Humility and Fasting
Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. For zeal for your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me. When I wept and humbled my soul with fasting, it became my reproach…But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord. At an acceptable time, O God, in the abundance of your steadfast love answer me in your saving faithfulness. - Psalm 69
Our theme passage for this journey together is 2 Chronicles 7:14, which calls God’s people to humble prayer and repentance. In the Bible, fasting is associated with mourning (1 Samuel 1), with repentance and returning to the Lord (Joel 2:12-13), and with humbling oneself before God (Psalm 69; Psalm 35). True fasting and prayer described by Jesus in Matthew 6, never has a view to self-righteousness or trying to impress people. Fasting is part of our acknowledgment that we need God as our true food and drink and that we depend on him for all things at all times.
When he was tempted to turn stones into bread at the end of his 40 Day fast, Christ replied, “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4). In those words, we hear an echo of the prophet Jeremiah who said, “Your words were found, and I ate them, and they became to me the joy and the rejoicing of my heart” (Jeremiah 15). Feasting is a form of celebrating and filled with joy. Fasting is simply a different form of feasting.
In fasting, we are reminded that we are creatures blessed by the Creator with provision, that we are his servants empowered with his grace for our work, and his subjects ennobled by his truth. In fasting, we celebrate that we have God’s own word and will as our most needed food. The hunger we experience reminds us of how much we depend on God and not on ourselves, of how desperately we need him. Being satisfied with his word reminds us that our true treasure is Christ himself and that he alone can satisfy our souls.
Fasting isn’t the same thing as going hungry. In terrible times of famine and lack, people go hungry, but they experience this involuntarily and suffer great harm. Fasting is a choice to say ‘No’ to what my body demands so my soul can more fervently say ‘Yes’ to the sweetness of God’s word as my true feast and Christ as my life and strength.
O Lord, low as I am as a creature, I am lower still as a sinner. I have trampled your law times without number. Sin’s deformity is stamped upon me, darkening my brow and touching me with corruption. How can I be so proud? The lowest abasement is my due place. Help me to see myself in your sight and then pride must whither, decay, die, and perish. Humble my heart before you and replenish it with your choicest gifts. When I am tempted to think highly of myself, grant me to see the wily power of my spiritual enemy. Help me to cling with a determined grasp to my humble Lord. If I fall, let me hide myself in my Redeemer’s righteousness, and when I escape may I ascribe all deliverance to your grace. Keep me humble, meek, and lowly. Amen.
The Valley of Vision, a collection of Puritan Prayers
Quotable: “Prayer makes a godly man, and puts within him the mind of Christ, the mind of humility, of self-surrender, of service, of pity, and of prayer. If we really pray, we will become more like God, or else we will quit praying.” – E.M. Bounds