Slow Down and Fast

Tonight with the youth group I'll be talking about Jesus' response to those who inquired about the lack of fasting among his disciples (Mark 2:18-22). I thought I'd put up a couple thoughts and quotes I found on my notes from our study in spiritual disciplines last year. I know many of us are wrestling over decisions or carrying heavy burdens. Sometimes we can get so caught up seeking answers and solutions that we start worrying and working in our strength and on our terms. In times of great need, there is no better action than an expression of complete dependence on God. Fasting in faith is such an expression.

David Smith said the following of fasting: "All our fasting must be on this basis; we should use it as a scriptural means whereby we are melted into a more complete realization of the purpose of the Lord in our life, church, community, and nation."

"The case of a person's self, or family, or the church, or commonwealth, may be such that ordinary humiliation and prayer will not suffice. So it may be that some hardness of heart may be grown upon a person; or some sinful lusts may have gotten so much strength that they will not be subdued without fasting." (sorry no reference.)

Donald Whitney: "Fasting is one of the best friends we can introduce to our prayer life."

Whitney offers two quotations from David Brainerd's journals that give account of Brainerd's experience in dedicating a day for fasting. I'll include them both as a testimony of the great grace given in response to fasting in faith.

"I felt the power of intercession for precious, immortal souls; for the advancement of the kingdom of my dear Lord and Saviour in the world; and withal, a most sweet resignation and even consolation and joy in the thoughts of suffering hardships, distresses, and even death itself, in the promotion of it. . . . My soul was drawn out very much for the world, for multitudes of souls. I think I had more enlargement for sinners than for the children of God, though I felt as if I could spend my life in cries for both. I enjoyed great sweetness in communion with my dear Saviour. I think I never in my life felt such an entire weanedness from this world and so much resigned to God in everything."

"I set apart this day for secret fasting and prayer, to entreat God to direct and bless me with regard to the great work I have in view, of preaching the gospel. . . . God enabled me to wrestle ardently in intercession for absent friends. . . . The Lord visited me marvelously in prayer; I think my soul never was in such an agony before. I felt no restraint, for the treasure of divine grace was opened to me. I wrestled for absent friends, for the ingathering of souls, for multitudes of poor souls, and for many that I thought were the children of God, personally, in many distant places."

I hope some of these words stir in your hearts as they do mine. I desire to experience that "sweet communion with my dear Saviour." I want my heart to be awakened to pray for the ingathering of souls. I want to be weaned from this world and resigned to God in everything.

Let's embrace God's promises and seek His sufficient grace. On the side of my notes from our lesson on fasting I wrote: "Fast in faith accepting a divine invitation to His special grace." Not sure where those words came from but I think we should.