“And when you pray, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”
– Matthew 6:16-18 (English Standard Version)
In this blog, we address the faithful Christian approach to fasting (and by association the practice of denial) as taught us by the Lord Jesus himself and recorded in Matthew chapter six.
Pretty much every known religion has incorporated these practices as accepted methods of renewing the worshiper’s relationship with their god; some have gone so far as requiring them as part of their worship and developing specific rituals to emphasize these practices.
Fasting and deprivation have been part of the Judeo-Christian faith since Old Testament times, and unfortunately, so has the propensity to take something meant to bring attention and focus to God and turn it to bring attention to ourselves.
Jesus recognized this as being very damaging to the worshippers of YAHWEH because inevitably, the stronger the person’s desire was to elevate himself, the more the acknowledgment of YAHWEH as almighty God and Father would suffer. Such is the way of self-deification, and such is the way the schism caused by sin continues to widen.
What are those attributes of fasting and deprivation that can completely be turned from being a positive means for the healing of our relationship with God, to bringing about the destruction of that relationship?
In order to best answer that question, we need to first the role of fasting and deprivation in both individual and corporate faith:
● They help us to strengthen our connection to YAHWEH, to seek His guidance, and to express surrender, repentance, and dependence on Him. Christians also see these as means of drawing particular attention to the suffering of Jesus for us on the cross for the sake of paying the price for our sin;
● They serve as a means of showing the seriousness of our return to the Lord by humbling ourselves before him and acknowledging our dependence on Him;
● They serve as means by which we can gain control over our physical nature and fight against our temptations;
● They serve as means by which which our attention is shifted away from worldly things back to the righteousness of God;
● They serve as reminders that all that we are blessed with, including life itself, should never be taken for granted because none are ever a given, but are transient from one momentto the next;
● They serve as means by which we mourn the losses in life, either individually or corporately. And when mourn the loss of loved ones, fasting and deprivation remind us of how the death of the body, but also potentially the death of the soul.
Jesus reminds us that fasting and acts of deprivation are not exhibitionas of piety for the sake of personal recognition, neither are they contests to see who can outdo whom, rather they are acts of contrition to be shared between us and the Lord.
They are not intended to gain the approval and praise from our friends and neighbors who will come and go in an instant depending on whether or not you retain their favor, but that of the Father who grants us His favor for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ.
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