Fasting In A Fast-food World
Sermon
A 'NEW AND IMPROVED' JESUS?
Sermons For Lent And Easter
If I told you that I have a sure-fire, effortless plan whereby you can lose 25 pounds, with no exercise, and no money, would I have your attention? I thought so. You can't pick up a Woman's Day magazine, Good Housekeeping, McCalls, Red-book, Ladies' Home Journal, Cosmopolitan, Reader's Digest, or even the National Enquirer without finding at least one article on how to lose weight. It's a multi-million dollar business in America.
And, if you are overweight, you probably need to lose some fat to be more healthy. It's never easy, it takes a powerful lot of willpower and determination, it costs in effort, exercise, and dollars. Constantly we are urged to diet: diet to lose weight, diet to look better, diet to aid digestion, diet to build muscle, diet to control cholesterol, diet to lower blood pressure, diet to avoid heart attack. Sometimes the word that is used is not this ugly word "diet," but an even uglier one; "fasting."
A "healthy fast" is fine, but Ash Wednesday's text calls for a "holy fast." Fasting for the six weeks of Lent may, or may not, result in weight loss, but I can guarantee you it can result in a real gain of spiritual depth if properly followed.
I know this is asking a lot. We might be willing, even if it is difficult, to go on a "healthy fast" for the body, but would you even consider a "holy fast" for the soul?
Declare A Holy Fast
Our text is written in the Old Testament book of Joel. The prophet is calling the nation and people to repentance because the Day of the Lord is near. It is an appropriate message for this Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Lent comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word "to lengthen." It is nearing springtime and the days are getting longer as spring appears. But, for the Christian, for the church, Lent signals that party time is over, Mardi Gras is past, and now a whole new mood prevails. Once more we begin our annual, six-week pilgrimage to Good Friday's cross. We instinctively draw back, for words like repentance, fasting, discipline, and denial are hard words. But if we try to take shortcuts on the journey, or avoid responding to the call, we will never fully participate in the gladness and glory of Easter Day.
First, we hear the call of God, through the prophet Joel, to repent: repent of our sins, repent of our selfishness, repent of our thoughtlessness, repent of our neglect of the Word, repent of our failure to pray, repent of our neglect of God, repent of our failure to live up to the highest and best that we know. Oh, yes, we really need to repent! Only someone hopelessly hardened could say there was no need for us to repent.
One of the ways we give evidence of our true repentance is by fasting (Joel 2:12, 15). Weeping and fasting are outward signs of our genuine sorrow for sin. This "holy fasting" is to be an external expression in denying ourselves, and it is also to include a fasting and mourning of the heart. Until the heart is reached, every other act is just a meaningless formality and cold ritual. Our spiritual renewal must go far beyond just our outward activity, but at least it does begin there.
Fasting was a common practice in times of calamity and was intended to express the humility of the worshiper before the judgment of God. But "holy fasting" is not as popular as it once was. Our Catholic friends are no longer required by church ordinance to fast from meat on Fridays and during Lent. Protestants speak ever so piously in excusing themselves from fasting. They say, "Let's not take something from ourselves, let's add to our disciplines for Lent. Let's add more Bible reading, more prayer, more good deeds. That's far better than denying oneself."
These words sound good, and it's true that adding to our spiritual activities is worthy, and should be encouraged; but in reality this is usually a cop-out, a nice way to avoid "holy fasting." There is something in us humans that we don't like or want to deny the self anything it desires. Andrew Murray reminded us: "We have within us a self that has its poison from Satan - from hell - and yet we cherish and nourish it. What do we not do to please self and nourish self? We make the devil within us strong. Look at your own life. What are the works of hell? They are chiefly these three: self-will, self-trust, and self-exaltation."
Strange, isn't it, that religious fasting is so difficult for us? We all know of persons who for certain causes and political purposes have fasted. Prisoners in jail have often gone on strenuous fasts to obtain better living conditions. We will remember seeing vividly portrayed on television (May 1989) the 300 students falling in the streets of Beijing, China, as they fasted for political power and freedom.
And as we fast for health: we give up something if it reduces cholesterol, lets us live longer, or pleases us when we look in the mirror. But would we fast for God? Isn't that asking too much of a fast-food generation, a people that not only wants what we want to eat, but wants it now!
The fact is, it is very hard to have a "holy fast," to do it for God and for God alone. We'd much rather indulge ourselves. That's why gluttony is a deadly sin. The early desert fathers believed that a person's appetites are linked: full stomachs and jaded palates take the edge from our hunger and thirst for God. They spoil the appetite for righteousness. God grant that we may "hunger and thirst after righteousness" during these purple days of Lent, and rejoice in the privilege of a "holy fast" for Christ.
Center On God
If we are to engage in a "holy fast" during Lent, we need to remember that fasting must forever center on God, and God alone. If our fasting is not unto God, we have utterly failed. Our motives for fasting must never be for health benefits, for success in getting our prayers answered, for gaining new power. There is no motive high or holy enough to replace the desire for God as the center of our fasting.
John Wesley said, "Let fasting be done unto the Lord with our eye singly fixed on him. Let our intentions herein be this, and this alone, to glorify our Father which is in heaven."
So quickly, in our spiritual journey, do we find our motives mixed and our priorities confused. When My Fair Lady was having its long run on Broadway, a couple from Atlanta planned their whole vacation around the availability of tickets for a matinee performance. It was something like eight months in advance they had to secure their tickets.
They went to New York City on the proper weekend. They got to the theater in plenty of time, found their seats - they were good seats in the fourth row in the center section - took their seats, and settled down to enjoy the play. Every seat in the theater was filled except the seat to the left of the man. The curtain rose, and still no one had taken the seat. At intermission, he turned to the woman on the opposite side of the empty seat and said, "This is amazing! We had to buy our tickets eight months in advance, and we get here and find an empty seat."
She said, "Well, that seat belongs to me, too. It was my husband's seat. He died." The man replied, "I'm terribly sorry. But couldn't you have invited a friend to come with you?" She answered, "No, they were all at the funeral."
So it is, one of the first things to happen when we try to center on God is that our priorities are found to be topsy-turvy. Our motives are mixed. One sure thing; as soon as you begin a "holy fast" you quickly learn what controls you. We often cover up what is inside us, hide it even from ourselves. But if pride or temper or jealousy or pettiness are inside, they quickly surface when you start to fast. Begin to fast and immediately you are tempted to call attention to your "deep spirituality" of fasting (like the Pharisees Jesus told about), and our pride erupts. Begin to fast, get hungry, and you get mean! Begin to fast, and our prevailing sins quickly rise up to expose themselves.
Jesus told us not to call attention to ourselves when we fast. The Pharisees did that, and the only reward they received were pious words of self-commendation they heard from their own self-praising lips.
Experiences Of "Holy Fasting"
Over the years, so many beautiful and wonderful things have transpired in the lives of those who have opted for self-denial during Lent, and have engaged in some kind of "holy fast."
As a pastor, I encouraged my congregation to a "holy fast." They could give up whatever they chose for the six weeks of Lent, and seek to know Christ himself in richer ways during the discipline. One little five-year-old girl, Annette, heard my sermon on fasting. Annette's favorite food was Pop-tarts, a fruit-filled goodie that she had learned to pop into the toaster for herself. As she left the church that Sunday morning, before Lent began the following Ash Wednesday, she looked up at me and said, "I'm going to give up Pop-tarts for Jesus for Lent and my mommy is going to give up potato chips. She loves them better than anything!" Her mother, Judy, gasped in surprise. She didn't even know the child was listening to the sermon. And it was true, potato chips were her favorite food! So, in the face of her daughter's commitment to give up Pop-tarts, Judy knew she had no choice; it would be six long weeks before she could taste another potato chip!
One man, in the same church, gave up smoking his pipe for six weeks, and never took it up again. One woman gave up crossword puzzles and used that hour a day for more Bible study and prayer. Another woman gave up her soap operas on television and used the time to pray. One gave up gossiping at the office and said she never felt so "clean" since she quit running through the daily garbage of other people's lives. And some gave up one food or another, some gave up certain meals - but it was a great joy, as their pastor, to see how the external actions began to penetrate their hearts, their spirits, and their lives. Changes began to take place in the church, in the families, and in the spirit of the congregation. A "holy fast" is a penetrating energy, and it gives new life and strength to all it touches where Christ is made the aim and center of it all.
My spouse and I find, personally, that Lent is the richest time of the entire church year for us. Our "holy fast" of six weeks may mean we fast on our "indispensable" coffee, on desserts and sweets, or maybe it is breakfast, or we fast on lunch. But the important truth is that the journey - the journey of repentance, of self-denial, the "holy fasting" - make the path to the cross inexpressibly sweet and unbelievably rewarding.
The fact is, whatever we "give up" is infinitesimally small when compared to the magnitude of the Savior's sacrifice on the cross-tree, but still it does in a tiny way let us experience some of his suffering, too.
An American businessman went to Oberammergau to see the famous Passion Play. He went backstage to meet Anton Lang, who then played the part of Christ. Noticing, in the corner, the great cross which Mr. Lang carried in the play, the tourist stooped to lift it to his shoulder, but he couldn't move it even one inch off the floor. It was made of heavy iron-oak beams. Amazed, the man turned to Lang and said, "I thought it would be light, hollow. Why do you carry a cross that is so terribly heavy?" Anton Lang replied softly, "Sir, if I did not feel the weight of the cross, I could not play his part."
True, you and I will never know the agonizing pain nor the tremendous load of the Christ-Cross, but a "holy fast" will keep us reminded of the direction we are headed and that his cost was far, far more than ours!
And, if you are overweight, you probably need to lose some fat to be more healthy. It's never easy, it takes a powerful lot of willpower and determination, it costs in effort, exercise, and dollars. Constantly we are urged to diet: diet to lose weight, diet to look better, diet to aid digestion, diet to build muscle, diet to control cholesterol, diet to lower blood pressure, diet to avoid heart attack. Sometimes the word that is used is not this ugly word "diet," but an even uglier one; "fasting."
A "healthy fast" is fine, but Ash Wednesday's text calls for a "holy fast." Fasting for the six weeks of Lent may, or may not, result in weight loss, but I can guarantee you it can result in a real gain of spiritual depth if properly followed.
I know this is asking a lot. We might be willing, even if it is difficult, to go on a "healthy fast" for the body, but would you even consider a "holy fast" for the soul?
Declare A Holy Fast
Our text is written in the Old Testament book of Joel. The prophet is calling the nation and people to repentance because the Day of the Lord is near. It is an appropriate message for this Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Lent comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word "to lengthen." It is nearing springtime and the days are getting longer as spring appears. But, for the Christian, for the church, Lent signals that party time is over, Mardi Gras is past, and now a whole new mood prevails. Once more we begin our annual, six-week pilgrimage to Good Friday's cross. We instinctively draw back, for words like repentance, fasting, discipline, and denial are hard words. But if we try to take shortcuts on the journey, or avoid responding to the call, we will never fully participate in the gladness and glory of Easter Day.
First, we hear the call of God, through the prophet Joel, to repent: repent of our sins, repent of our selfishness, repent of our thoughtlessness, repent of our neglect of the Word, repent of our failure to pray, repent of our neglect of God, repent of our failure to live up to the highest and best that we know. Oh, yes, we really need to repent! Only someone hopelessly hardened could say there was no need for us to repent.
One of the ways we give evidence of our true repentance is by fasting (Joel 2:12, 15). Weeping and fasting are outward signs of our genuine sorrow for sin. This "holy fasting" is to be an external expression in denying ourselves, and it is also to include a fasting and mourning of the heart. Until the heart is reached, every other act is just a meaningless formality and cold ritual. Our spiritual renewal must go far beyond just our outward activity, but at least it does begin there.
Fasting was a common practice in times of calamity and was intended to express the humility of the worshiper before the judgment of God. But "holy fasting" is not as popular as it once was. Our Catholic friends are no longer required by church ordinance to fast from meat on Fridays and during Lent. Protestants speak ever so piously in excusing themselves from fasting. They say, "Let's not take something from ourselves, let's add to our disciplines for Lent. Let's add more Bible reading, more prayer, more good deeds. That's far better than denying oneself."
These words sound good, and it's true that adding to our spiritual activities is worthy, and should be encouraged; but in reality this is usually a cop-out, a nice way to avoid "holy fasting." There is something in us humans that we don't like or want to deny the self anything it desires. Andrew Murray reminded us: "We have within us a self that has its poison from Satan - from hell - and yet we cherish and nourish it. What do we not do to please self and nourish self? We make the devil within us strong. Look at your own life. What are the works of hell? They are chiefly these three: self-will, self-trust, and self-exaltation."
Strange, isn't it, that religious fasting is so difficult for us? We all know of persons who for certain causes and political purposes have fasted. Prisoners in jail have often gone on strenuous fasts to obtain better living conditions. We will remember seeing vividly portrayed on television (May 1989) the 300 students falling in the streets of Beijing, China, as they fasted for political power and freedom.
And as we fast for health: we give up something if it reduces cholesterol, lets us live longer, or pleases us when we look in the mirror. But would we fast for God? Isn't that asking too much of a fast-food generation, a people that not only wants what we want to eat, but wants it now!
The fact is, it is very hard to have a "holy fast," to do it for God and for God alone. We'd much rather indulge ourselves. That's why gluttony is a deadly sin. The early desert fathers believed that a person's appetites are linked: full stomachs and jaded palates take the edge from our hunger and thirst for God. They spoil the appetite for righteousness. God grant that we may "hunger and thirst after righteousness" during these purple days of Lent, and rejoice in the privilege of a "holy fast" for Christ.
Center On God
If we are to engage in a "holy fast" during Lent, we need to remember that fasting must forever center on God, and God alone. If our fasting is not unto God, we have utterly failed. Our motives for fasting must never be for health benefits, for success in getting our prayers answered, for gaining new power. There is no motive high or holy enough to replace the desire for God as the center of our fasting.
John Wesley said, "Let fasting be done unto the Lord with our eye singly fixed on him. Let our intentions herein be this, and this alone, to glorify our Father which is in heaven."
So quickly, in our spiritual journey, do we find our motives mixed and our priorities confused. When My Fair Lady was having its long run on Broadway, a couple from Atlanta planned their whole vacation around the availability of tickets for a matinee performance. It was something like eight months in advance they had to secure their tickets.
They went to New York City on the proper weekend. They got to the theater in plenty of time, found their seats - they were good seats in the fourth row in the center section - took their seats, and settled down to enjoy the play. Every seat in the theater was filled except the seat to the left of the man. The curtain rose, and still no one had taken the seat. At intermission, he turned to the woman on the opposite side of the empty seat and said, "This is amazing! We had to buy our tickets eight months in advance, and we get here and find an empty seat."
She said, "Well, that seat belongs to me, too. It was my husband's seat. He died." The man replied, "I'm terribly sorry. But couldn't you have invited a friend to come with you?" She answered, "No, they were all at the funeral."
So it is, one of the first things to happen when we try to center on God is that our priorities are found to be topsy-turvy. Our motives are mixed. One sure thing; as soon as you begin a "holy fast" you quickly learn what controls you. We often cover up what is inside us, hide it even from ourselves. But if pride or temper or jealousy or pettiness are inside, they quickly surface when you start to fast. Begin to fast and immediately you are tempted to call attention to your "deep spirituality" of fasting (like the Pharisees Jesus told about), and our pride erupts. Begin to fast, get hungry, and you get mean! Begin to fast, and our prevailing sins quickly rise up to expose themselves.
Jesus told us not to call attention to ourselves when we fast. The Pharisees did that, and the only reward they received were pious words of self-commendation they heard from their own self-praising lips.
Experiences Of "Holy Fasting"
Over the years, so many beautiful and wonderful things have transpired in the lives of those who have opted for self-denial during Lent, and have engaged in some kind of "holy fast."
As a pastor, I encouraged my congregation to a "holy fast." They could give up whatever they chose for the six weeks of Lent, and seek to know Christ himself in richer ways during the discipline. One little five-year-old girl, Annette, heard my sermon on fasting. Annette's favorite food was Pop-tarts, a fruit-filled goodie that she had learned to pop into the toaster for herself. As she left the church that Sunday morning, before Lent began the following Ash Wednesday, she looked up at me and said, "I'm going to give up Pop-tarts for Jesus for Lent and my mommy is going to give up potato chips. She loves them better than anything!" Her mother, Judy, gasped in surprise. She didn't even know the child was listening to the sermon. And it was true, potato chips were her favorite food! So, in the face of her daughter's commitment to give up Pop-tarts, Judy knew she had no choice; it would be six long weeks before she could taste another potato chip!
One man, in the same church, gave up smoking his pipe for six weeks, and never took it up again. One woman gave up crossword puzzles and used that hour a day for more Bible study and prayer. Another woman gave up her soap operas on television and used the time to pray. One gave up gossiping at the office and said she never felt so "clean" since she quit running through the daily garbage of other people's lives. And some gave up one food or another, some gave up certain meals - but it was a great joy, as their pastor, to see how the external actions began to penetrate their hearts, their spirits, and their lives. Changes began to take place in the church, in the families, and in the spirit of the congregation. A "holy fast" is a penetrating energy, and it gives new life and strength to all it touches where Christ is made the aim and center of it all.
My spouse and I find, personally, that Lent is the richest time of the entire church year for us. Our "holy fast" of six weeks may mean we fast on our "indispensable" coffee, on desserts and sweets, or maybe it is breakfast, or we fast on lunch. But the important truth is that the journey - the journey of repentance, of self-denial, the "holy fasting" - make the path to the cross inexpressibly sweet and unbelievably rewarding.
The fact is, whatever we "give up" is infinitesimally small when compared to the magnitude of the Savior's sacrifice on the cross-tree, but still it does in a tiny way let us experience some of his suffering, too.
An American businessman went to Oberammergau to see the famous Passion Play. He went backstage to meet Anton Lang, who then played the part of Christ. Noticing, in the corner, the great cross which Mr. Lang carried in the play, the tourist stooped to lift it to his shoulder, but he couldn't move it even one inch off the floor. It was made of heavy iron-oak beams. Amazed, the man turned to Lang and said, "I thought it would be light, hollow. Why do you carry a cross that is so terribly heavy?" Anton Lang replied softly, "Sir, if I did not feel the weight of the cross, I could not play his part."
True, you and I will never know the agonizing pain nor the tremendous load of the Christ-Cross, but a "holy fast" will keep us reminded of the direction we are headed and that his cost was far, far more than ours!
