Our Failure to Fast is a Failure of Faith
Recapturing This Wonderful Spiritual Grace in a Life Ruled By a Trust in Idols
Good Morning,
The next portion of the Westminster Directory of Public Worship that we’ll be looking at is a practice that is almost completely forgotten today. I don’t think we have the requisite spiritual state to even contemplate it, let alone bring it back in full force. My purpose in saying that is not to run us down in 2025, but merely to note the reality that we would need to do a lot of reviving of just the biblical idea of fasting let alone thinking about events as a people or a nation in the hand of the providence of God. Sometimes we do not realize how disconnected we are from the attitudes and conceptions of the world in comparison to our forefathers and foremothers in the faith. We should think on that to our shame. Yet, it does no good for us to wallow in it.
Our goal should be as we are confronted with the doctrine of fasting and the public nature of what the DPW enjoins for us that we move back to appreciating the spiritual discipline and what it can and should do for us in our personal and corporate walks with Christ. Many of the biblical ways of spiritual growth are passé in our day because we have a materialistic mind, and cannot see the benefits of such a work, yet all throughout the scriptures from Adam to John the Revelator what do we hear of people doing. People as disparate as the king of Nineveh to Moses? They engage in fasting, for sin, for repentance, in seeking God’s guidance, etc . . . When is the last time you fasted for these or any other reasons? When is the last time your denomination or your local church ask you to do these things? Sadly, I think we all know the answer.
Let’s go ahead and read what the directory has to say as we are introduced to this biblical teaching:
When some great and notable judgments are either inflicted upon a people, or apparently imminent, or by some extraordinary provocations notoriously deserved; as also when some special blessing is to be sought and obtained, publick solemn fasting (which is to continue the whole day) is a duty that God expects from that nation or people.
A religious fast requires total abstinence, not only from all food, (unless bodily weakness do manifestly disable from holding out till the fast be ended, in which case somewhat may be taken, yet very sparingly, to support nature, when ready to faint,) but also from all worldly labour, discourses, and thoughts, and from all bodily delights, and such like, (although at other times lawful,) rich apparel, ornaments, and such like, during the fast; and much more from whatever is in the nature or use scandalous and offensive, as gaudish attire, lascivious habits and gestures, and other vanities of either sex; which we recommend to all ministers, in their places, diligently and zealously to reprove, as at other times, so especially at a fast, without respect of persons, as there shall be occasion.
Social media, television, and our being inundated with information and outside influence has done a number on our sense of the world and the events that take place in it. We almost feel like we are living in a movie, or at least a soap opera. There is a mental disconnect between the real and the experience. It is part of the reason why we struggle in looking to the Lord in times of national crises because we look instead to the director of the production, and to the leader of the country as our guide and the one to provide the answer. While Psalm 20:7 warns us against such it is helpful to know that it is not merely a Twenty-First century problem. We are not the first ones in human history to forget who the true Sovereign is. If we would have fasting come back into the normal operations of the Christian church as the DPW designs it the people of God need to operate in a head space where Jehovah alone is the ruler and ordainer of all that comes to pass.
As you look at the selection for today you will see that there are particular requirements for a fast to be a fast. It necessitates “total abstinence” from everything including food (unless health requires, which again points to the pastoral love of the Westminster Divines) to wealthy living to general human entertainment. Fasting is supposed to be hard. It is the wholesale falling on ones face, metaphorically and sometimes literally, in order to plead to the Lord for help. We are to do this either in response to a disaster whether of human or natural causes or in preparation for some event that might cause great distress to the nation and/or church. Our hearts and eyes are to be on the one who is actually able by His blessed providence to affect the event. If Jesus tells us that prayer and fasting can move mountains who are we to live as if He is ignorant of how the world operates and as if our only hope is to wish it away? Fasting is a prime example of what Paul speaks of when it comes to walking by faith and not by sight. It is a learned spiritual discipline.
That more than anything speaks to why it is so neglected today. We forsake the simpler means of grace, like prayer and reading Scripture together, so why is it any surprise that we do not as a body of believers take advantage of this more difficult, something that asks more of us than these other blessings of mercy? What then are we to do if we are to recapture this spiritual good? Like most things in the Christian life we have not because we ask not. If you want to begin or desire Bethany ARP to engage in fasting then seek the elders to lead us in these things. Ask me to call a day of fasting and prayer. Think first of God’s control over the events of the world, reject the fear merchants who want you to listen to them first in seeking solutions. Seek ye first the kingdom of Christ and His kingship and authority.
That is the answer to building up your fasting muscle.
In closing, notice again from the opening paragraph of the section of the DPW we are looking at today. When God answers prayer we must not forget to show thanks, and fasting is a wonderful way to witness to our undeserved receiving of mercy. Our reliance upon the maker of the heaven and the earth is a powerful help not only to our day-by-day faith, but it is the glory found in the heart of all believers that we have the privilege to know God’s power over all, that we might this day and every day be in peace in His sovereign love. Fasting is a strong help in every trial.
Here is a last word:
https://www.modernreformation.org/resources/articles/the-mod-fasting-and-the-pursuit-of-god
Blessings in Christ,
Rev. Benjamin Glaser
Pastor, Bethany ARP Church