Life For The Innocent | A Study For The Fatherless, Widow, Orphan, & OppressedSample

Fasting & Feasting Pt. 1

The original mandate given to Adam by God, was to multiply, cultivate the world, and produce. Unfortunately, our world today is driven by consumption. We consume food, drink, programs, services, and most of all, people. The church, though it should be a glowing example of production and human flourishing, often turns into the same program-riddled machine that eats and wears people out as that of the world in which we live.

God, in his infinite wisdom, has provided a glorious answer to our consumption problem, fasting.

Most of us understand fasting as a food issue, and as a health aid. However, in God’s economy it is a human rights gift. For example, did you know that in our world today, we have enough food to feed every person on earth four complete and healthy meals a day? The reason why poverty exists is not in the lack of supply, but in distribution. The greedy, the rich, the entitled, and those gorging themselves beyond what they should on earth’s bounty, take the majority of the good, and leave the majority of the world left with nothing. If we as humans would learn to restrain the sins of our flesh rather than indulge ourselves, we would see a greater freedom throughout the world on every level.

Human trafficking exists because people everywhere are indulging wildly in their lusts and sick fantasies. Poverty exists because of obesity. Oppression exists because people abuse and thirst for power and supremacy. Land is tortured and exhausted because of greed; animals are abused and mistreated for profit, and everything that we see being depleted or robbed in any way, shape, or form, ultimately is testament to our sin-gone-wild.

We would like you to consider Isaiah 58 in your time with the Lord today. Consider the nature of the Israelites as they fasted. Consider your own pursuits today and how you might have stolen from others (e.g. kept your calendar too busy so you can’t stop for compassion, or how you are directly or indirectly responsible for your own out-of-control flesh). The good of the whole world rests on God’s work through our repentance and fasting!