The Lost Art of Fasting - Getting Ready to Fast

Introduction
I have been practicing the discipline of fasting regularly since 1996 and have experienced God move in many ways both personally and in answer to prayer for others. I have been frustrated with the lack of training, models, and practice in Christianity to learn from, which has led to an immense search for and study of fasting to develop this discipline in my own life.

The following is the culmination of research, observation, and testing that I have put together to assist you in your pursuit of God through the means of fasting. The Bible seems to just make assumptions about fasting, but we simply do not know how to go about exploring these disciplines of the inner life. Fasting was so common in biblical times that one did not need to ask how to start a fast, or even what it was, because everyone already knew. This is not true of our culture.

My prayer is that you find this inspiring and practical, as well as informative and spiritual. My hope is that you will join with me in fasting for personal revival, but even more so, for revival for our church, community, and country. My heart aches to see God pour His Spirit out upon us in a mighty way, in a way that causes a Great Awakening in the depths of our being.

May the grace of the Lord be with you,

Rev. Bryan Todd

GETTING READY TO FAST

Most of us have heard a lot about prayer, but I wonder how much we have been taught about the importance and purpose of fasting. Follow the subject through the Bible and you’ll discover that it’s everywhere. Fasting is not just an aside to the Christian life, but essential to the life that pleases God.
God created the human body as a finely tuned physical engine of enormous power, but it requires fuel to keep operating. That fuel is called food. To make sure the body gets fuel, God has created within us an appetite for food, called hunger. As part of the balance of nature to keep life going, food satisfies our appetite and gives us strength.

So why would one choose to go without food?

If you have never fasted, it is probably a scary thing to think about going without food for any length of time. People have a variety of concerns because we are programmed to eat three times a day. Many wonder if they will get hungry and if the hunger pains will hurt. Fasting does not hurt anymore than dieting to get thinner. If you can cut back on your eating just to lose weight, you can cut back on food, in a reasonable way, to seek God’s presence and get an answer to your prayers.

Other people have a different question. “Can I hold out?” We cry out, “I have tried this before and never have finished. I don’t want to go through that feeling again.” No one wants to get started on a journey they can’t complete. The ability to stay on your fast is not dependent upon how hard you try to stay away from food, but by how positive is the attraction of knowing God and spending time with him. Another question is “Will I harm myself?” We are conditioned to think that we must get our three meals a day. But statistics have demonstrated that fasting is actually good for us. During a fast we eliminate poisons and toxins from the body as well as giving your digestive tract an opportunity to rest.

Still others are concerned what their friends will think. The answer is simple: you don’t fast to impress friends and on most occasions, you don’t even let them know. Will you feel like a freak? I do most of the time. Will you wrestle with self-righteousness? I do sometimes. Will you want to quit cause no one else is fasting? Probably.

I don’t express these thoughts to scare you or to be fatalistic, as much as to give you an honest look at what goes through at least one person’s mind who practices the discipline of fasting regularly. This is not to say you will or won’t experience the same as me when you fast, as much to say it has rarely been a mystical “seventh heaven” experience for me. I have even found that at times I reap more spiritual victories and have sweeter communion with the Lord after the fast is over than during the fast.