The practice of fasting

 

Wesley's view of fasting

 

Odilon Massolar Chaves

  

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Copyright © 2024, Odilon Massolar Chaves

All rights reserved to the author.

Reproduction in whole or in part of the book is prohibited,

Article 184 of the Penal Code and Law 9610 of February 19, 1998.

Books published in the Wesleyan Library: 101

Address: https://bibliotecawesleyana.blogspot.com

Cover: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_siOJZ71JE

Translator: Google

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Odilon Massolar Chaves is a retired Methodist pastor, with a doctorate in Theology and History from the Methodist University of São Paulo.

His thesis dealt with the Methodist revival in England in the eighteenth century and its contribution as a paradigm for our days.

He was editor of the official Methodist newspaper and coordinator of the Theology Course.

He is a writer, poet and youtuber.

All glory be to the Lord

 

 

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Table of Contents

 

 

·       Introduction

·       Its meaning                        

·       The time of fasting

·       The reasons for fasting

·       The fast acceptable to the Lord

·       The Importance of Humility and Prayer

 

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Introduction

 

 

        "The practice of Fasting" according to Wesley's vision is a necessary book for our day.

          The great truth is that we do not value fasting as the People of God did in the Old Testament and the Early Church.

        With this we are losing the great opportunity to obtain great blessings for ourselves, because the answers that the Lord gave to His people when they humbly cried out after fasting are undeniable.

        When someone decides to fast, they often end up not practicing a fast acceptable to the Lord, precisely because of the lack of guidance from the Church.

        For this reason we have made an abridgment, with additions, to John Wesley's sermon on fasting, and published it in this booklet.

           This sermon is found in the book Wesley's Sermons, volume II, between pages 17 and 36. Everything that is in quotation marks means Wesley's word.

        We have tried to put several verses in this booklet to perceive more clearly the common practice of fasting and the seriousness with which the People of God exercised it.

        There are churches today that have the weekly practice of fasting and cry out to the Lord for so-called impossible causes. Others have an almost daily practice.

        We must take the practice of fasting seriously by checking the biblical guidance to avoid errors and exaggerations.

        I know people who have had problems because of exaggerations, as well as I know people who have fasted according to biblical guidance and have been blessed.

        For this and other reasons, we must take the practice of fasting seriously.

        In the last chapter we make some observations and give guidance on the true purpose of fasting.

 

The Author

 

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Its meaning

 

        Fasting is something simple. The Bible writers "give the word fast the unique meaning of not eating, abstaining from food...". It is not eating for a certain time".

        Its meaning is "to afflict the soul" In Psalm 35:13 David says: "My garments were of sackcloth; I afflicted my soul with fasting, and in prayer I reclined on my breast."

          The Lord also spoke to Moses, "But the tenth day of this seventh month shall be the day of atonement: ye shall have an holy convocation, and ye shall afflict your souls; you will bring an offering made by fire to the Lord" (Lev 23:27).

        We also see that in the Old Testament there were some other practices when fasting: "On the twenty-fourth day of this month the children of Israel were gathered together with fasting and sackcloth, and they brought earth on them" (Nehemiah 9:1).

        Some put ashes on their heads, others stopped wearing necklaces and new, beautiful clothes. They tried to give a sad and humble appearance. In the New Testament we do not see these concerns. We see a normal fast in Paul (2 Corinthians 6:5; 11:27), in the Early Church (Acts 13:2; 14:23), and in Jesus' recommendations: "When you fast, do not be grieved like the hypocrites; for they disfigure their faces in order to make it appear to men that they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have already received their reward. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that it will not appear to men that you are fasting, but to your Father in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you" (Matthew 6:16-18).

        David grieved fasting to save his son (2 Sam 12:16-18). Then, when he saw that the child had died, he "rose from the ground, washed, anointed himself, changed his garments, went into the house of the Lord, and worshipped: then he came to his house, and asked for bread; they set it before him, and he ate" (2 Sam 12:20).

        Others were even concerned about hurting, afflicting the body. Wesley says that "such discipline would only go well with the priests and worshippers of Baal."

          He further says: "The heathen gods were but devils: it was certainly pleasing to their satanic god that the priests (1 Kings 18:28) shouted with a clamor and wounded themselves until their own blood covered them." According to Wesley, this cannot be acceptable to the Lord who came not to destroy but to save.

        But what is the reason for afflicting the soul?

        Now the soul is made up of feelings, intellect, and will. Even after the new birth there is still in us the evil nature, which needs to be transformed. It fights against the Spirit and prevents God's action in our lives.

           When we have a tendency to vanity, envy, jealousy, pride, anger, backbiting, etc., it means that the soul is opposing the Spirit and our spirit. We need, therefore, to humble ourselves. One of the ways we humble ourselves is by fasting. With it you are trying to depend solely on God and not on your ability. You are asking the Lord for forgiveness and crying out for his mercy.

        It is important to note that drinking water does not break the fast. Fasting is giving up eating food. When Jesus fasted for forty days, the text says, "And after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was hungry" (Matthew 4:2). And of David, after fasting, the text says that he "came to his house and asked for bread" (1 Sam. 12:20). This means that they drank water during their fast.

 

The time of fasting

 

 

        After all, how long should we fast?

        The Bible speaks of several types of fasting. The rarest is forty days. These were exceptional cases. Moses, Elijah, and Jesus were fasting for forty days. They were people who were used immensely by God and had a special ministry.

        The duration of the fast that the Bible comments on the most is one day: "... on the day of fasting" (Jeremiah 36:6); “... he fasted the night, and did not allow instruments of music to be brought before him" (Dan 6:18), etc.

        Another practice of fasting is until three o'clock in the afternoon. It was practiced weekly, on Wednesday and Friday, throughout the year. It was a common practice of the Jews (Luke 18:12) and later in the Christian Church. They didn't eat anything and stayed in the service until 3 pm.

        Another way to fast is through abstinence, which is practiced due to physical illness or weakness. In this case, the person eats little or stops eating certain foods.

          Wesley says, "There is no passage in Scripture alluding to such a practice, but I cannot condemn it, since Scripture does not." According to him, this fast has its usefulness and undoubtedly receives God's blessing.

        Wesley says that the simplest practice of fasting is abstinence from pleasant delicacies: "Daniel firmly resolved not to defile himself with the king's fine delicacies, nor with the wine which he drank..." (Dan 1:8). Daniel asked, "I pray you, your servants ten days; and that we should be given vegetables to eat and water to drink" (Dan 1:12).

        The Jews also had established fasts: of the seventh month (Lev 23:27); fourth, fifth, and tenth month (Zechariah 8:19). In contrast to other fasting practices, the Lord says of these, "... it shall be for the house of Judah rejoicing, gladness, and solemn festivities; love therefore truth and peace" (Zechariah 8:19).

        In the Christian Church there were established fasts, both annual and weekly. There was, says Weslley, one that preceded the Passover. It was kept by some for forty-eight hours, by others for the whole week, by many for two weeks. They did not eat until dusk.

        The early Christian Church also practiced the fasts of the fourth and sixth day of the week. It was an undeniable fact.

        There are also occasional fasts. They were observed from time to time, according to circumstances and opportunities: "After this, the children of Moab and the children of Ammon, with some of the Ammonites, came to battle against Jehoshaphat ... Then Jehoshaphat was afraid, and set out to seek the Lord; and he proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah" (2 Chronicles 20:1-3). Faced with opposition from Babylon, King Jehoiakim preached a fast before the Lord to all the people who came from the cities of Judah and Jerusalem (Jeremiah 36:9).

 

The reasons for fasting

 

        Wesley also talks about the fundamentals of fasting. He talks about at least five reasons:

        1 - "To him who is under deep affliction, overwhelmed by the sorrow of sin and the most alarming expectation of the wrath of God."

        Saul fasted for a whole day and still did something wrong by consulting the medium. Then the text says: "... strength was lacking, because he had not eaten bread all that day and all that night" (1 Sam 28:20).

           During the shipwreck of the ship in which Paul led them: "Paul begged all to eat, saying, 'Today is the fourteenth day, when you are waiting and you are without food, having tasted nothing. I beseech you to eat something; for your safety depends on it; for none of you will lose a hair. And when he had said this, he took a loaf of bread, and thanked God in the presence of all, and when he had broken it, he began to eat" (Acts 27:33-35).

        During this kind of fasting, says Wesley, people "tremble, waver, are inwardly touched with brokenness of heart, and can accuse none but themselves: they discover their grief before the Almighty God, and ask Him for mercy." 

        2 - "To supply the food of lust and sensuality, to ward off incitement to mad and dangerous desires, base and futile affections."

        This fast is for people who have been led to the practice of sin: abuse of unlawful things; overeating; lack of temperance and sobriety; mad excitement of the intellect and inattention to things of the deepest reach.

        Those who have had these practices seek to deprive themselves of what leads them to perdition.

        3 - "For a pious vengeance on himself"

        This fast is for the one who realizes that the flesh is taking over in his life. You realize that they are always doing something wrong. So, he seeks revenge on the soul with fasts. It afflicts the soul, it punishes the soul.

           Wesley remembers that David and Paul acted like this at a certain point in their lives. But Wesley also says that we should not attach too much importance to this fast.

        4 - "The most powerful reason for the observance of fasting is that it was an aid to prayer."

        God rejoices to raise the souls of his male and female servants above all things on earth, and sometimes to the third heaven.

        This fasting, says Wesley, confirms and increases the "earnestness of the spirit; penetration, sensitivity and delicacy of conscience; indifference to the world and, consequently, the love of God."

        Wesley also says that God has chosen fasting so that by this means the wrath of God may be withdrawn and thus we may obtain blessings.

        Wesley cites several examples of blessings that came after fasting: Ahab humbled himself and the Lord did not bring evil into his days (1 Kings 21:25-29); it was for this purpose that Daniel fasted to soften God's wrath and receive His blessings (Dan. 9:3-16).

           The same happened with the king of Nineveh: "The Ninevites believed in God; and they proclaimed a fast, and clothed themselves in sackcloth, from the greatest to the least" (Jon 3:5).

        Wesley says that "fasting is a means, not only of appeasing the wrath of God, but of attracting also any blessing we need."

        He quotes God's people fighting Benjamin: "... they came to Bethel, and wept, and stood there before the Lord, and fasted that day until evening; and before the Lord they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings" (Judges 20:26).

        The People of God were involved with idols, so even the ark of the Lord had been stolen. They came to their senses and "fasted that day, and there they said, 'We have sinned against the Lord'" (1 Sam. 7:6). They were victorious (1 Sam. 7:10).

        Ezra proclaimed "a fast by the river Ahava, to humble ourselves before our God, to ask for a happy journey for ourselves... (Ezra 8:21).

        The early church fasted for the choice of the apostles (Acts 13:1-3). Jesus goes so far as to say that: "This kind of demons does not cast itself out except by force of prayer and fasting" (Mt 18:19-20).

        Wesley completes by saying that not only temporal blessings come through fasting, but also the great gospel promise of the outpouring of the Spirit.

 

 

The fast acceptable to the Lord

 

 

        After all, is all fasting accepted by God?

        Of course not!

        On one occasion, the Israelites asked the priests, "Will we continue to weep with fasting in the fifth month, as we have done for so many years?" (Zechariah 7:3).

        The Lord said, "When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month during these seventy years, was it for me that ye fasted, as an effect for me?" (Zechariah 7:5).

        After all, then, what is the fast acceptable to the Lord?

        Wesley puts at least four practices:

        1 - "Let it be practiced in the presence of God, with our simple eyes fixed on it. Let it be our intention, alone, to glorify our Father who is in heaven..."

        Nothing to please men and women. Nor should we suppose that we deserve anything because of fasting. "Fasting is only a way which God has ordained, in which we hope in His undeserved mercy, and in which, without any merit on our part, He has freely promised to give us His blessing."

        Therefore, in fasting we must express our sin; to hope for an increase of purifying grace; add earnestness and fervor to prayers.

        From a fast practiced in this way, the Lord is pleased

        2 - We must seek to afflict our soul and not our body.

        A simple external act does not please God, because we will be afflicting the body and not the soul, which needs to be humbled, molded, restored.

        Wesley says that we must be careful with the health of our bodies: "We must be very careful, every time we fast, to keep the proportion between abstinence and physical resistance. We cannot offer God suicide, nor can we destroy the body for the aid of the soul."

           He adds: "If we cannot abstain entirely from food, we can at least abstain from delicate delicacies. . . ."

        In every fast we must exercise the life of godliness, which implies a contrite and humble heart, which produces repentance and leads to change of life.

        3 - "Let us join fasting, at all times, our fervent prayers, pouring out our whole soul before God (...). This is the time to extend our prayers, for our own benefit and for the good of our brothers."

        Prayer and fasting must go together, as in apostolic times.

        It makes no sense, therefore, for a person to just stop eating. It is necessary that she has moments of prayer, crying out to the Lord for the transformation of her life and for the blessing so desired.       

        4 - "It only remains, so that our observance of such a fast is acceptable to the Lord, that we add to it alms, works of mercy, according to our means, both for the benefit of the body and for the benefit of the soul of our neighbor."

        Wesley says that with such sacrifices God is also pleased. Thus the angel declared to Cornelius: "Thy prayers and thy alms have gone up to remembrance before God" (Acts 10:4).

        In the question asked at the beginning of this chapter, in the book of Zechariah, if the Israelites should continue fasting, because seventy years ago they had done so and nothing happened, the Lord still said to them: "Execute true judgment, show kindness and mercy each one to his brother; do not oppress the widow, or the fatherless, or the stranger, or the poor, nor devise evil in his heart against his neighbor" (Zechariah 7:9-10).

        The Lord concludes and answers why He did not attend the fasts: "Because I cried and they did not listen to me, they also cried and I did not hear them ... (Zechariah 7:12).

        Wesley quotes Isaiah, who speaks of true fasting: Break your bread with the hungry, and bring into your house the poor and pilgrims; when you see the naked, cover it..." (Isaiah 58:7).

        When we fast and do acts of love, "then shall thy light break forth as the dawn, thy healing shall spring forth without restraint, thy righteousness shall go before thee, and the glory of the Lord shall be thy rear; then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer thee... (Isaiah 58:8-9).

        Isaiah concludes, "... and you will be like a watered garden, and like a fountain of waters, whose waters will never fail" (Isaiah 58:11). 

 

The Importance of Humility and Prayer 

 

        It is important to note that in the Old Testament there was a practice of fasting in which not only the people stopped eating, but also drinking: "... fast for me, and do not eat or drink for three days" (Esther 4:16). This does not mean a biblical recommendation.

        There were also fasts that were practiced that brought an unfavorable reaction from the Lord. Jezebel, for example, proclaimed a fast and ordered Naboth to be stoned (1 Kings 21:8-10). And Ahab still took his inheritance. That is why the Lord wanted to send evil into Ahab's life (1 Kings 21:19).

        Seeing his situation, Ahab "tore his clothes, covered his body with sackcloth, and fasted; he slept in sackcloth, and walked with his head bowed" (1 Kings 21:27). Because he had humbled himself, the Lord delivered him: "... since he humbles himself before me, I will not bring this evil in his days..." (1 Kings 21:29).

        Here, then, comes a very important issue: there is no fast offering to the Lord. The Bible speaks of various offerings: "freewill offerings" (Deuteronomy 16:10); "he presented peace offerings" (1 Kings 3:15); "meat offerings" (Psalm 20:3); Christ offered himself (Ephesians 5:2); Sacrifices and offerings (Hebrews 10:10). It does not say offering fasting.

          Fasting is a means and not an end.

        The Bible also says about offering burnt offerings (Gen. 22:2) and sacrifices (Gen. 46:1), but it does not say about offering fasting. Fasting helps. God looks at the heart.

        Fasting is always to lead us to humility, repentance. With humble hearts we cry out to the Lord and He answers us, according to His good pleasure. It was like that in Nineveh. They believed, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth (Jon 3:5).

         The king, seeing and knowing the situation, took off his royal robes and covered himself with sackcloth and sat down on ashes (1 Kings 3:6). He also ordered that no one, including animals, should taste anything or even drink water (Jon 3:7). All were covered with sackcloth. The text also says: "... they will cry out strongly to God; and they shall turn every man from his evil way, and from the violence that is in his hands" (Jon 3:8).

        The purpose of it all was: "Who knows whether God will return and repent and depart from the fierceness of his anger, so that we do not perish? (Jon 3:9). And it really happened: "God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way: and God repented of the evil which he had said he would do them, and did not do it" (Jon 3:10).

        When Ezra directed the people to fast, the goal was "... a fast by the river Ahava, to humble ourselves before our God, to ask him for a happy journey for us..." (Ezra 8:21).

        It is evident that when we fast we also cry out to the Lord for some blessing. But fasting is a means for us to humbly reach the Lord and thus be blessed.

        Therefore the Lord said to Solomon, "... if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves, and pray, and seek me, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sins, and will heal their land" (2 Chronicles 7:14).

        Of course, we fast for the Lord (Zech. 7:5).

        When we spoke in the preceding chapter of acceptable fasting, we made it clear that it is to be practiced in the presence of God; it is to afflict the soul; it must be practiced with fervent prayers and with works of love and mercy. Thus, we fast thinking only of the Lord.

        Fasting should bear fruit in us: repentance, humility, dependence on the Lord. With a broken heart, the Lord is much more likely to bless us. See that on every occasion the Lord looked for humility and change of life.

        If you have a goal in life, then fast. But know that God will look at your heart and your faith.

        When we fast we are saying "no" to carnal tendencies, which prevent the flow of the Spirit and the action of God. We are declaring that the stomach is not our God. We are accepting something simple, crazy to the world, as having come from God. Yes, when we fast and pray, we release spiritual power. Therefore, fasting must be specific, it must have a goal. The Lord will not fail to answer us at the right time of His wonderful will. Fasting strengthens the spirit.

        Fasting that has an end in itself turns out to be the practice of a work. And Paul has already guided us by saying "... not of works, lest any man should boast" (Ephesians 2:9).

        Therefore, we must fast recognizing that we need God, that we trust in His great love.

        The Israelites once asked the Lord, "Why do we fast, and You do not take heed of it? Why do we afflict our souls, and You do not take it into account?" (Isaiah 58:3).

        Notice that here we are not talking about a fast offering, but about the reason why they fast and the Lord does not take into account the affliction of the soul and the prayers.

        The Lord answered, "Behold, ye fast unto contention and strife, and to smite with a wicked fist; fasting as today your voice will not be heard from on high" (Isaiah 58:4). It was not the fast that the Lord would accept, but would or would not listen to the prayers offered in fasting.

        Immediately afterwards the Lord spoke of the need for them to practice a fast that would reveal acts of love, mercy and justice (Isaiah 57:6-7).