“I grew up in the church” feels like a cheesy way to begin a testimony, but I have come to know that this phrase is just the beginning of a testimony that will surely represent God’s faithfulness.

So, I grew up in the church. But the story does not actually start with me. My parents were not actually regular church-goers until my mom was pregnant with me. And in my perspective, a baby truly changed everything. My great-uncle and great-aunt even changed churches when my parents started attending my home church so that they could be there to help raise me in the local church. I do not remember a time in my life where my uncle, aunt, dad, mom, me, and brother were not attending our local church. My parents were incredibly faithful to the house of God. I am so thankful to not only have grown up in the local church, but to grow up and still genuinely love the local church.

I begin with this to explain that I know about the local church. I have heard thousands of teachings and preachings in my life. I was in Sunday school from the time I could walk and talk. And yet, I do not remember ever being taught about fasting. It was always something referenced in my church growing up, and I was familiar with the common scriptures on the topic, but it was not a spiritual discipline that I actually knew anything about.

This lack of teaching in the church on the subject of fasting is actually not that uncommon. A theologian named Richard Foster found that between the years of 1861 and 1954, almost 100 years, there was not a single full-length book written on the subject of fasting. Wow.

Pastor Gary Hamrick from Virginia said: “The topic of fasting — the voluntary absence of food for a limited period of time for the purpose of drawing near to God — is one of the least-practiced and least-preached among spiritual disciplines. But fasting is mentioned more times in the Bible than water baptism. The subject is referenced 77 times in Scripture.”

So, the question I have for you today: why do we fast?

If you would be willing to stick with me, I would like to share how God taught me about the why behind the spiritual discipline of fasting and prayer.

At the end of 2022, I was beginning to prepare to come to Peru as a Missionary Associate with Assemblies of God World Missions, being mentored by Bill and Lena Shrader. During this time, I was also traveling with Heartbeat Family Ministries, an Assemblies of God US Missions team led by Scott and Annie Miller with a focus on family-based discipleship. We had traveled across the state of Alabama and beyond having already had many powerful family services, and I was seeing God move in the lives of families and in my own life like never before.

God was also teaching me about spiritual discipline during this time, and He was asking specific things of me. I would start watching a show, and I just knew I could not keep watching it. I would try to go somewhere, and I knew in my heart I could not go. I now know that this season God was showing me how to make more room for Him in my life by monitoring my input.

I was also working another job so I could not always travel to every event with our team. I began to question myself and question God because it seemed like every time I was not with the team, they would see an actual physical miracle happen during the family services. I was incredibly frustrated. Here I am. I had been in church my entire life. I was preparing to go to Peru as a missionary. I was faithful to this ministry. And yet, I had never seen God perform an actual physical miracle. If I am being honest, I was angry. I wanted to see God perform a miracle. I felt like I needed to know that He was truly the God of miracles before I started my journey as a foreign missionary.

2023 begins and my local church started the year with 21 days of prayer and fasting. I decided in my mind that I was going to be committed to this time of prayer and fasting like never before. I was going to fast food, for real.

I do not remember when this next moment happened, but I remember I was at church at our midweek service. While the pastor was preaching, I was skimming through Isaiah. You can totally judge me for not listening to the pastor, but I had already read the book he was preaching from.

As I read Isaiah 58, it was like the Holy Spirit truly opened my eyes to what this passage of Scripture tells us. Let’s look at it:

Isaiah 58:1-12 NIV True Fasting

1 Shout it aloud, do not hold back. Raise your voice like a trumpet. Declare to my people their rebellion and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.

2 For day after day they seek me out; they seem eager to know my ways, as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them.

3 ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?’ “Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers.

4 Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.

5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?

6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?

7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.

9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I. “If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk,

10 And if you spend yourselves on behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.

11 The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.

12 Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.

The night that I read Isaiah 58, I remember feeling such excitement. It was like I finally got it. The “why” behind fasting became so clear to me. I remember even showing this to a mentor that night.

The type of fast that God desires is not one where I am only fasting to fulfill a religious requirement and it is not a fast where I am still satisfying my own selfish desires.

But the type of fast that God desires is one that goes against our fleshly nature, one that brings us to a place of true heart change. It is a fast that removes the sinful chains, tears away the ropes of the burdensome yoke, sets free the oppressed, and breaks every burdensome yoke. It is a fast where we share, we protect, we clothe, and we do not turn our backs on people.

All of this goes against our human nature.

A true fast, where we are denying the flesh by starving the physical, brings us to a place where we are aligning ourselves with God’s nature. Where we are re-aligning our hearts with the Father’s heart. True fasting results in drastic heart-change.

God so graciously opened my eyes to this part of Scripture. And in the beginning of 2023, I was in the process of some serious heart change. Our ministry team was also praying and expecting God to move in some pretty significant areas of our lives and the ministry we were a part of.

I shared with my leaders what God was teaching me through Scripture, but also that I was still questioning why I had not seen a miracle when our team had seen so many. We talked about how the enemy was fighting me in this area, making me feel unworthy while also giving pride room to grow in the midst of it. I was learning to reject the lie that I was not worthy, and replace that lie with truth from God’s Word. That I can and will choose to praise God because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; His works are wonderful and I know this to be true. That I am not worthless and that I am worthy of His calling because He made me worthy of it.

Our ministry team was planning a service, a “Night of Miracles,” at our leader’s house that was open to our entire community where we were praying, fasting, and expecting to see miracles. Leading up to that night, I had decided to fast again for two reasons. One, my leadership asked me to and I respect and honor their authority over my life. And two, because I wanted to see freedom and deliverance take place, God helping people, and see people strengthened by God’s power.

Here is a photo taken from that “Night of Miracles.”

I want to pause the story here to read 3 verses from Matthew.

Matthew 6:16-18 NIV Fasting

16 “When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.

17 But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face,

18 so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Fasting is not a ritual to show you are more spiritual than other people.

Fasting is not a means to make God do what you want Him to do.

But we do have a Good Father who rewards the pure in heart.

Scripture tells us that a true fast will be rewarded by our Father in Heaven.

That night our team was rewarded in a special way. We saw just what Isaiah talked about – the sinful chains removed, the ropes of the burdensome yoke torn away, the oppressed set free, and burdensome yoke broken.

As we were listening to Amber tell us about the pain she was experiencing, Annie placed my hand on Amber’s feet. Annie spoke over my life and told me that God was about to show me what I had been praying and seeking Him for. We began to pray for Amber, declaring healing in the name of Jesus, and the burdensome yoke of plantar fasciitis was broken.

She began to feel a change in the pain that she had felt for years in her heels. So, we prayed again. As we prayed again, she took steps back with a shocked look on her face. She was feeling pain leave her feet. In that moment, I knew I had witnessed an immediate physical miracle.

This photo is literal documentation of the first immediate physical miracle I ever saw, and it is a testimony to me of how my Father in Heaven rewards those who offer him a true fast with a pure heart.

Amber was not the only miracle I saw that night.

I felt with my own hands the rattle from asthma in a little girl’s lung just go away.

I watched the immediate relief flood over my dear friend from a great trauma she had experienced in her life.

I praise God for that.

The Father increased my faith exponentially that night and in the months to come. But most importantly, the Father was drawing me close to His heart. And that is what matters most when we choose to practice the spiritual discipline of fasting.

Fasting is not a spiritual discipline that is mandated in the new covenant, which is the promise that we have because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But when we look at Scripture, there is a hefty list of people who fasted with purpose:

Abraham’s servant when he was seeking a bride for Isaac

Moses on Mt. Sinai

Hannah when she prayed for a child

David on several occasions

Elijah after his victory over Jezebel

Ezra when he was mourning Israel’s faithlessness

Nehemiah when he was preparing the trip back to Israel

Esther when God’s people were threatened with extermination

Daniel on numerous occasions

The people of Nineveh, including the cattle 

Paul at the point of his conversion

The Christians at Antioch when they sent off Paul and Barnabas on their mission endeavor

Paul and others when they appointed elders in all of the churches

AND Jesus when he began his public ministry

If Jesus practiced fasting as a spiritual discipline, it is in our best interest to follow suit, no?

To me it is clear that Jesus did not mandate fasting for his followers, but that Jesus expected that we would fast.

Luke 5:33-35 NIV Jesus Questioned About Fasting

33 They said to him, “John’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.”

34 Jesus answered, “Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them?

35 But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.”

We, the church, are in those days.

We are anxiously awaiting the return of our bridegroom.

We must be growing in spiritual discipline and in spiritual maturity.

If I were to summarize the teachings in my local church over the last few months, I could easily do that in just 2 words: Spiritual Maturity.

Believer, when was the last time you took part in a true fast with a pure heart?

This is a question I have been asking myself in the past few weeks. I have been thinking about what I have shared with you today for a while now, and I did not know when or where I would be able to share what was forming in my spirit person – but, here we are.

Shortly after I arrived in Peru, I just kept repeating this phrase over and over again in my spirit:

“It is time to grow.”

And it was actually in Spanish and not in English which was kind of weird to me because I think in English, but I digress.

I would often be reminded of this phrase when I was in my local church’s weekly young adults service. I knew this phrase was for my personal walk in my own spiritual maturity, but I came to believe it was also for my local church here in Peru. And that phrase has proven true to what I am seeing in my local church. My local church has grown in numbers in the last months, and we are now in 2 services. My local church has been growing spiritually, and that is obvious to me because of the sheer attendance in our weekly discipleship course, as well as the daily 7am zoom call where the young adults are coming together to read and study Scripture.

It is time to grow, church. If you are not sure where to start growing in your spiritual maturity, I would contend that a true fast with a pure heart is a great place to start.