sin. Your problem is not your body because your body just obeys the desires of your soul – That is your mind, your will, your desires and emotions .
When we are born again our Spirit is made new and we are new creations in the spirit, your spirit has no sin and it’s intact, but you still have an old mind that needs to be transformed and needs to be renewed.
The Bible says when you are born again you need live in the Spirit.
“If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”
Galatians 5:25 NKJV
Some of our spirits are in the trunk while our soul are ones behind the wheel.
There is body, soul and spirit. The soul is the one that ends up giving the orders to the body and the spirit is always silenced.
Now, what fasting does is it shuts down the soul and says: you’re no longer in charge, and slowly the spirit starts taking control of your life.
All your problems come from the soul; this is why God says you should afflict your soul in order to let the spirit guide your life.
Your soul wants to always be in control of your life, that’s why when you say:
I’m going to church , your soul says : No, you need rest, stay home.
I’m going to fast , then your soul says: Don’t fast , it’s enough to just eat different kinds of food , if you fast for too long you are going to die, you need to eat every day. Your soul wants to control your life.
Fasting is a spiritual weapon that humbles and transforms your soul and strengthens your spirit.
“This shall be a statute forever for you: In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall afflict your souls.”
Leviticus 16:29 NKJV
These verses talk about a holiday which God established for Israel as Yom Kippur – Day of Atonement – Jews traditionally observe this holiday with a day-long fast and intensive prayer.
Leviticus 16:29 : “You should afflict your soul”
What does it mean to afflict your soul?
God says: You shall afflict your soul.
Some different Bible versions say: “you must fast”, others say, “you must not eat” and still others say, “you must deny yourself”.
Every theologian in the world will agree that this means to fast and also this is what the Jews actually do, they fast!
“To afflict your soul” does not mean you go and beat yourself up or hurt yourself, it just means you fast.
God says “It’s a statute forever”, something that God still envisions for us today.
To afflict your soul is an interesting term because God presents fasting as painful to the soul.
Why does God present fasting as a pain to the soul?
If you ever have fasted you understand that it’s an affliction to your soul as well as to your body because during fasting you get moody, you get cranky, during fasting you can may even feel down, a little depressed. Why? Because your soul has been afflicted.
Have you noticed that when you fast the days go by slower? It’s fasting and supposed to be fast , but it goes by very slowly!
When you’re fasting it’s not your body that is most afflicted but your soul is the one that actually feels it the most.
The worldly people, people who do not know Christ, they live a fleshy life, they have their bodies making decisions for them, their flesh controls their decisions.
We, as a born again people, should live by the spirit. However many christians and religious people are still soulish people.
What does it mean to be a soulish person?
Soulish people are stubborn. Stubborn meaning their will is not broken, their emotions are easily offended, because their emotions are not submitted to God and their ideas are always confused.
A soulish person is someone who is stubborn, emotional, always confused, easily offended and people who are always fighting with others.
Do you know why you have difficulty in your relationship with some people?
Why do you not talk to certain people? Why do some people keep moving from one church to the other? Why do you keep on fighting with others and you can never fix ruined relationships?
Because your flesh is too strong and alive. Only fasting will kill and destroy your flesh and your old self.
What does fasting do with a soulish person?
What fasting does is this: the soul goes through a breaking and sanctification period while your mind loses itself and your emotions rage. In this moment of affliction, you gradually move from a soulish person to a spiritual person because your spirit gets quickened and awakened.
God wants you to be a spiritual person and spiritual people are those who have their souls under control and let their spirit lead their soul.
Why should we fast?
Because if not, you can get yourself in an emotional rollercoaster; you can be a stubborn person , and if you are stubborn you can destroy your marriage, you will move from church to church because everyone is wrong and you’re the only one who’s ever right; you can lose your job and you can lose your friends.
If your ideas are always confusing you will miss good opportunities. Your soul needs to be sanctified and one of the ways of doing that is through fasting.
What does fasting do in our soul when we fast?
Fasting humbles our souls and teaches us self-control.
Fasting has emotional benefits. How many of us eat because of our emotions and not because of our stomach?
Some of us are not over-weighted because of genes but some of us have emotional problems that we use food as a medicine to cure emotions, which is not a good idea!
But when you start fasting, the negative emotions surface but now you have to find another source comfort that’s not food, so instead you go to the Holy Spirit.
That’s why fasting helps heal our emotions, fasting exposes the sickness of our soul.
Example: When you are sad you go and open the fridge, the moment you’re depressed you rush to order takeout, the moment you are down you just stuff yourself with chocolate to help you feel a little better for a while.
But then on the next morning, you look at yourself and think: I hate myself, why am I putting on weight again, and so it’s a cycle of depression and feeling bad, felling slightly better and then worse again. Fasting puts an end to this cycle.
When you end your fasting you restrain your negative, toxic emotions and you are able to maintain your weight because you are not feeding your emotions physically.
Through fasting your soul is afflicted for a little period of time. Your body goes silent, your spirit is strengthened, your emotions get stabilised, you submit to the will of God and your mind has a better sense of clarity, even your body benefits when you fast.
There are people who get healed thanks to fasting, they change because of this discipline. This is a spiritual weapon that you have to use weekly.
What does fasting do to our bodies? Are there benefits to our body when we fast?
There are several scientific studies that show that fasting helps prevent obesity and associated chronic disease, reduces inflammations, improves overall fitness, decreases the risk of metabolic diseases and it improves both brain function and brain structure.
Fasting is abstaining from food for a spiritual reason. Fasting is not starvation, starvation is when you can’t eat for lack of food. Fasting is your choice!
Fasting is not a diet. Dieting is abstaining from food with the purpose of losing weight or getting a better health.
Fasting has a spiritual purpose behind it and you must use this Spiritual Weapon.
Food is good, it was designed by God. But men’s first sin happened because of food. Adam and Eve ate what God told them to fast!
Jesus’ first temptation was with food.
Food is not evil. Food is actually very good, but for most of us food is the reason we have physical problems and sickness and abstinence of food could be a way of solving some of those problems.
Many people are sick because of the food they eat. If eating food has caused problems, maybe abstinence from it can help.
Have you ever seen how when dogs get sick they may stop eating for a day or two? There is a natural instinct which God installed within animal that when they get food poisoning or when they get sick they know that if they stop eating for a while, I don’t know how but they get cured through fasting.
Fasting brings transformation to your soul and body and also feeds your spirit.
Fasting has spiritual benefits, it moves me, not God!
It increases my sensitivity to the Lord. It’s not that fasting makes God talks, it simply helps us to listen.
Fasting restores our hunger for God and fasting helps us regain control over our appetite. Something spiritual happens when we fast, is that your Spirit begins to finally get nourished and gets stronger.
“The spirit of a man will sustain him in sickness, But who can bear a broken spirit?”
Proverbs 18:14 NKJV
The Bible says that your spirit can take care of your body, but your body cannot take care of your spirit.
The Bible says: Your spirit can sustain your body
Your spirit can handle a weak, sick and broken body! That’s why you can fast for 1, 3, 7, 21 days without any food and your spirit will sustain your body.
Let’s read the verse where that Jesus quotes to Satan in the wilderness when He was fasting and was tempted by Satan.
“So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.”
Deuteronomy 8:3 NKJV
“He humbled you, He made you hunger.”
God brought Israel from Egypt and made them fast for 3 days, without warning them so He could humble them.
What they did do? They murmured, they complained, doubted the Lord and asked to go back to Egypt.
They never learned the lesson of fasting which was the humility of the soul so you can be positioned to receive God’s supernatural provision and step into God’s promises for your life.
Even when God made Adam, He also made him fast.
It was like Daniel’s fasting!
“but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.””
Genesis 2:17 NIV
God said: you can eat from any tree but don’t eat from that one. Guess what Adam did? He broke his fast!
God took Israel out of Egypt, He made them fast to teach them they should live by His word. Guess what they did? They complained and murmured because of their negative, toxic emotions.
They found a source of comfort in food but God wanted them to find comfort in His presence.
God said: I will teach you that man shall not live by everything that’s in their fridge but they may live by the Word of God.
Fasting teaches you: you’re more than your body.
Fasting teaches you: you’re more than your food.
Fasting teaches you: you’re an eternal Spirit and your Spirit is the lamp of the Lord.
If you take care of your spirit, your spirit will take care of your body.
Fasting helps to transform the Soul, the Body and also strengthens your Spirit.
When you fast, even if God doesn’t reveal His purpose to you, He will guide you, He will close doors that had been open before and He will open doors that are not open right now. He will call you and lead you to His purpose.
God will unlock His will in your life. Why? Because fasting is humbling yourself and God exalts those who are humble!
Fasting is not showing off, it’s not saying look at me because I’m fasting. Fasting is about denial not self-glorification.
When you fast, the Bible says He will reveal His perfect will for you.
How many of you receive this word from God? God is calling to fast and pray!
Listen to His voice.
May the Lord bless you