If You Liquidise a Happy Meal, Does It Still Count?

So, yesterday we looked at an interesting piece of American history where the President actually decreed that there should be a National Day set aside for prayer and fasting - of course, the President was Abraham Lincoln, but who is he compared to the geniuses we have had in office recently? But no politics here, this post is about the practice of fasting - what do you actually do when you undertake a fast?

Essentially a fast is a relatively simple spiritual discipline which is not merely suggested in the bible but is expected. Jesus said in Matthew 6:16, "When you fast ..." and then he goes on to instruct us not to let our faces betray our internal hunger pains by running around looking pitiful because we haven't eaten breakfast.

The simplicity of fasting is this - we set aside a period of time in which we decide that we will deny our bodies the cravings that it has, in particular food, and focus our minds, souls and spirits on seeking the Lord. We have chosen to set aside 6 days for fasting - well, beginning after church on Sunday January 10th until after our special evenign celebration on Friday January 15th. So for that entire time, I want to encourage as many people in our church to decide that they will abstain from food and will only consume liquids.

I remember a number of years ago when my previous church was in the middle of a week long fast, there was a rumor going around that one of the guys had figured out that since we were fasting solid food and consuming water, a liquid, then maybe it would be ok if he put a steak in a blender and liquefied it. If you could get it up a straw then really, would it count against you in your fast?

Now please let common sense prevail, but I would encourage you to set your mind to only consuming liquids - primarily water, but other possibilities are fruit juices but really you should avoid any tea or coffee or any drink with caffeine in it.

But won't I be hungry? How will I cope in work without having something to eat all day? Well, the simple answer is, yes, you will be hungry, at least for the first two days, but not because you have to eat, but more because you are conditioned to eat - three squares a day. We most commonly eat not out of hunger, but out of habit. We eat lunch at the same time every day, even before we have any pains of hunger, we check our watch and determine it is time to eat. After a couple of days of ignoring those demands from your body, you will break the habit of eating and actually often begin to not feel hungry anymore. I know this is hard to believe, but it really does happen. The fasts that I have done that have been the least hunger driven were the ones where I only drank water and didn't drink anything else, no hot chocolate, or coffee or soup or broth - just water.

On another savory note, before you begin a fast, it is a good idea to eat a lot of fruit the day before so your morning constitution can clear the way so to speak. Once you begin your fast you will have nothing in your system to push along any digesting or completely digested food and there is a risk of constipation. The best way to cure this is to avoid it happening in the first place with a little preparation and planning of roughage and fruit the day before.

The most important thing about fasting is not the lack of food intake, but it is what you do with the time that you would normally have spent on preparation and even eating the meal. You have just instantly freed up a couple of hours in your day in which you can take some time to pray and seek God's face.

This can even be more difficult for some than going without food. For a fast to be an effective spiritual discipline we need to take time to seek the Lord. Most people can spend some time in prayer when they have a list of things that they can bring to God and ask Him to fix, heal, stop, start, whatever it is, it is always easier to pray when you have your list ready. But what about coming to God just to hang out with God? What about seeking Him just for the sake of seeking Him? That will be the subject of tomorrow's posting.