Fasting
Mark 2:18-23
You may want something to change in our world today. One of the best ways to hear from God and see God move is when we choose to fast. Voluntary abstaining from food or technology can express repentance in preparation for an act of deliverance.
The question of fasting in Mark does not come in isolation. Jesus’ proximity to others who were socially unclean caused the religious to pay more attention to Jesus. Mark presents the encounter with John’s disciples as another group who had been told and shown (by John) that Jesus was the promised Messiah. The escalation is clear with a look toward Mark 2:23-3:6. What is the standard? Clearly, Jesus was willing to spend time with others whom the religious distanced themselves from. Jesus would also challenge a normal religious practice, which is only mandatory on the Day of Atonement (see Leviticus 16:29-31)? Both the disciples of John and Pharisees ask Jesus about fasting.
Fasting was used as a time of preparation for oneself and expectation for God’s activity. However, we have seen Jesus say “the time is fulfilled” back in Mark 1:14. Therefore, now was not the time for fasting. The time of preparation was over. God was active through the presence of Jesus. So Jesus avoids the trap by staying consistent with his message.
William Lane puts it this way, “That is why maintaining what is old (fasting as an expression of repentance in preparation for the judgment to come) represents a misunderstanding and a basic ignorance that the time of salvation has already come with Jesus. The Pharisaic practice of fasting perpetuated the old in an unbelieving mechanical fashion blind to the new moment which God had introduced” (The Gospel of Mark, 113). The images of the wedding, the new cloth, and the new wine depict an image of what is happening in Jesus. Would the people of the day continue to live by their standards or join in with Jesus? Jesus is neither an ascetic nor anarchist.
The lingering question that may remain for the Christian today: Should we fast?
The simple answer is yes. Now to elaborate on why Christians should periodically fast today. Jesus’s response wasn’t that his followers would never fast, but they weren’t going to fast while he was present with them. We can and should fast while Jesus is away in heaven and we await his return. “Christian fasting,” wrote John Piper, “at its root, is the hunger of a homesickness for God.”
Until the Bridegroom (Jesus) returns for His bride, He knows how yearnings for Him will incline our hearts, with the result that we “will fast.” “Without a clear biblical purpose, fasting becomes an end in itself. Every hunger pang only makes you calculate the time remaining until you can eat. Although the physical discomfort is unpleasant—perhaps even painful—it is important to feel some degree of hunger during your fast. Your hunger helps you, serving as a continual reminder of your spiritual purpose” ( Donald Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines, 216).
Fasting challenges us to move away from our cultural standards in pursuit of living the way of Jesus. Fasts help us remember the eternal when we are consumed by the temporal. All fasts are primarily about God. On each occasion, seeking God in the fast should be more important to us than what we seek from God through the fast. It’s not about what we hope to get from God, but reminding that a connection with God will sustain us when we cannot sustain ourselves.
A quick guide to fasting:
- Set a time. Start small.
- Pick a reason.
- Growth of the church
- Repentance for personal sin
- Protection and guidance for another
- Growth in hearing the Holy Spirit
- Choose what you will abstain from
- Food
- Technology
- Start the fast.
- Pray every moment you have a longing.
- End the fast.