All right, next few moments I want to talk about fasting and prayer. All right, this first Sunday of the new year. Matthew chapter 17, verse 14. And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him and saying, Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is a lunatic and sore-vexed, for oft times he falleth into the fire and oft into the water. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you? Bring him hither to me. And Jesus rebuked the devil, and he departed out of him, and the child was cursed from that very hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus apart and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief, for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place, and it shall remove, and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Howbeit, this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." Now, what does that mean? This kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. I want to talk for a few moments about the subject of prayer and fasting. A few years ago, I preached three Sunday evening services on this particular subject. This is going to be a condensed version of that, but I want to talk about why should we talk about this now. Is this a relevant subject? It's not something that typically we bring up or even talk about. Is this a subject for 2015? Well, it is in the Bible, okay, so it is fair game. There's a good start. Practically, January is a good time to talk about prayer and fasting. One of the obvious reasons is why. we could probably all use to eat a little bit less right now, right? So people are more open to talking about prayer and fasting in the month of January. That's just a practical reason. Probably you were not the green smoothie queen over the holidays, all right? Let's just put it that way. And so here we are at the beginning of the year. Spiritually, though, this is a time of year that we have an inner desire to make the full use of the year. We want to make sure that we have a good year that we use this year for the Lord, we want to start out well. Corporately, as a church, here's another reason we want to talk about this, we have some big things to talk about here as a church and big things to pray for as a church. What I'm going to challenge us to do is something that I challenged us to do a few years ago. I'm going to challenge us to do this again I can't quite remember exactly what I said back then, but here's what I say now, okay? For the next two Wednesdays, so this Wednesday the 7th and Wednesday the 14th, for anybody that would like to participate, I would like to challenge you to take the lunch hour on those two Wednesdays to pray and to fast. Now, I'm not going to ask you if you did it, all right? So this isn't a matter of, all right, everybody that fasted stand up, you know, and we kind of, here, I did it. That's not what we do. This is not an imposed thing. It's a challenge. It's something that I would encourage us to do. Probably most people, including myself, do not regularly pray and fast, though we should. It seems clear from Matthew chapter 17 that there are some items that Jesus designated that are not going to take place apart from prayer and fasting. And so we want to learn a little bit about this and just kind of maybe take another notch forward as a church in our understanding of prayer and what it means to pray and fast. Now, if that day doesn't work for you, if the lunch hour doesn't work for you, don't think, well, I can't do Wednesday, I'm not going to do it. Maybe there's another day for you, maybe an evening, maybe something other than food, because we'll talk about that here in just a moment. What is, though, biblical fasting? I'm going to give a little bit of explanation. This is not a full sermon on prayer and fasting. It's a shorter sermon, but we're going to cover a little bit of territory and make some applications. Let me remind us that fasting is not an exclusively biblical concept, okay? other religions fast. The health community feels that there's value in some kind of fasting, right? So what is distinctive about biblical fasting? Because this is not Jesus just saying, okay, if you deprive yourself of something for a period of time, I'm more likely to listen to you. That's not what he is saying, but that's kind of maybe the idea that we have. Biblical fasting, here's my definition that I've kind of put together, it's a long definition, it's going to be hard to write down, you can try to write it down if you want. Biblical fasting is the temporary setting aside of some good thing for the purpose of spending extra time to gain a more confident, steadied gaze upon God, In doing so, my faith is strengthened and refined. The prompting to do this is usually due to a need and the prompting of the Holy Spirit." So that's kind of, it's not like one sentence, it's kind of like three kind of jammed together. What is biblical fasting? Let me read it again. Biblical fasting is the temporary setting aside of some good thing. Now typically it's food, and we're going to talk about why the biblical references often are to food, but it could be something else. So if you are a teenager, you can apply this. Maybe it might not be possible for you to give up a meal on a Wednesday, or maybe that's just not possible to do that. There are other things that we can fast from. but it's the temporary setting aside of some good thing for the purpose of spending extra time to gain a more confident, steady gaze upon God. And in doing so, my faith is strengthened and refined. The prompting to do this is usually due to a need and the prompting of the Holy Spirit." Okay? What we're talking about is having time that we involve in prayer, okay? So prayer is definitely a part of biblical fasting. The primary focus of that time is on Christ, all right? Now, we're going to look at Matthew chapter 9 here in just a moment, but that passage indicates that our primary focus is upon Christ. Now, we're not used to, and maybe you are, but most of us are not used to biblical fasting, and so when we don't eat and we're trying to pray, what do we think about? leftover piece of lasagna, what we're going to have for dinner, the fact that we're hungry. I mean, you just think about everything else except for what you're trying to think about. But our primary focus is upon Christ. There is a need that the Holy Spirit is usually touching on to prompt us to fast. However, we do not have to wait for a need in order to fast. In Acts chapter 13, I'm not turning to these passages, but when Paul and Barnabas were sent out, before they were ever sent out, it says that the church fasted and prayed, and it sounds like that was a natural thing. It didn't even sound like that was some abnormal thing. It sounded like the church was in the practice of doing that. When I was in India, A long time ago, the first time I was in India, the church that we were at, once a month, all the pastors in that particular area got together and they prayed and fasted the entire day. And there was always some needs, but that was their regular practice. Probably that's what was happening in the early church. There are several biblical examples of people who prayed and fasted and called together corporately, God's people, to pray and fast because of a need. Governmental people like Jehoshaphat, Nehemiah, and Esther all proclaimed corporate fasts to pray for some particular need that was going on. So let me say again, biblical fasting is the temporary setting aside of some good thing for the purpose of spending extra time to gain a more confident, steady gaze upon God. In doing so, my faith is strengthened and refined. The catalyst to do this is usually due to a need and the prompting of the Holy Spirit." By the way, is that Bruce Tuttle sitting back there? Well, I'll be. Why aren't you up here? Good to see you. I had no idea you were here. You have some of your family here, too. You guys snuck in. Well, you cannot sneak in on a Sunday night, sorry. You know, you're kind of a little bit in the light, and so there's like an angelic-ness about you, but I didn't know. So, great to see you. Do you want to give us a little bit of an update? I'm going to be done here in a few minutes. Do you want to just come and give us a little bit of an update, or are you here just to not say anything or not Do anything would you be willing to do that? Man, I am so glad to see you. I'm so sorry I didn't recognize you at the beginning, but it's great to have you here all right, so Please Peter you remind me at the end because sometimes I pray and I say good night, and I go on all right But we want to make sure Bruce is able to give us an update here very good well All right, and you can correct anything I'm saying, you can correct when I'm done here this evening, all right? The goal of biblical fasting is to seek God. The result should be a refined and more solidified faith, and the reason is usually because of some need. So, fasting can be food, but it can also be what? Let's just throw out a few other things that it can be. It doesn't have to be food, it can be what? media. You know, I think, I had that one written down, that could be one that you say, okay, you know, now for most of us, like saying I'm not going to watch TV over the lunch hour on Wednesday isn't going to really matter. We don't do, most of us don't do that anyways. But you might say, hey, for a time, instead of not being part of media, being on media, teenagers who save video games, that I'm going to take that time, I'm going to spend a little bit of extra time praying, reading my Bible, media. What else? Anything else? We can fast from going to school. No, I'm just kidding. We've got to go back. We've got to go back to school. Anything else? fasting from maybe a hobby, maybe something that, you know, we tend to do all the time that maybe is a hobby. So it can be something other than food. However, most fasting is linked to food. Why is that? Why is most fasting linked to food? And I'm going to give you a reason that I think scripturally can be supported is because food and eating is something natural that God has given us. It's a God-given desire. Food is a good thing to be enjoyed, and it involves appetite. And when we fast, when we remove ourselves from something natural like that, it does tend to remind us and make us feel acutely what we desire in our lives. Now, let me give you a warning about fasting. I need to give a couple warnings about fasting. These are not medical warnings, although you could probably work those out yourself, okay? These are spiritual warnings. First of all, the Scripture warns about self-righteousness and fasting. 1 Timothy 4, Colossians 2, 1 Corinthians 8 all talk about the dangers associated with abstaining from something in the religious realm. There were very strong cautions about that given in the New Testament. Luke 18 expressly warns about self-righteousness. There was one guy who fasted twice a week. He even said, I fast twice a week, blah, blah, blah, blah. But the guy that was being honored was the guy who said, God, I am a sinner and I am in desperate need of your mercy. So the first warning about fasting is self-righteousness. Even that feeling that you have that, hey, man, I love food, I'm giving up food. You know what? I'm probably doing something that most of the people in the rest of the church aren't doing right now. Well, that's self-righteousness, and that's a natural feeling that can happen for this particular practice. And the second thing, which I think is a danger also, is what I would call a mercenary or meritorious attitude when it comes to fasting. Meaning, I am denying myself of this. God, you know how important food is. To me, I love food. So much, God. So therefore, because I'm denying myself of this meal, please grant my request. I can't possibly be praying and fasting for nothing. So I'm doing this for you, God. You do something for me. I would say more often than not, that's kind of the thought I have when I fast, even though I don't fast much. Okay, I'll just be honest with you about that. But, you know, I get myself up for it, and I'm praying, and it's so hard to pray. Your mind's going in so many different directions, and then you get to the dinner time or whatever time you're going to eat, and you feel so glad to have food again, and you think to yourself, Man, I really sacrificed a lot for God here in doing this. So God, are you going to answer my prayer? Prayer and fasting is not a mercenary type of thing where we do something and now God needs to do something for us. Let me have you turn to what is perhaps the most important passage in the New Testament on the subject of fasting, and it's in Matthew chapter 9. Matthew chapter 9. I'm going to read the passage in the New King James to straighten out some of the words, or modernize some of the words I should say. Matthew chapter 9 and verse 14 says, Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast? Now, you can almost hear the spirit in that. A little bit of that, maybe self-righteousness? Why are we doing it and you guys don't do it? We'd really like to be eating like the rest of you, kind of thing. Jesus said to them, he uses the illustration of a wedding. So I think that's the first thing of note. Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch pulls away from the garment, and the tear is made worse." And what's happening here is Jesus is saying, I'm instituting something new here in what he's giving the illustration of the wineskin. Verse 17, nor do they put new wine into old wineskins, or else the wineskins break, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. For they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved." Why is this important? Why is this text important? Well, fasting primarily in the Old Testament was from the perspective of mourning over something. That's what people were used to. So if Jesus said, hey, we need to fast, they would say, what happened? What went wrong? Who died? Okay? Fasting, Jesus now turns it around and says, we'll have a joyful anticipation about it. That's why he uses the illustration of the bridegroom, and in his illustration, he's the bridegroom, okay? He's the one who's coming to claim the bride of Christ. So fasting will now have a joyful yearning expectancy and it will be new in what he is stating to his disciples. Eagerly anticipating, the bridegroom's going to be taken away. So the disciples of John come and say, why are we fasting and you're not fasting? He says, well, when the bridegroom is here, you have a big party and nobody's fasting then. Well, I'm here, so nobody's fasting now. But when the bridegroom is taken away, then you will fast and it is for the joyful expectancy of the return of Christ. That's why I said earlier that our focus in fasting is on Christ. Now, the very fact that we have a difficult time in fasting, even concentrating in prayer, we have a difficult time concentrating in prayer without fasting. And then you add the lack of food or whatever it is on top of that, now we have an even more difficult time, exposes in us our frailty, our fragility, the work that's involved in prayer. to be able to fight, to have a steadied gaze upon God, looking at Christ to strengthen our faith. So I wouldn't take these as negative things, kind of like, oh man, I've got a headache and I'm having a hard time. No, just take that as a reminder of my humanity and of the need to fight through, to keep persevering until we have a steady gaze upon Christ. Which, by the way, may not happen in just one time of fasting. Okay? It's just not going to happen. And you know, you have a half-hour lunch break. That may not happen. But the steady, recurring—hopefully we'll add this as a part of our Christian lives, and God will help us with this. As we enter a time of prayer and fasting, here's what I would encourage you to do. I would encourage you to ask yourself if Psalm 63 resonates with your heart. I'm going to read Psalm 63 in the English Standard Version. Here's what it says. Oh God, you are my God. Earnestly I seek you. My soul thirsts for you. My flesh faints for you in a dry and weary land where there is no water." Now, think about that in terms of food. When we are thirsty, we yearn for water. When we are hungry, we long after food. That's being compared to our relationship with God. What I would encourage you to do in that half hour, I'm going to give some practical things in just a moment, when you have that half hour lunch break, and you're going to take that time, and you're not going to eat your lunch, but you've got your bottle of water there, you've got your open Bible, is to ask yourself the question, am I during this time yearning as much for God as I do for food. And I think many of us would have to say, no, I'm overpowered right now by thinking about even maybe the needs in my life. Maybe it's not even food, but just the needs in my life. Am I doing what Jesus encouraged the disciples to do, to yearn after the bridegroom, the joyful expectancy of seeing Christ again? Is my gaze steady on Christ? Do I hunger after him? So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and your glory, because your steadfast love is better than life. And we can substitute in there, your steadfast love is better than food. My lips will praise you, so I will bless you as long as I live. In your name, I will lift up my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food. and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips." Let me give you a couple quotes from the best book that I know about prayer and fasting. There are not too many of them out there, but the best book that I'm aware of on the subject of prayer and fasting is a book called A Hunger for God by John Piper. In the introduction of that book, there were two men that you've maybe read other books by, David Platt and Francis Chan, who wrote a foreword to a new edition of that book, and here's what they said. There is spiritual delight to be found in God that far supersedes the physical diet of this world, and fasting is the means by which we say to God, more than our stomachs want food, our souls want you. Here's another quote from that book from the author of the book. It is not the X-rated video, but the primetime dribble of triviality we drink in every night. For all the ill that Satan can do when God describes what keeps us from the banquet table of his love, it is a piece of land, a yoke of oxen, and a wife. Luke 14 verses 18 to 20. The greatest adversary of love to God is not his enemies, but his gifts. And the most deadly appetites are not for the poison of evil, but for the simple pleasures of earth. For when these replace an appetite for God himself, the idolatry is scarcely recognizable and almost incurable." What a powerful quote that is. Let me give you some practical suggestions. We're going to take, I'm encouraging you to take two lunch times, this Wednesday, following Wednesday. The reason I say Wednesday is because when we meet together on Wednesday night, we come to prayer, and it's just a nice time to get together. Not that you walk up and say, hey, I was fasting today. How about you? We don't talk about that. But we get together for prayer, and it's just a nice day to do that, all right? So I'm suggesting the next two Wednesdays at lunch. What do you do? Because if you've never done this before, you're probably going to be like, Okay, I'm here, what do I do? Okay, here's what you can do. Number one, you can read your Bible. You can begin by reading your Bible. Open your Bible up, read in a passage, and then pray through the passage that you have, and then I have a couple other suggestions of things to do here. Here's another thing that's okay. Now maybe you need somebody to say this is okay. Alright, I'm just a man, but I'm saying I think this is okay. Read a solid Christian book like the one I just mentioned. Now you can, there's probably not enough time to order the book on Amazon and get it here by Wednesday unless you have, what is it, Amazon Prime? You can probably do that. But you can get on DesiringGod.org a free PDF of that book. You go on there, you get a free PDF of the book, you can read through that book. It is a very, Very challenging book, okay? But read a Christian book that gets your heart warmed up. Because you're going from work and then all of a sudden, okay, I'm fasting, I've got to think about God. How do I do that? Read a good Christian book like the one I mentioned, Hunger for God. Consider getting together with someone else. If you're near someone, you can join someone. It's great when you can get together with someone else, you're both doing the same thing, and you can pray together. I think that's a wonderful thing if you can possibly do that. And then pray specifically about needs. pray specifically about needs. Here's three of them that I had listed for our church in 2015 as we begin. These are corporate needs. Number one, unity among believers. I think that God has done some wonderful things in 2014 in this area of unity among believers. But I think we've got more to go. I mean, we don't want to say, hey, we're unified, we're here. We want to continue to pray about unity among believers. John 17 is a wonderful passage to pray in connection with that one. Number two, personal discipleship relationships. praying for that, that as I've preached on that, we've talked about that, and we've reinforced that, that we could pray that deeper into our church. And then number three, financial growth and stability in 2015. I know it seems like kind of a mundane thing to pray about the finances, but who is going to pray about our finances? No, that's our responsibility to pray about our finances, and so I would encourage you to pray about that. as well. So for the next two Wednesdays at lunchtime, consider giving that time to be able to spend in prayer and fasting. Let me give you some points here from things I've read. We fast because we're hungry for God's Word and for God's Spirit in our lives. We fast because we long for God's glory to resound in the church and God's praise to resound among the nations. We fast because we yearn for God's son to return and God's kingdom to come. Ultimately, we fast simply because we want God more than we want anything else in this world has to offer. And so let me just give this corporate challenge to those of you who are here tonight. What would it be like for us as a church to begin this year by saying, by our words and by our actions, God, this year we want more of you. Okay? I'm going to pray and then I'm going to have Brother Bruce come up and share about the ministry that God's given him. Father, thank you for the time that we have to spend talking about fasting and praying, but we don't want to just talk about these things. We want to do them. We want to practice them. And so, Lord, would you help us to take and to notch further our understanding of you, our longing for you, and As we spend these Wednesdays in prayer and fasting over the lunch hour, would you draw us closer to you? Would you steady our faith? Would you steady our gaze upon Christ? We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.