Fasting Exercises For Spiritual Health

“Fasting”; an Ancient Christian Personal Discipline

“Fasting is voluntarily going without food — or any other regularly enjoyed, good gift from God — for the sake of some spiritual purpose.”

Jesus assumes that his people will fast, although it is not a command (see Matthew 6:16 and Matthew 9:15)

Each one of us has to decide for ourselves exactly what it is that we will go without. We will all do this in different ways. Each one of us have to decide how long we will fast and why. Make sure you check with your doctor if you have any doubts about abstaining from food..

Firstly, please read this article.

http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/fasting-for-beginners.

Secondly, I am going to suggest the following for July 2017. We will update this later Let’s keep this simple!

  • Whatever you do, start after you meal on Monday night, 24 July and end with the potluck on the Sunday the 30th July at 6.00pm

  • As you fast, focus your thoughts and prayers on growth for ACPC. Also pray for specifically:

    • The people who come week by week and are the stalwarts of the Church

    • Those who maybe you haven’t see for a while

    • Those who you hadn’t seen before and met recently

    • The Parish Council and those leading home groups, Sunday School etc

  • Pray for refugees from Syria this week and especially those who have come to New Zealand

  • Lastly, for a completely different kind of fast, I suggest we all make sure that we “fast” from collecting plastic bags. This means a little strategic thinking about recycling old plastic bags or using other bags when shopping.

Fasting is both a personal and community discipline. This time we will make it more personal, so feel free to decide what this means for you – and there will be no checking up on you!

 

Stuart Vogel