"What is Biblical Fasting?" "Should We Fast?" "How Do We fast?" Here's What the Bible Says About Fasting.

In today's episode, I want to discuss fasting. We will discuss what fasting is, what the Bible says about it, why we should fast, why it's important, and more.

First, I want to say a quick prayer: "LORD, I pray that you lift up every single person reading this right now. Holy Spirit, consume me and move me to do the will of God the Father. Use me as a vessel for your work, LORD, and work through me to make an impact in other people's lives. I pray that you show us the truth today, and you help us to discern that truth and live by it. LORD, I pray that whatever each person is supposed to receive from this episode, they receive it and implement it in their daily lives. I love You with every ounce of my being. In Jesus' name, Amen."

Alright, so first, what is fasting? Fasting is abstaining from food or drink for a specific period of time. So, not having certain foods or drinks for a specific period of time, and people fast for a bunch of different reasons. What I'm specifically going to be speaking about is biblical fasting. It's not only fasting from food or drink, but you can also fast from certain things in your life. You can fast from social media, I mean, pretty much anything that you're giving up for some time for God, that is what fasting is. Now, there are many different reasons why people fast as well, but I'm just going to dive straight into some scripture, and we will go into some scriptures of people fasting in the Bible.

Now let's get into some scripture:

"Then Jesus left the Jordan, full of the Holy Spirit, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for forty days to be tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and when they were over, he was hungry." -Luke 4:1-2

So this right here shows that Jesus fasted for 40 days. He was led by the Holy Spirit, He didn't eat anything, and He was tempted by the devil when He was hungry after fasting for 40 days. So right here, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, He fasted. Another person who fasted for 40 days is Moses.

"Moses was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did not eat food or drink water. He wrote the Ten Commandments, the words of the covenant, on the tablets."

-Exodus 34:28

"I didn’t eat any rich food, no meat or wine entered my mouth, and I didn’t put any oil on my body until the three weeks were over."

-Daniel 3:10

So if you've gone to church or you've been a Christian for a while, I'm sure you've heard of the Daniel Fast. It is one of the most popular fasts out there for Christians. That fast is from these verses, from this verse, and then there's also some verses where he did a 10-day fast. So Daniel, whenever he had gotten a vision from God, he fasted for three weeks. Now he didn't fast from all food, but he fasted from certain foods.

"Go and assemble all the Jews who can be found in Susa and fast for me. Don’t eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my female servants will also fast in the same way. After that, I will go to the king even if it is against the law. If I perish, I perish.”

-Esther 4:16

I'm just going over like one or two verses of these stories, but I highly recommend, if you have time, to dive into each of these stories that I'm going over and really get the full context of these verses. If you haven't read the books of Daniel, Esther, and the other ones that I'm going over, I highly recommend that you take some time to read those because they're very great. I mean everything in the Bible, it's full of truth, it's God's words, and it's great to live by.

"Even now— this is the Lord’s declaration— turn to me with all your heart, with fasting, weeping, and mourning. Tear your hearts, not just your clothes, and return to the Lord your God. For he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in faithful love, and he relents from sending disaster." -Joel 2:12-13

"and was a widow for eighty-four years. She did not leave the temple, serving God night and day with fasting and prayers."

-Luke 2:37

"As they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” -Acts 13:2

“Whenever you fast, don’t be gloomy like the hypocrites. For they disfigure their faces so that their fasting is obvious to people. Truly I tell you, they have their reward. 17 But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18 so that your fasting isn’t obvious to others but to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you." -Matthew 6:16-18

"Then John’s disciples came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?” Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests be sad while the groom is with them? The time will come when the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one patches an old garment with unshrunk cloth, because the patch pulls away from the garment and makes the tear worse. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. No, they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.” -Matthew 9:14-17

There are a lot of other scriptures in the Bible about fasting, but I just wanted to go over these specific ones. So we see where Jesus fasted, Moses fasted, Daniel fasted, Esther and the other Jews fasted, and the widow in the book of Luke fasted. Many people in the Bible fasted.

So why should we fast? Is this just something that people did back in biblical days, and something that we don't need to practice now? Or is this something that we should do regularly? Fasting is not a command in the Bible, but it does show throughout the Bible all about fasting. Jesus says that His disciples are going to fast after He goes back to heaven, and we see in the book of Acts where they do fast. So fasting is very important. The reason why we fast is to give something to God so that we can have a deeper connection with Him, so that we can humble ourselves and seek guidance from Him, and so we can deny our flesh. Fasting is a big way to say, "I'm denying my flesh. I'm giving all of this to you, LORD, and I'm going to rely on you for strength. I'm going to rely on you through every aspect of my life."

There could be a bunch of different reasons why you may fast. It may be that there's something in your life that is consuming your life, something that you think about all the time, something that you want all the time. It could be a food, it could also be something else, like social media or a certain TV show, or an item. Really, anything that you are putting above God, just giving that to Him, even if it's just for a specific amount of time. Like, "LORD, I give this to you. This is very important to me, and I'm going to give it to you, and I know that you will sustain me." He is our daily bread, He is our portion, and we do not need anything else but Him.

It can be very easy to get consumed with materialistic things in this world, and just get so caught up in the things in this world. That's why we need to practice fasting; that'll help us with spiritual discipline. It'll help us with just practicing discipline, letting the Holy Spirit guide us, and giving everything to God.

Fasting is something that I didn't start incorporating until just last year. I've been a Christian pretty much my whole life, but if you've watched any of my videos or listened to any of my podcasts, then you know that I was down deep in the darkness for a few years, and then I recommitted my life to Christ in 2020. Since then, I have been really diving into scripture, studying, getting closer to God, letting the Holy Spirit guide me, and my life has completely transformed because of Jesus Christ. One big thing that I didn't incorporate, which a lot of Christians don't, is fasting. I was not fasting. There was one other time that I'd ever fasted in my life before the past, like six to eight months, and that was one time I did a juice fast, and it wasn't anything spiritual. I was just doing a juice fast to try and detox my body. It was like this health thing I was trying to do.

Last year, I started doing where I would fast certain things. Now, actually, there was a time or two when I did like fast social media or something like that. When it comes to a food fast, I just started doing those last year, and that was a big thing for me. Food has been a big problem for me for a long time, and I may go deeper into that on a different episode. If someone wants me to dive deeper into that, just comment or email me at faithfuelsmyfire@gmail.com and let me know specifically what you want me to dive into. Food has been a big problem for me. Coffee has been a big problem for me. So with spending quiet time with God, I have had to fast from some things over the past months, and it has really helped so much. God has delivered me from some things because I fasted. Whenever I fasted and gave them up for a specific amount of time, He took them away completely and delivered me from it, and it's all glory to God. He is so incredible.

If there's something in your life right now that is just consuming you daily, I want you to first always pray and talk to God about it. Don't make any decisions based on what I tell you. This is your relationship with God, but just ask Him, "LORD, what is it that you want me to give up for you? Reveal to me what's holding me back from being fully committed to you." He will reveal it to you. You have to be still, listen to him, and seek to hear from Him what it is that He wants you to fast. Then the biggest, most important step is being obedient. Once you hear that from the Lord of what it is He wants you to give up, give it up. He may not tell you for a specific amount of time, give it up for a few days, give it up for a few months, and talk to God about that. If you don't get a specific time frame on how long you should fast this certain thing that you're fasting, then just set a time and let God guide you every step of the way while you're fasting.

One big, crucial step is keeping in constant prayer. You're not just giving something up just to give it up. You're giving it up for the LORD. You're giving it up to help strengthen your relationship with Him and to know that He is the one who sustains you. He is the very most important thing, and you don't need anything else but Him. If you've been confused about things in your life, if you need clarity on things, if there is something very specific that you're wanting to happen but it hasn't happened yet and you're just very confused on it, I urge you to pray and ask God, "What is it that's holding me back from getting this? What is it that you're trying to show me? What is it that you want me to give up, LORD?"

I've mentioned this a lot of times in my episodes, but sometimes things don't happen the way you want them to happen because that's not what God has planned for you. If it's something that you know you've heard from God that this is what's supposed to happen, and it hasn't happened, it may be because you're still holding onto something that He's wanting you to give up. So it's so important for you to ask, "LORD, what is it that you want me to give up? Reveal to me what's holding me back from being fully committed to you." Whenever He reveals that to you, give it up to Him. Fast, whatever that is. If it's food, if it's social media, if it's something materialistic, you just have to listen and be obedient. I'm telling you, it is going to make such a difference in your life. It has made such a difference in my life. It has strengthened me spiritually. It has strengthened my relationship with Christ, and it has helped me so much to be able to just really hear his voice, stay in tune with the Holy Spirit, and walk and step with the Spirit. Even though we have the Holy Spirit within us, we have to make sure we're asking the Holy Spirit to consume us, to move us to do the will of God the Father, and we have to make sure we're walking in step with the Spirit.

God loves us so much, we are His children, He cares for us, He wants the best for us, and He wants to have that close personal relationship with us. Sometimes we can let things get in the way of that because this world is so full of distractions and so many things that we could put above God. That's why it's so important for us to practice discipline, deny our flesh, and fast for periods of time. However long you want to fast, however often you want to fast, that's really up to you and God, and what you want to fast is up to you and God. But I urge you, if you haven't tried fasting at all, just get in the secret place with God, spend some quiet time with Him, and ask Him what it is that He wants you to give up or what it is that is holding you back from being fully committed to him. I urge you to just give all of that to God and see what happens in your life. See how He strengthens and sustains you and how He is the only one that you need.

So I hope this episode helped you guys to know what fasting is, why it's important, why we should fast, and to be able to see some stories in scripture in the Bible of other people fasting as well. So that is it for today's episode. Stay tuned for another episode next week.

I love you guys so much.

Never forget to choose faith over fear.

-Lorena Camille (Faith Fuels My Fire)

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Scripture taken from The Christian Standard Bible. Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible®, and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers, all rights reserved.