I began Inscribe the Word Scripture Writing Plans in 2016, and every year, I am in awe of how God uses these plans to bring hundreds of thousands of people to Scripture. I am humbled and honored to bring this resource to you.

This year, our theme is The Spiritual Disciplines. By placing daily spiritual rhythms in our lives, my husband and I have decided to rebuild our lives around our apprenticeship to Jesus.

Each month in 2022, we will focus on a new spiritual discipline. I will also be including some books and resources to help you put that discipline into practice in your everyday lives. In January, we inscribed verses focused on Sabbath Rest. This February, our Scripture passages were on prayer. This month, we continue our study of the Spiritual Disciplines but looking to see what the Bible says about Fasting. Fasting and prayer usually go hand-in-hand, and I thought it was a good continuation of last month's study.

My prayer is that you see these not as legalistic rules but as ways to Abide in the Vine each and every day. (John 15:1-8)

I imagine out of all of the Spiritual Disciplines we study this year, FASTING will be the least popular. “Fasting is a willing abstinence from food for a period of time. It is one of the most abused and least used of all the practices of Jesus. Yet for millennia, it was a core practice of apprenticeship. We live in a culture not only of food, but of excess, luxury, and addiction. For so many of us, the desires of our body have come to hold power over us. In the battle with our “flesh,” we have become its slave, not its master.” (Source)

Before 2021, I never did a Biblical fast. I always went into times of fasting with the wrong motivation. I fasted for God to give me an answer about something, I fasted to lose weight, I fasted for a blessing . . . all wrong motivations. But once I began to learn what the Bible said about fasting, I realized that this ancient Spiritual Discipline has been too long neglected and too wrongly practiced.

I would like to share some words from Adele Ahlberg Calhoun from her book, "The Spiritual Disciplines Handbook". I would encourage you to pick up a copy today. She writes . . .

“Fasting has been part and parcel of the Judeo-Christian tradition for millennia. Scripture is replete with examples of people who fast for a variety of reasons.

Old Testament saints fasted at times of mourning and national repentance. They fasted when they needed strength or mercy to persevere and when they wanted a word from God (see 1 Samuel 7:6; Nehemiah 1:4; Esther 4:16). However, fasting was no magical guarantee that God would answer as the intercessor wanted. King David fasted when he wanted God to spare the life of Bathsheba’s child, but the child died (2 Samuel 12:16-20).

Fasting was a normal practice for the Jews of Jesus day. Jesus began his ministry with a forty-day fast. He also practiced fasting before healings and to overcome temptation. But he did not hold his followers to a strict regime of fasting (Matthew 4:2; Mark 2:18-19; Luke 5:33).

The New Testament church sometimes fasted when it sought God’s will and needed the grace and strength to remain faithful to God’s work. There were also fast times linked to times of worship (Acts 13:2-3).

In many Christian traditions fasting is an important part of preparing to embrace a particular liturgical season. During Lent, fasting reminds the church of how Jesus gave up everything—even his life—for us.

THE WRONG MOTIVATIONS
Scripture also gives a variety of warnings about fasting for the wrong reasons or with the wrong attitude:

(1) When people do not live as God desires they should be prepared for fasting to accomplish nothing (Isaiah 58:3-7).
(2) Fasting is not for appearances. It does not make anyone pious or holy, and it does not earn points with God (Matthew 6:16; Luke 18:9-14).
(3) Fasting is not a magical way to manipulate God into doing our will; it’s not a way to get God to be an accomplice to our plans.
(4) Neither is fasting a spiritual way to lose weight or control others.
THE PURPOSE BEHIND FASTING.
Fasting clears us out and opens us up to intentionally seeking God’s will and grace in a way that goes beyond normal habits of worship and prayer. While fasting, we are one on one with God . . .

Fasting is an opportunity to lay down an appetite—an appetite for food, for media, for shopping. This act of self-denial may not seem huge—it’s just a meal or a trip to the mall—but it brings us face to face with the hunger at the core of our being. Fasting exposes how we try to keep empty hunger at bay and gain a sense of well-being by devouring creature comforts. Through self-denial we begin to recognize what controls us. Our small denials of the self show us just how little taste we actually have for sacrifice or time with God."

I know there are many questions and even some confusion around this practice. I would love to respond to those questions, but a blog post isn't really the place to do that. I would encourage you to dive into the resources listed below. These have helped me on my walk through fasting and living out this practice in my life.

If fasting is not something you are comfortable or familiar with, at the very least, take this month's Inscribe the Word plan and see what the Bible says about fasting. What situations do people fast? What does Jesus say about fasting? And perhaps these verses will encourage you to practice fasting as part of your Spiritual Rhythms.

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