The Importance and Power of Fasting, Part 1

Thank you, Mr. DeMoure. Good afternoon. Happy Sabbath to all of you. Very nice to see all of you here today. My wife has gone off and left me again. She's in Alaska with the grandson and my daughter. It's 100 degrees here and 65 there. So I guess she made a wise decision. I am planning to join her, though, in a couple of weeks, so I'm looking forward to that. In two weeks, I hope to be out there myself for a little over two weeks. Also, I wanted to mention that we're probably going to have a teen Bible study along with this, but we are going to have a teen swim party after the garage sale over at the Whitlarks. That's what we're tentatively planning at the moment. If that all works out, I hope it will. I've got to double-check on that. But we'll let you know and send you an email or get back to you if that's the case, or certainly let you know next Sabbath. But if you don't hear from us, plan on a teen swim party after the garage sale next Sunday afternoon at the Whitlarks. Well, brethren, the Day of Atonement is the only day that God specifically sets aside as a day of fasting, a commanded day of fasting, once a year. That seems pretty reasonable, doesn't it? Just once a year. However, Christ says when He went to the Father after the resurrection, His disciples would fast. So we'll get to that Scripture in a bit. I believe God does want us to fast more often than just the Day of Atonement. Perhaps one reason we are commanded to fast, however, is for our education. Otherwise, we may not even know what fasting is like. I'm not too sure many of us would have thought this up on our own. Yeah, I think I'll stop eating and drinking. That was an idea that God no doubt shared and gave to mankind.

Most of us don't realize the idea of denying ourselves food and water for even one day. If God didn't command us to fast, I don't know that many of us would have ever tried it. By fasting, we realize that we are weak physically. We do need food and water to sustain us, to keep us alive. Now, some people seem to fare better when they fast than some. It seems like some just have a horrible time fasting for one day and others not such a difficult time.

But if they continue to fast for 48 hours or 72 hours, then it hits everyone. Some quicker than others. So we do need food and water to sustain us, to keep us alive. God is not only our Creator, but He is also our sustainer. And by fasting, we more fully realize our dependence upon God, who has not only created us, but who also sustains us daily by providing food and water. Every good gift comes from God, and I consider food and water very good gifts.

Another reason God commands a fast on the Day of Atonement is so that we may more fully appreciate the importance and the power of fasting, because there is great importance and there is great power in fasting. It is a very, very powerful spiritual tool. One, frankly, that is often neglected even by God's elect, by God's called and chosen people. I know I have neglected this wonderful tool at times throughout my 40 years almost. I guess it has been 40 years now in God's Church. I know I have neglected to fast as much as I should have, would have been better had I fasted more. At times, I am sure we have all neglected to avail ourselves of this powerful spiritual tool.

So in this sermon, I would like to show you the power of fasting as it is revealed in the Bible. Hopefully, you will be encouraged to fast more frequently in the days ahead. So let's begin by going to 1 Samuel 7, where we read about a situation where the children of Israel were being harassed by the Philistines.

Of course, this was God's chosen nation, but they had already made many mistakes. They had sinned against God. They were paying the consequences for their sins, and the Philistines had been harassing them for years. In 1 Samuel 7, we will begin reading in verse 3. Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, If you return to the Lord with all your hearts and put away the foreign gods and the asterisks, or the images of Canaanite pagan goddesses, if you will put away these foreign gods and these asterisks from among you and prepare your hearts for the Eternal, and serve Him only, and He will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines.

So the children of Israel put away the bales and the asterisks, those pagan gods, and they served the Eternal only. And Samuel said, Gather all Israel to Miss Pa, and I will pray to the Lord for you. Last week we talked about the importance and the power of prayer.

And, of course, fasting is always accompanied by prayer. I don't know that anyone ever fasts and doesn't pray along with it. We should certainly be praying along with our fasts. Verse 6, So they gathered together at Miss Pa, they drew water, and they poured it out before the Eternal, and there they fasted that day, and said there, We have sinned against the Eternal, and Samuel judged the children of Israel at Miss Pa.

So Samuel judged them. In other words, he considered their spiritual condition. He saw that they were repentant, that they were fasting, that they were praying, that they were looking to God for His deliverance. Verse 7, And when the Philistines heard that the children of Israel had gathered together at Miss Pa, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel.

They saw this as an opportunity to strike again against Israel and to harass them further. And when the children of Israel heard of it, they were afraid of the Philistines. The Philistines were more powerful than the Israelites. So the children of Israel said to Samuel, Do not cease to cry out to the Lord our God for us, that He may save us from the hand of the Philistines.

And Samuel took a suckling lamb and offered it as a whole burnt offering to the Eternal. And Samuel cried out to the Lord for Israel, and the Eternal answered Him. Now as Samuel was offering up the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel.

But the Eternal thundered with a loud thunder upon the Philistines that day, and so confused them that they were overcome before Israel. And the men of Israel went out to Mispah and pursued the Philistines and drove them back as far as below Beth-Kar.

And Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mispah and Shen, and called its name Ebenezer, saying, which means the stone of help, by the way, saying thus far the Lord has helped us. So the Philistines were subdued, and they did not come any more into the territory of Israel.

So God stopped that harassment, and it was largely because of the attitude of the children of Israel who had repented of their sins. They had put away the foreign gods, the idols that they had been putting before the true God. And they looked to God, and they had faith that God would deliver them. And God did indeed deliver them.

So here we see the power of prayer and fasting coupled together. We see repentance, we see fasting, and we see that God sees and hears. It's also true in our own individual lives, when we as individuals repent of the sins that we've committed, and we seek God with all of our heart and soul and might, when we admit our sins to God, and we seek Him in prayer and fasting, God will surely deliver us.

There is great power in fasting.

God does respond favorably to our seeking Him through repentance that is displayed in prayer and fasting. God responds when we seek Him in prayer during a severe trial as well. This was a severe trial for the children of Israel, and they did look to God in prayer and fasting, and God heard their prayers.

Fasting shows our dedication to God. It shows our willingness and desire to put Him first in our lives, even above our own physical desires. We all love to eat, I would say, or at least most of us love to eat. I certainly do. I enjoy it a great deal. In fact, I probably enjoy it too much.

But there are times when I realize it's far more important that I fast for a day and give up food and water so that I might draw nearer to God, that I might have the strength of God in my life, that I might have His power in my life, that I might draw nearer to God and develop a greater and a closer relationship with Him.

So there comes a time when God really wants to see us fast and turn to Him in repentance. If we've been sinning, if we've been spiritually out of focus, and we know it, we realize it, we see it, that's a good time to turn to God in prayer and in fasting. In 1 Kings 21, again, we'll see the power of prayer and fasting. Even if a person's been very carnal, very sinful, when we turn to God in prayer and fasting, it makes a huge difference. 1 Kings 21, beginning in verse 17, shows an example of King Ahab. King Ahab was one of the most carnal, one of the most sinful of all the kings. He was married to Jezebel. You may recall that. They were quite a couple. In 1 Kings 21, verse 17, The word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, Arise and go down to meet Ahab, the king of Israel, who lives in Samaria. There he is in the vineyard of Naboth, where he has gone down to take possession of it. You shall speak to him, saying, Thus says the Lord, have you murdered and also taken possession? You may remember the story about Jezebel and about Naboth, and about how Ahab wanted that vineyard. So much so that they murdered Naboth. Have you murdered and also taken possession? And you shall speak to him, saying, Thus says the Eternal, in the place where the dogs lick the blood of Naboth, dogs shall lick your blood, even yours. So Ahab said to Elijah, Have you found me, O my enemy? Remember he hated Elijah. And he answered, I have found you, because you have sold yourselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord. Behold, I will bring calamity on you. I will take away your posterity, and I will cut off from Ahab every male in Israel, both bond and free. I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and like the house of Beitah, the son of Ahijah, because of the provocation with which you have provoked me to anger and made Israel sin. God does not take sin lightly. God sees our sins and be sure our sins will find us out, and they certainly were going to find Jezebel out. They were also going to find Ahab out.

Verse 23, In concerning Jezebel, the Lord also spoke, saying, The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel. That's exactly what happened. That was a prophecy that was fulfilled. The dogs shall eat whoever belongs to Ahab and dies in the city, and the birds of the air shall eat whoever dies in the field. But there was no one like Ahab who sold himself to do wickedness in the sight of the Lord, the Eternal, because Jezebel, his wife, stirred him up. As I said, they were quite a team. And he behaved very abominably in following idols, according to all that the Amorites had done, whom the Lord had cast out before the children of Israel. So it was when Ahab heard those words that he tore his clothes and put sackcloth on his body, and he fasted and lay in sackcloth and went about mourning. Evidently, he believed what Elijah was telling him. He believed something very bad was going to happen because of his sins. And he humbled himself. And the word of the Eternal came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, See how Ahab has humbled himself before me. Perhaps God even wanted to wake up Elijah to a degree and show him that God could even forgive someone like Ahab if Ahab was repentant. See how Ahab has humbled himself before me. Because he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the calamity in his days. In the days of his son, I will bring the calamity on his house, where the whole house would be taken into captivity, and they would certainly suffer greatly.

So God is merciful at this point, even to Ahab. Of course, Ahab doesn't really repent fully. He repents for a time, and eventually his sins certainly find him out.

So the point being made here is there is great power in fasting. This is what Ahab had done. He humbled himself in sackcloth and in ashes, and he fasted. And he besought God. He wanted God to forgive him. He wanted God to be merciful to him. And so he fasted, and God saw what he was doing. He noted his fasting.

And also note that when we fast, we certainly ought to humble ourselves before God and confess our sins before him. God had mercy. And so Ahab did not have to deal with these punishments in his own lifetime, not the extent of the punishments that God would have brought upon him otherwise. So again, we see great power in fasting. Even someone as carnal as Ahab can get results when they seek God in fasting. In 2 Chronicles 20, we'll see another example, a very powerful example, of a good king, not a perfect king, but a good king in certain ways, who feared God and also sought God in fasting, and also turned the entire nation of Israel to God in fasting. 2 Chronicles 20, verse 1. 2 Chronicles 20, verse 1. It happened after this that the people of Moab, with the people of Ammon and others with them, besides the Ammonites, came to battle against Jehoshaphat, king Jehoshaphat of the house of Judah. Then some came and told Jehoshaphat, saying, A great multitude is coming against you from beyond the sea, from Syria. And they are in Hazazan Tamar, which is in Gedi. And Jehoshaphat feared and set himself to seek the Eternal, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. So Judah gathered together to ask help from the Eternal, and from all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord. Then Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Eternal before the new court, and said, O Lord God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven, and do you not rule over all the kingdoms of the nations? And in your hand is there not power and might, so that no one is able to withstand you.

Are you not our God who drove out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and gave it to the descendants of Abraham, your friend, forever? And they dwell in it, and they built you a sanctuary in it for your name, saying, If disaster comes upon us, if sword, judgment, pestilence, or famine, then we will stand before this temple, and in your presence, for your name is in this temple, and cry out to you in our affliction, and you will hear and save. And now here are the people of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Sayre, whom you would not let Israel invade when they came out of the land of Egypt, but they turned from them and did not destroy them. Here they are, rewarding us by coming to throw us out of your possession, which you have given us to inherit. Of course, God had told them to destroy those people initially, and they didn't really follow through on what God had told them. So, in a sense, they got what was coming toward them. But surely those people were not showing a lot of gratitude either, as they were turning against Israel.

Verse 12, O our God, will you not judge them, for we have no power against this great multitude that is coming against us. Nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are upon you. Now, it is sad that usually people don't really seek God the way they should until they are in deep trouble.

It seems that human nature is such that until we really have to, we are not so quick to humble ourselves in fasting, to go to God, no food, no water, seeking God and seeking His will. Usually it is because we have gotten ourselves into some trouble, and we want God to bail us out.

God does do that, but we shouldn't count on that. We shouldn't wait until we are in deep trouble before we turn to God with this powerful tool of fasting. This is something that we should do regularly, especially if we really want to see something miraculous happen in our lives. If you have been fighting a huge battle, but you haven't been fasting, then you are really not utilizing the most powerful spiritual tool that you could find. Data fasting. When you fast, when you humble yourself in fasting, and you show God that you really are serious, that you really want His help, that you desire Him to be a better person, that you desire His help, and you are willing to do extreme measures like fasting, God will most likely hear your prayers, and He will see that you are fasting, and He will do something to make things happen, to change things, to miraculously get things moving. So King Jehoshaphat saw this. He knew that they were weaker than these nations that were rising up against them. They were in deep trouble. They needed help to battle their enemies, so they sought the eternal. They asked Him for help. The Bible says, knock and the door will be opened. Ask and you shall receive. So it's certainly not wrong to fast and to ask for help for others and to ask for help for yourself. Fasting certainly has other purposes in addition to drawing near to God. Certainly that's one of the major reasons why we fast, is to draw near to God, is to draw close to Him, and to have that close walk with Him. But it's also to get things moving. Now, God respects the fact that we care enough to fast and we beseech Him and go before Him faithfully. Satan is our enemy and we do need to fast in order to defeat Satan the Devil, who wants to defeat us. So Jehoshaphat was afraid. He was afraid that they would be taken captive at that time. He was afraid that many of them would be killed. Perhaps He would be killed. But His reaction to his trouble was not to cower in a corner in fear, but it was to seek God through fasting.

So this was a communal fast. It was the whole community of Israel getting together. The whole nation came together. In unity and results happened. God heard their prayers and God intervened. And these people actually turned against themselves and they killed one another.

And God delivered them. And you can read the whole story later. But God did hear their prayers and God certainly intervened and answered these prayers. And they were miraculously delivered. In the book of Ezra, there's another incident where God answers prayers and protects the Jews as they turn to God in fasting. Let's go to Ezra 8.

Ezra 8. Ezra 8.

Of course, these Israelites had been in captivity in Babylon and they were going back to Israel.

In Ezra 8, beginning in verse 21. Ezra 8, verse 21. And I'm jumping in the middle of the story, so you'll have to go back and read the context later. We'd like to know more about the story. Ezra says in verse 21 of chapter 8, Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from Him the right way for us and our little ones and all our possessions. So fasting on a regular basis just to get God's guidance and His direction and His wisdom is very wise. If you'll fast regularly for this very reason, so that you'll be near to God, so that you'll see where He wants you to go, the decisions that He wants you to make. So they humbled themselves to seek from Him the right way for us, for our little ones, and for all our possessions, for all that we possess, that we own. For I was ashamed to request of the king and escort of soldiers and horsemen, to help us against the enemy on the road, because Ezra had talked to them about their great God, and how God would deliver them, and how God would protect them, and how God would take care of them. And so he was ashamed to ask for a physical escort. He rightly realized that, you know, if you're going to say these things about how great God is, then you really ought to trust Him. You should put your faith in Him. You don't need an escort from the king, if you have God on your side. So I was ashamed to request of the king and escort of soldiers and horsemen, to help us against the enemy on the road, because we had spoken to the king, saying, The hand of our God is upon all those for good who seek Him, but His power and His wrath are against all those who forsake Him. So we fasted and we entreated our God for this, and He answered our prayers, and God delivered them and brought them safely into the land of Israel.

So again, there's power in praying and fasting and seeking God.

God answered these prayers, and He protected the Jews.

So He had to put His money where His mouth was, so to speak. He had to show that He really did trust God, and He proved His faith in His actions. And we should prove our faith in our actions. It takes faith to fast. Why would you fast otherwise, if you didn't have faith, that God was real and that God would respond to your fasting?

So we should fast in faith, believing that God is going to answer, He's going to hear our prayers, He's going to see our faithfulness, and God will answer. God will guide us and direct us, and God will deliver us as needed. He will protect us when we pray and fast. Now, in the book of Nehemiah, we see that another man of God sought God in prayer and fasting, Nehemiah chapter 1. Nehemiah chapter 1. The words of Nehemiah, the son of HaKaliah, came to pass in the month of Chezlev, in the 20th year, as I was in Shushan, the citadel, in Persia, that Hanani, one of my brethren, they were also taken captive, they were in captivity, and that Hanani, one of my brethren, came with men from Judah, and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped, who had survived the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem, and they said to me, the survivors who are left from the captivity in the province are there in great distress and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down, its gates are burned with fire. Of course, the reason they went into captivity was because of their sins, and their failure to repent and to seek God, had they sought God in prayer and repentance and fasting on a regular basis, they would have never ended up in captivity in the first place. Verse 4, So it was when I heard these words, that I sat down and I wept, and I mourned for many days, I was fasting and praying before the God of heaven. And I said, I pray, Lord God of heaven, O great and awesome God, you who keep your covenant and mercy, with those who love you and observe your commandments, please let your ear be attentive and your eyes open, that you may hear the prayer of your servant, which I pray before you now, day and night, for the children of Israel your servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against you, both my father's house and I have sinned.

We have acted very corruptly against you, we have not kept the commandments, the statutes, nor the ordinances which you commanded your servant Moses. Now, I would imagine that all of us at times should take a day to fast and to pray and to admit that we have sinned, that we have turned against God since the last time we fasted and prayed, fervently and faithfully, that we have let down, that we have shirked our duty, our responsibility as true servants of God, again, we should be fasting on a regular basis because we sin on a regular basis, don't we? Is there anyone here who doesn't sin on a fairly regular basis? If you're a sinner, then you should also be a faster. You should be fasting as well.

So he admitted the sins not only of himself, but of all the people. And, frankly, we all sin, don't we, as the people of God. So we pray for each other, we pray for ourselves, we confess our sins, our own individual sins, but we also realize that we're all sinners and we all need to be forgiven. And we all need to have the power and the strength of God within this congregation. So we should fast and pray for one another and seek God for each other.

Remember, I pray the word that you commanded your servant Moses, saying, If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the nations. Has our church been scattered to some degree? Has the church of God been scattered over the last 40-50 years?

Is it not, perhaps, partially because of our sins? Because we haven't been as faithful and we haven't fasted and prayed and repented as we should? But these are things we should ask ourselves and say, Is there anything I could do that would help correct this so that we might have a better future than we've had the past?

We should all consider this and look within ourselves and ask ourselves, Have we done enough? Have we prayed enough? Have we fasted enough? Have we turned to each other and helped each other and always been there for each other? Have we supported each other? Have we developed those relationships that Mr. Baker talked about in the sermonette? Not Mr. Brown, Mr. Baker, that he talked about in the sermonette? We should be pulling together as God's people more and more so as we see the day approaching. We live in perilous times, we really do. We just don't know when things will really begin to crash down upon us. Yeah, then we'll feel like fasting then. We'll feel like praying more fervently when this whole country is falling apart around us. And when we can't take everything for granted that we take now, we go to the mall and we go through there and we see the opulence, and we're used to it. You know, things have gone very well in this land and in this nation. And we take it for granted, but there will come a day of reckoning when it's going to begin to fall apart. It's already started. If we have ice to see, we can see that it really is a very shaky world that we live in. The economy is very shaky here in the United States. When you're $17 or $18 trillion in debt, that should frighten all of us. I mean, how can that go on forever? There will be a time of reckoning in the future. And the more we draw near to God in fasting and prayer now, the better we're going to be able to make it through the days ahead. So I think we need to just be honest with ourselves as the Church of God and as the people of God individually and collectively, and consider maybe we can do more. Maybe we should do more as God's people.

So Nehemiah began to look to God with prayer and with fasting, and he admitted his sins and the people of the sins of the people.

Verse 8 again, And let your servant prosper this day, I pray, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man, for I was the king's cupbearer. Now, you can read the rest of the book of Nehemiah, and you can see that God really was with Nehemiah, that God heard this man's prayers, and he saw his fasting, and it made a huge difference, and it's recorded in the Bible for you and me.

It's recorded so that we can learn and not repeat all of these mistakes, these sins that we continually repeat. Because Israel, of course, did go... I mean, they went into captivity again. The temple was destroyed, and their history, they repented for a while, but they always would go back to their sins.

So, here we see, when we fast, God looks upon us favorably, and he grants us favor in other people's hearts. You know, King Art of Xerxes... I don't have time to read the rest of it, but King Art of Xerxes was approached by Nehemiah, and it made a difference, and he allowed Nehemiah to go, to lead him, and to go lead people back, lead Israelites back into the land of Israel. So, when we fast, God will look upon us favorably. He will grant us favor in other people's hearts as well.

So, if you haven't been praying, perhaps that's something you should do more of, and if you haven't been fasting, that's something you should do more of. If you really expect God to intervene, instead of pouring money after situations that you can't seem to get ahead of, maybe you need to fast more. Maybe you need to pray more. God looks at the heart. He knows your heart. I'm not judging anyone. I'm just saying we need to judge ourselves. In Nehemiah 9, we'll go several chapters ahead in the book of Nehemiah, where we'll see they fasted again here.

In verse 1, Now on the 24th day of this month, the children of Israel were assembled with fasting, in sackcloth and with dust on their heads. Then those of Israelite lineage separated themselves from all foreigners. They stood and they confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. And they stood up in the place and they read from the book of the law of the eternal their God for one-fourth of the day. So they read quite a bit from the book of the law that day.

And for another fourth, they confessed and they worshipped the eternal their God. So depending on what you consider a day, if you consider a day a 24-hour day, then half the day 12 hours was spent in prayer and study of God's word. During that day of fasting, 12 hours would have been spent.

If you would consider a day to be 16 hours, say 8 hours of sleep, that leaves another 16 hours, then that would have been at least 8 hours of Bible study and prayer and worship. If you consider 12 hours a day to be a day, sometimes they say 12 hours in the day, 12 hours in the night, then at least there were 6 hours of reading and praying and worshiping. So they were pretty dedicated. So when you fast, you should spend a lot of time praying and reading your Bible, studying the Bible.

That's when you'll get more out of your fasting. If you don't really have time to devote yourself to God, it's usually not a very effective fast. You really need to find a day that's going to work, where you're not going to have a thousand interruptions, when you're not working, when you have an entire day to devote to God in prayer and fasting.

I know it's not easy because we live busy lives. And it's very easy to put off fasting, isn't it? It's very, very easy to never find a good day to fast. And if you're working 5 days a week and you're going to church on the Sabbath, and all you have is Sunday to catch up on things around the house, if you're not pretty organized and if you're not on top of things, chances are you'll never find a good day to fast.

It's just difficult to find a good day to fast. So you have to carve out a day. You have to plan ahead and carve out a day, a good day, when you can study and you can pray and you can really devote yourself to God in prayer and fasting. So I'm not going to read any further there, but it just shows that they were also fasting, they were repenting before God, they were dedicating themselves to God.

Fasting should be accompanied with much prayer, with Bible study, with worship, with praising God, with maybe singing hymns to God, thanking God for all that He does in your life. In this case, the people of Israel acknowledged God's righteousness and their suffering was not due in any part to God, but it was due to their own wickedness. That's generally the case. They were suffering because of their wickedness. Because of their sins, they became servants to another master, they became servants to another nation, and that nation reaped the blessings that Israel should have received.

They gave away their blessings because of their wickedness and their refusal to follow God faithfully. I think we should ask ourselves if we don't do that today, to some degree. Do we give our blessings away? Because we are refusing to receive blessings that should be ours because of our stubborn disobedience, because we cling to a sin that we haven't been able to overcome because we haven't been diligent enough, we haven't prayed and fasted enough. Otherwise, God would give us victory over that sin. So maybe it is partially due to our own fault, our own wickedness, our own sin.

Is there another master who has dominion over our bodies and our possessions at their pleasure because of our sins? In other words, they rule over us. The Bible talks about we are going to be a servant to someone. Either we are going to serve Satan or we are going to serve God. And if we are steeped in sin, then we are serving Satan the devil. Unless we are overcoming our sins, putting our sins out of our lives, and being truly repentant before God, then we are giving blessings away. We are not reaping those blessings.

So we need to renew our covenant with God. We all need to renew our covenant with God on a regular basis, seek Him more faithfully and wholeheartedly.

These people made an oath to God during their fast, which included separating themselves from the world, coming out of the world. It entailed keeping God's law and keeping His Sabbath day holy. Also, tithing was a part of this. They were to remember to tithe and not forsake the tithing because some had been robbing God by not paying their tithes. And also, they were not providing for those who were to receive the tithes. They were not caring for the house of God. They were not caring for the holy things of God. They were neglecting the temple. They were neglecting to take care of things.

But when they repented, they even went so far as to impose a temple tax on themselves to make sure the temple was kept in good order. Because before that, it had not been kept in good order. There were times when the children of Israel repented and they turned to God, and God would bless them.

They would take their fast seriously. They would enter into an agreement with God. They would rededicate themselves to God.

And they would analyze how they had neglected to serve God. These were people who had repented before. They had good hearts, unlike those who had gone into captivity. But they saw that they still had a long way to go, and they needed to repent of their sins. Not every single person went into captivity. Now, some were very faithful who went into captivity. Daniel was very faithful, but he went into captivity. But there were others who were also faithful who did not go into captivity.

God protected some because they had drawn near to him. They were close to him.

You know, there are so many examples in the Bible. In the book of Esther, there is an example of where the Jews fast. And they mourn upon hearing of the king's decree. Remember, in the book of Esther, they were going to actually destroy all the Jews. Mordecai, you remember the story of Mordecai and Haman. And Haman had gotten a decree from the king that all the Jews would be destroyed.

But they fasted in Esther, chapter 4. Let's just go there briefly.

Esther, chapter 4. When Mordecai learned all that had happened, he tore his clothes and he put on sackcloth and ashes. And he went out into the midst of the city. He cried out loud and in a bitter cry. He went as far as the front of the king's gate. For no one might enter the king's gate, clothed with sackcloth. And in every province where the king's command and decree arrived, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, with weeping and wailing. And many lay in sackcloth and ashes. So Esther's maids in eunuchs came and told her, and the queen was deeply distressed. Then she sent garments to clothe Mordecai and take his sackcloth away from him. But he would not accept them, because Mordecai was a very diligent and wholehearted person who was seeking God and God's deliverance.

In verse 16 of chapter 4, Go gather all the Jews who are present in Sushan, and fast for me. Esther called them together with Mordecai, and she asked them to fast for her, because she had to go to the king. And that was a dangerous thing, to have to go to the king. In fact, the queen before her, Vashti, you know, had been banished. So gather these Jews together and fast for me, neither eat nor drink, for three days. They really got serious in this case. Don't eat food, don't drink water for three days, neither night or day. So these were complete 24-hour fasts, three in a row, 72 hours.

My maids and I will fast likewise, and so I will go to the king, which is against the law, and if I perish, I perish. But of course, she did not perish, and they all turned to God in fasting, and there is great power in fasting. We see it over and over and over again in the Bible. Why was Esther fasting? Was she fasting for wisdom? Was she fasting for protection? Was she fasting for courage? I think she was fasting for all those reasons. She had to face the king. She needed God on her side. Esther was a woman going into a man's world. This was the world in which Vashti lost her position because she went beyond a woman's place, a queen's place, even. So she needed to go with a proper spirit of submission. She had to go before the king. Otherwise, she could have lost her life or she could have been banished. But he received her, and he received her well. She had a tremendous balancing act to do, but she fasted for three days and three nights, and the children of Israel fasted, the Jews fasted, along with her. So fasting can result in turning our mourning into great joy because the Jews were all mourning. Mordecai was mourning. They were all mourning, but when they fasted and they prayed and God heard their prayer and delivered them all, their mourning was turned into great joy. So we should have faith that our mourning will be turned into joy if we beseech God with fasting and with prayer and we really put ourselves out there before God. In Daniel 9, it shows that Daniel also prayed and fasted and confessed to sins. Daniel 9. Let's go there and see this example. Daniel 9. Verse 3, Verse 3, And we have departed from God's precepts and His judgments. Neither have we heeded your servants the prophets who spoke in your name to our kings and our princes to our fathers and all the people of the land. O Lord, righteousness belongs to you, but to us, shame of face. As it is this day to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all Israel, those near and those far off in all the countries to which you have driven them, they were scattered because of their sins, because of the unfaithfulness which they have committed against you. O Lord, to us, belong shame of face to our kings, our princes, our fathers, because we have sinned against you.

We should all be willing to say the same thing. Daniel said it. He was a man of God, but he had sinned and he knew it. The people had sinned. They had rebelled against God. Don't think you haven't ever rebelled against God. I've rebelled against God. We all have. Every time we sin, we rebel against God.

O Lord, to us, belongs shame of face. We should be ashamed of our sins. Verse 9, to the Lord our God belongs mercy and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against him. Verse 10, we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to walk in his ways, in his laws which he set before us by his servants the prophets. Yes, all Israel has transgressed your law and has departed so as not to obey your voice. Therefore, the curse and the oath written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, have been poured out on us because we have sinned against him. And he has confirmed his words which he spoke against us by bringing upon us a great disaster, for under the whole heaven such has never been done as what has been done to Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us. Now, I think it's disastrous what's come upon the church of God over the years. I consider it a disaster. Don't you? Don't you think we've gone through a disaster in the church of God? We've been scattered. You know, brethren, we all need to repent more fully of our sins and turn to God more faithfully. If we're going to see the hemorrhaging stop in the future, if the blood is going to stop symbolically, if the bleeding is going to stop, we all have to turn to God. We all have to repent before God. We have to fast more often. We have to pray more fervently. We have to take it more seriously. Then we may see God work miraculously, as we've never seen Him work before.

I think we need to look at the fruits. God says, by the fruits you'll know. Let's look at the fruits. Let's take ownership.

Let's start with ourselves and accept the fact that we are sinners, that you are a sinner. I am a sinner. Let's start with ourselves. Let's repent of our sins. Let's fast more faithfully. Take it more seriously. Ask God to forgive us, and not only us, but all of us.

And if all of us will turn to God in fasting and in prayer, then we will see miraculous things begin to occur.

After this prayer that I just read in the book of Daniel, Gabriel continues to give Daniel understanding of the prophecy. We see here that it is okay to seek understanding in fasting. If you don't understand some things, fast more often so that God will give you understanding. As Daniel did. Daniel didn't understand the prophecy very well. He sought understanding. God revealed things to him.

It doesn't necessarily imply that God will give us prophetic understanding, but He may give us more understanding. The more we turn to Him, the more understanding we will have prophetically about many prophecies in the Bible.

Again, we see that fasting is always coupled with prayer, with supplication, with confessing the sins of both the individual, as well as the people that a person is fasting on behalf of. We should fast for each other. We see that the prophets not only confess the sins of the people and nation as a whole, but also their own personal sins. And notice the word, we, we, we. It happens over and over again. Jehoshaphat said it, Daniel said it, Esther said it. It's all about we. We go to God in fasting and prayer. So they weren't being self-righteous in their approach. Daniel acknowledges that the people have been wicked in breaking God's law. We don't have anything to be self-righteous about. Come on! What do you have to be self-righteous about? Are you that righteous? I don't have anything to be self-righteous about. So we accept God's law as good and as right and as the way we ought to live. We show honor to God. We show respect toward God when we do these things and we turn to God in fasting, admitting that we've sinned. Not just in the letter, but also in the Spirit. Christ came to show a better way. Christ came to show that if we look at a woman, we've lusted for her. We've sinned.

He said if you harbor hatred toward someone, if you can't forgive someone, you sinned. He showed us the Spirit of the law goes far beyond the letter. And those of us who have the Spirit of God, we're supposed to walk in the Spirit. So we are held more accountable. God does expect more from us. As His Church, we should be walking in the Spirit, putting the sin away and walking more faithfully with God. So Daniel goes to God and he bases his request on the great mercy of God. God is merciful and we should have faith in that mercy. This prayer got immediate results. Let's go to verse 16. Read a little bit further here.

Verse 16, O Lord, according to all your righteousness, I pray, let your anger and your fury be turned away from your city Jerusalem, your holy mountain, because for our sins and for the iniquity of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people are a reproach to all those around us. Now, therefore, our God, hear the prayer of your servant and his supplications, and for the Lord's sake, cause your face to shine on your sanctuary, which is desolate. The sanctuary is desolate. O my God, incline your ear and hear, open your eyes and see our desolations and the city, which is called by your name, for we do not present our supplications before you because of our righteous deeds but because of your great mercies. O Lord, hear, O Lord, forgive, O Lord, listen and act, do not delay for your own sake, my God, for your city and your people are called by your name. And then a great prophecy was revealed to Daniel here about the coming of the Messiah. So there is, again, great power in prayer and in fasting. There are many, many benefits of fasting in prayer.

There is much more that can be said, and I think I'll take a second sermon to go further in this particular topic. There is much more that can be said about it. God does want us to turn to Him in prayer and in fasting. There are many, many good reasons why we ought to fast more often than we do. Christ said His disciples would fast. Next time we'll go to that Scripture. We know that Paul fasted often. The Scripture in the New Testament says he fasted often. The early Christians fasted often. The early church fasted often. Again, we're all sinners and we need to be overcomers. We need to put the sin out of our life. Righteousness really does matter. We're to become unleavened in our conduct. We are to become unleavened in our thoughts, in our words, and in our actions. And we're never going to get there unless we use fasting as a tool. You're never going to make the progress you need to make in your life unless you are willing to start fasting more often. Fasting is a tool that you absolutely have to use. You absolutely have to do it. You can't make excuses for not doing it. You have to begin doing it. I have to do it more and we all have to do it more. Sometimes change doesn't take place except by prayer and fasting. I know that I want to change spiritually. I want to grow more now than I ever have in the past. I want to become stronger spiritually in the days ahead. And I know that you also want to be stronger spiritually. I want all of us to be more pleasing to God individually and as a local congregation. I want to see growth take place in this congregation and around the world. I know that you do as well. So prayer and fasting will make a real difference. Fasting is important. There is real power in fasting.