Session 2: “Disciplines of Prayer & Fasting” — Wednesday, September 21, 2022
Introduction
Inspiration — Vision
Revelation — Intention
Integration — Means
Transformation
Luke 6:46-49 (NLT) “So why do you keep calling me ‘Lord, Lord!’ when you don’t do what I say? I will show you what it’s like when someone comes to me, listens to my teaching, and then follows it. It is like a person building a house who digs deep and lays the foundation on solid rock. When the floodwaters rise and break against that house, it stands firm because it is well built. But anyone who hears and doesn’t obey is like a person who builds a house right on the ground, without a foundation. When the floods sweep down against that house, it will collapse into a heap of ruins.”
Essential Disciplines
When you give (Matt. 6:2-3)
When you pray (Matt. 6:5-7)
When you fast (Matt. 6:16-17)
Abide in His Word (John 8:31-32)
Prayer
The purpose of prayer is not to get God to do what you think God should do. The primary purpose of prayer is relationship, and in that relationship we are transformed. The objective of prayer is communion with God. Our relationship, communion, the practice of His presence should become the gravitational pull of our life, not a side hobby we get to when we can. Our communion with God is to become the source of our life (eternal life), not a supplement.
Purpose: Be with Jesus
Luke 5:16 (NLT) “But Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer.”
John 5:19 (ESV) “So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise.”
John 15:5 (ESV) “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
“To pray is to change. Prayer is the central avenue God uses to transform us. If we are unwilling to change, we will abandon prayer as a noticeable characteristic of our lives.” ~ Richard Foster
Framework for Integration
Basic Discipline
Baseline Discipline
Build Discipline
Integration of Prayer
Basic: Begin or End most days in 5-10 minutes of conversation with God
Baseline: A consistent daily practice, morning and/or evening of 10-30 minutes, of worship, listening, and conversation with God
Build: Combining Silence and Solitude into the discipline, as well as praying the Word of God consistently.
Fasting
The purpose of fasting is not to impress or manipulate God into answering your prayers; it’s not to lose weight or impress people either. The primary purpose of fasting is to deny self and depend on God, to say “no” to the cravings of the body that control us more than we think. If our communion with God is to become the source of our life (eternal life), then we have to acknowledge the things that distract us or distance us from that communion. Though food is a necessity in life, it is not ultimately what sustains us.
Purpose: Deny self and depend on God
Matthew 4:4 (ESV) But he answered, “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
“Fasting is one of the more important ways of practicing that self-denial required of everyone who would follow Christ…Fasting teaches temperance or self-control and therefore teaches moderation and restraint with regard to all our fundamental drives.” ~ Dallas Willard
Integration of Fasting
Basic: Try fasting for the first time. Try picking a meal to skip, or abstain from a food/drink that you struggle with. And during your time of fasting, intentionally spend time turning your attention towards God in prayer and/or scripture.
Baseline: Practice fasting once a week (a meal or a day).
Build: Fast twice a week (two meals or two days) and/or further focus your time in fasting with journaling, scripture, and prayer. Add a three-day fast two or three times a year to recalibrate your spiritual disciplines to communion with God. Extra Thoughts and Quotes
Prayer:
Like unseen radio waves, the presence of God is everywhere. His personal presence is with us on a continual basis. Prayer, above all else, is like tuning our heart and mind (like a radio dial) in to His presence. The more we tune into that presence, the more we are changed by it.
Yes, a major element of prayer is to live in partnership with God by, by which His will is enacted “on earth as in heaven.” Yes, we can “ask and receive.” Yes, we can pray in the form of “requests” and statements of faith that declares God’s truth and will over situations. But to enact His will, you have to ask rightly, to know God’s character and will, we must be in alignment with His will; which brings you full circle to the primary purpose of prayer is for relationship, and transformation within that relationship.
“To ask “rightly” involves transformed passions. In prayer, real prayer, we begin to think God’s thoughts after him: to desire the things he desires, to love the things he loves, to will the things he wills.” ~ Richard Foster
Our own transformation enables us to be a more effective as a partner with God. This is what our transformation into Christlikeness is for, being a greater vessel of God’s will.
Fasting:
Our hunger is more than our hunger for food. How we satisfy our hunger and desires has implications beyond food. If we live undisciplined toward food, if we satisfy every hunger for anything we think will satisfy, and then gorge ourselves with it, that lack of discipline implicitly trains us that every desire we have, beyond food, will need to be satisfied.
We hunger for things we think will bring satisfaction, happiness, or fulfillment to our lives. Not everything we desire is good, and even much of the good we desire isn’t good in excess.
“More than any other Discipline, fasting reveals the things that control us… [It] reminds us that we are sustained “by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” Food does not sustain us. God sustains us…In experiences of fasting we are not so much abstaining from food as we are feasting on the word of God. Fasting is feasting!” ~ Richard Foster
“Fasting is choosing not to indulge in food and sustenance.” ~ Scot McKnight
“Some Christians think fasting proves to God their utter seriousness and deep devotion. God, so they think, will be especially attentive to my prayer if I fast. Nonsense. God cannot be manipulated or badgered into giving us what we want.” ~ Scot McKnight
Self-control is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, it used to be considered a virtue of society, now is considered a heresy of a cultural orthodoxy of self-gratification. Without self-control, we are at the mercy of our impulses and feelings. This is a marker of immature children that we are to train out of them. Fasting can prove to be even more difficult when the cultural tide moves toward unhindered self-gratification.