Joel 2:12-13 (NET)
12 “Yet even now,” the Lord says, return to me with all your heart—
with fasting, weeping, and mourning. Tear your hearts, not just your garments!”
GOD has higher purpose in mind for fasting. It is not for weight watchers or for putting discipline in one’s physical being. Yes, it helps us to become physically healthy and develops one’s self control, but it is way more than that. Fasting for spiritual purposes means to go without food and drink but always associated with lamentation and/or penitence, a sign of repentance for the sins we have committed. It should not be done for "look-at-how-spiritual-I-am" image. We cannot impress GOD by fasting if it involves unrighteousness brought by human righteousness, that is for traditional purposes. It is often joined with weeping as a sign of mourning because we admit we disobeyed GOD. Fasting should be yoked with prayer whether it is prayer for forgiveness or for supplication. Anyone can pray without fasting but no one can have spiritual fasting without praying earnestly. It is not presenting ourselves with hungry body sitting on ashes and wearing sackcloth to GOD, but presenting our contrite hearts torn apart brought by sincere repentance on account of our sins, a humble hearts because we are pleading to GOD to hear us. Here are few examples of many “Fasting in the Heart” in the Holy Scriptures.
The first recorded in the Bible to fast is Moses. He fasted forty days in two occasions when the LORD gave him the two sets of the two Stone Tablets of the Ten Commandments (Deut. 9:9 &18). Moses’ fasting is associated with supplications for Israel. He pleaded the LORD to listen to him not to destroy Israel, His own people, who (including Aaron) sinned against the LORD and had made Him angry. With Moses’ prayer and fasting for a total of eighty days, the LORD listened to him and agreed not to destroy them in two occassions (Deut. 10:10).
Another example of true fasting in the heart is King David, the man after GOD’s own heart (Acts 13:22). He admitted he sinned against the LORD because he struck down Uriah, his soldier, and have taken his wife Bathsheba as his own. After knowing that he had treated GOD with contempt through Prophet Nathan, he prayed and fasted for seven days, for God said HE will punish him through his household and will take the life of his child borne to him by Bathsheba. He cried to GOD to spare his child by fasting and spent the nights lying on the ground. But because GOD already pronounced His word, HE rendered the punishment and took the life of his child. Attributable to his sincere repentance and accepting the LORD’s verdict, GOD gave him another son borne by Bathsheba named Solomon, the chosen one to make GOD’s majestic temple (2 Sam 12:9-24 & 7:13).
In the case of Queen Esther, she urged her uncle Mordecai and all the Jews including her servants to fast as she planned to appear before her husband King Ahasuerus to ask him a favor to reverse his ruling; to destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews, from youth to elderly, both women and children in her time. She took the risk of her life for there’s a law that “Any man or woman who comes uninvited to the king in the inner court—that person will be put to death, unless the king extends to him the gold scepter, permitting him to be spared.” Thus she called them to fast for three days and this resulted that Haman, the king’s official who plotted the killing of all Jews be hanged on the very gallows that Haman had prepared for Mordecai. (Esther 2:19- 7:10)
The best of them all, in a superlative degree, was done by Jesus Christ in the wilderness (Matt. 4:2). He also fasted for forty days and forty nights. The first three examples were laid to illustrate the very reasons of why Jesus undergone fasting even He did not commit any sins. Moses fasted for the deliverance of Israel from GOD’s wrath, the very reason why Jesus had fasted as He absorbed the very sins of all people including Gentles to be His own sins. Jesus fasted to free us from GOD’s wrath. Then King David, not for his contemptuousness, but how he accepted the verdict of GOD. In the same manner that Jesus had accepted the punishment He would undertake to suffer on the cross and die for our sins. For having done so, Jesus fulfilled the prophecy to King David “He will build a house for my name, and I will make his dynasty permanent. I will become his father and he will become my son.” (2 Samuel 7:13-14). Jesus like Solomon built a temple, but a temple not made by human hands (Hebrews 9:11), He made us, our body, the Temple. Lastly as Queen Esther risked her life for her people, Jesus offered His Life to save humankind. On the other hand, Jesus disobeyed the fasting on Sabbath as He is pointing out that fasting is not in the tradition, but in the heart.
But all of those mentioned fasting were not imposed by GOD. It is all selfless act to win GOD’s favor for other people and an element of personal devotion to win GOD’s favor, and no hypocrisy in it.
However, there is only one fast command in the Bible and that was the fast on the Day of Atonement. This fast was only for a period of one day, from sunset of one day to sunset of the next in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, (Leviticus 16:29;23:32) and was ordained by the LORD. Also, the Israel according to Zech. 8:19 observed fasts on the fourth, fifth, seventh, and tenth months to commemorate the critical events in the Bible. Luke 18:12, mentioned that the Pharisees fasted twice a week. All these fasting and some other were institutionalized as an element of public religious devotion. And today, more fasting were added to observe like the fasting during Lenten Season. As for Catholics, it is established by the Church as one of her precepts to be one of the three expressions of penance namely; fasting, prayer and almsgiving. (CCC 2043;1434;1438). But more people including the Pharisees, practice fasting in observance of the law, not an act of penance, but a show-off of their righteousness. Here then when the pride sprouts and when the hypocrisy creeps in. Jesus said in Matthew 23:27-28, “Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs that look beautiful on the outside but inside are full of the bones of the dead and of everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you look righteous to people, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.” GOD being all-knowing, saw the same hypocrisy of people in the Old Testament, one of which in Isaiah’s time. This cause Him to reprimand His people and corrected their concepts on fasting. This is what GOD said in Isaiah 58:5-10:
5 Is this really the kind of fasting I want? Do I want a day when people merely humble themselves, bowing their heads like a reed and stretching out on sackcloth and ashes? Is this really what you call a fast, a day that is pleasing to the Lord? 6 No, this is the kind of fast I want. I want you to remove the sinful chains, to tear away the ropes of the burdensome yoke, to set free the oppressed, and to break every burdensome yoke. 7 I want you to share your food with the hungry and to provide shelter for homeless, oppressed people. When you see someone naked, clothe him! Don’t turn your back on your own flesh and blood! 8 Then your light will shine like the sunrise; your restoration will quickly arrive; your godly behavior will go before you, and the Lord’s splendor will be your rear guard. 9 Then you will call out, and the Lord will respond; you will cry out, and he will reply, ‘Here I am.’ You must remove the burdensome yoke from among you and stop pointing fingers and speaking sinfully. 10 You must actively help the hungry and feed the oppressed. Then your light will dispel the darkness, and your darkness will be transformed into noonday.
Jesus affirmed this call of GOD to change the way we look on fasting. He called us to Proper Fasting in Matthew 6:16-18. He said, “When you fast, do not look sullen like the hypocrites, for they make their faces unattractive so that people will see them fasting... When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others when you are fasting, but only to your Father who is in secret.”
According to Jesus, we should fast in private, to show to our Lord (not to people), and no one should notice it. We should not only do it at Lent, but do it as soon as our conscience tells us that we have offended GOD and we should be so sorry that we will not do it again. Sirach 34:31 (NRSVCE) says, “So if one fasts for his sins, and goes again and does the same things, who will listen to his prayer? And what has he gained by humbling himself?”
Like Jesus or Moses, David, and Queen Esther, let us offer fasting for not only for ourselves but for other people especially those who are sick and those who needs help for their conversion. We need to tear our hearts for ourselves and for others, as Psalm 51:17 (NRSVCE) says, “The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” AMEN
Comments