Yes to Deeper Union

In Psalm 63 David is a King on the run. His wealth, power, and possessions have all been stripped away and he finds himself in a desert, fleeing for his life while his own son tries to kill him. And yet, in this season of pain, David’s deepest longings are satisfied by God’s presence. Though most of us today won’t experience our lives endangered in a desert, we will find ourselves in seasons of desert pain at some point or another. But unlike David, our impulse to avoid pain prevents us from experiencing satisfaction in God as we often seek comfort in our “cheaper desires.” To help us refocus our attention to God, train ourselves to find true satisfaction, and experience more of our union with Him, we practice fasting.

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 Psalm 63, starting in verse 1, it says, God, you are my God. I eagerly seek you. I thirst for you. My body faints for you in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water. So I gaze on you in the sanctuary to see your strength and your glory. My lips will glorify you because your faithful love is better than life.

So I will bless you as long as I live. At your name I will lift up my hands.

This is one of my favorite Psalms. It’s a beautiful Psalm that was written by David in one of the most brutal seasons of his life. It’s kind of hard to tell that, of course, because this is so poetic. And beautiful, but the heading of this chapter, or other people would call it a superscript, the little tiny, uh, context, right when you see the number 63, gives us the context that David did not write this while at Disneyland.

He wrote this in the desert. Specifically, the wilderness of Judah and commentators all agree this points to likely when David was on the run from a coup for over three decades up to this point in the writing of the psalm, David ruled justly, not always perfectly. We’ve done a series on David before, but he was a good king over Jerusalem.

The people loved him and he was a man after God’s own heart. But one day a man sought to usurp his kingship. Something we’ve seen throughout history time and time again, but what made this Even more devastating, it was from his own son, Absalom. What he would do for a few years, he would sit in front of the gate, and as people were coming to see the king and bring about their grievances, he would pull them aside and whisper deceit and try to plant into their ears and their minds that he would be a better king.

Much better than his father. And after some political maneuvering, he actually gained the throne by force. David got word, and he escaped. And this was the betrayal of the worst kind. He had no choice. It was either to die, or to run to the desert. And it’s in this context We get one of the most profound prayers in all of Scripture.

Because of your faithful love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. And I’d actually dare to say that little to none of us have experienced the depths of this prayer. It’s not because we aren’t David, it’s not because this is just reserved for the spiritual elites, but I believe it’s because the moment we’re in.

You and I likely haven’t ventured away from pleasure long enough to see what’s on the other side. Unlike David, who found joy in the wilderness, we live in a culture that does everything to avoid such discomfort. Psychologists actually call this the pleasure principle. Simply put, we’ve been trained since birth to only choose what feels good.

And parents, we do the same. Let’s just do whatever Makes them stop talking. I’m learning to not say, shut up. Do not stop talking and just have some comfort. But logically we all know pain is necessary to the abundant life. It’s why you and I love Rocky 1, 2, and 3. Because pain is a part of the journey. But emotionally, we run from anything that’s remotely difficult.

And I found even for me, if life circumstances are unavoidably painful, we find ways to medicate ourselves with pseudo pleasures to take the edge off. So I would argue our culture has been in a decades long experiment of maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain. I just want to ask you this morning, where is that actually getting us?

Anxiety is at an all time high. Depression is more common than ever, even among our teenagers. And despite having endless entertainment at our fingertips, we’re lonelier than ever, we’re more restless, and we’re more dissatisfied. Good morning, everybody. Welcome to church. Looking at our cultural moment, J. W.

Richards, one of the recommended reads we have for this practice, puts it this way, quote, Our ancestors were victims of scarcity. We, in contrast, are victims of abundance. As an old monk once said, the devil sits at the summit. This is why I love Psalm 63 so much, because David, before this desert moment, had everything a person could ever want.

He had power, he had influence, he had wealth, he was going down in the history books, and yet, it was in the wilderness. When everything was stripped away, that he found something better than life itself. Jesus later put it this way, quote, whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. So, Is there a way you and I can lose our life for his sake and thus find it?

Is there a way that you and I can voluntarily go to the desert without our sons or daughter betraying us? Is there a practice from the way of Jesus that weans us off the pleasure principle and ushers us into a deeper union with God? And I would argue, yes, there are many, but chief among them is the practice of fasting.

Fasting is our focus, specifically in February, but all the way leading up to Easter. You’re gonna love Easter, cause we’ll stop talking about fasting, at least for a couple weeks. Uh, I had a lady at church I was talking to this week. And she said, uh, she was mentioning how everybody’s excited about fasting.

And she’s like, that’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever experienced in a church. People are excited about fasting. And I thought, well, they are until they try it. You know, all of a sudden everything comes a little bit different. I do want to note a few things as we begin, as we talk about fasting. I thought Pastor Caleb did a wonderful job introing our practice.

But I also just want to make sure context is set. this morning. First, I want to answer the simple question, what is fasting? At its most simplest form, it’s abstaining from food for a set period of time. Your PlayStation is not food, okay? Your social media intake is not food. If you are getting away from the news, which I think will be good for you, That is not fasting.

That’s abstaining. And abstaining is a wonderful practice. In fact, fasting is within the context of abstaining. But fasting, throughout church history, until us Americans, we like to personalize everything, and our own, add our own little twist, Christians have always understood that fasting meant abstaining from food.

By the way, it’s from all food. I remember when I was younger. I declared I’m gonna fast from cheeseburgers So I just went to Chick fil a a lot Thinking I am so honoring the Lord that it’s not fasting. That’s dieting. Okay, and that’s okay I’m not your doctor. Don’t ask what you’re supposed. I have no idea but it’s not fasting Fasting is just drinking water.

In fact, actually sometimes it’s doing nothing for three days Again, check with your doctor before doing some of these things, but we see that as an example in the content and the scriptures, uh, it’s drinking water or some people say it’s okay to have juice or black coffee. I did have a friend one time tell me, Hey, brother, we’re in the new covenant.

If it fits through a straw, it’s still considered fasting. And I thought, what about those boba straws? You know, just those huge ones. And my ninja can really whip up an in and out burger. And I was. Leaning towards that direction, 18 or 19 years old and the Lord gently was like, you have missed the point of fasting.

This whole idea of set period of time actually contains all sorts of freedoms within it. It can be one meal, for some of you, especially this month, that’s all you need to do. I know my wife loves breakfast, and so I’ve been telling her that’s a great start. And, uh, we were in New York City this Week and she said, I’ll fast from something else.

New York bagels. They are a must. And I couldn’t argue that other fast or two meals. What’s most common, I would say, or one day fast or from sunrise to sunset. So motivation to wake up at four in the morning. Get your food in for the day. Uh, there’s also a three day fast in scriptures. We see that in Esther and she asked people don’t drink food.

I’m sorry. Don’t drink food like I did with the ninja thing. No, but don’t drink water or food for three days. Again, consult your doctor, but we do have evidence of that in the scriptures. Also in the Bible, you see 10 day fasts. Some would argue a 21 day fast. It depends on your understanding of Daniel in chapter 10 anyways.

Most famously, you have a lot of 40 day fasts. These are difficult. But what’s amazing is you see these type of fasts with all sorts of people in the Bible. Moses, Augustine would argue, Moses represented the law and he fasted 40 days and 40 nights. He actually did it twice. So what are you doing with your life?

Uh, Elijah, he represents the prophets and he fasted for 40 days and 40 nights. I hate the 40 nights part. Like days was enough. And then Jesus, who represents the new covenant and all things grace. He fasted also 40 days. So I think it’s really helpful right away to push back to some of our obvious, like, misunderstandings.

It’s not just an Old Testament thing. Jesus, his disciples, and the church in Acts. We’ll look at Acts 13 likely next week. They all fasted. But here’s what’s interesting about fasting in the biblical text. In all of the library of scripture, there’s not an exact formula for fasting. It doesn’t say, here’s the kind of cup you should buy, and here’s the biggest size straw you can get.

It’s just in the narrative, which I find it to be beautiful. You kind of pick up on this idea of fasting all throughout the scriptures. And so we wanted to consolidate that for you, instead of having to read your entire Bible this week. From our studies of the Bible and church history, there are basically four reasons we fast.

Number one is to say no to cheaper desires. This was formedbyjesus. com slash fasting if you missed it. It was such a good word. Basically, our flesh is used to having its way. I read multiple authors in the study for this series, reference our stomachs as spoiled children and spoiled children. You know what they need to be disciplined, not to be coddled.

And so it’s been so fun to hear you talk about how your stomach’s not okay with it. And I’m like, I know it’s a spoiled child. Now I literally, I just full disclosure. I’ve had someone leave our church a couple of years ago because I made that statement. Please talk to me before doing that. There is a little bit of love there, but it’s also true.

Hearing that helped change my life. Uh, with saying no to cheaper desires, it’s because we are mastered, as Paul would use, specifically in Galatians, we are mastered by our cravings, and therefore we have little to no self control when it comes to not just saying no to food, but saying no to anger, or lust, or jealousy, drunkenness, envy, and gossip.

So it’s incredible, and I hope you’ve seen this in your life, even just this past week. Saying no to Food for the glory of God empowers us to say no to greater temptations or to put negatively if you can’t say no to food. It’s likely you don’t say no to many other temptations of the flesh. So honestly, even if you only fasted to discipline the flesh, you would see all sorts of benefits for your body, even from a health perspective.

I love how the Bible always, the science continues to prove it just to be right in all things of life. There are major health benefits. Let me just show you again. Let me emphasize, I am not a doctor, but this is what I read one time about what it happens, when it happens in your stomach for the first four hours after eating.

It’s called digesting. The body is feeding on energy from food in your stomach. But at 16 hours, which let’s be honest, our culture has been created where you don’t wait 16 hours. Naturally are at 16 hours. Our body actually switches from burning glucose for energy to burning fat. And this is what’s called ketosis.

This is why some people call it the keto diet. It’s also depending on what you eat for that diet. But, this is why I have intermittent fasted for years. It’s been very helpful for me. I feel like that burning of fat is much healthier for your body. But here’s what’s fascinating. At 24 hours, and most of us can’t get there.

Let’s just have grace for all of us today. But if you get to the full 24 hours, your body now shifts into autophagy. This is a Greek word meaning self eating. What it does though is it cleanses your body from old cells and dead cells and damaged cells. I even have a friend that I know on YouTube, once he found out he had stage 4 cancer, he began to fast long lengths of time and he is still living today.

Again, consult your doctor. I’m about to get out of all of this, but research is showing. It does kick out these cells that with their left unchecked, it leads to things like cancer and chronic illness. Okay, no more doctor stuff. Number two, why do we fast is to say yes to deeper union. It’s one thing to say no to cheaper desires.

It’s a whole nother thing to say yes to deeper union with Jesus. And I would argue. This is where the money’s at. This is our aim today. But quickly, the other two reasons, number three is to confess your need, and number four is to contend for your neighbor. Come the next two weeks to hear more. Should be up on the next slide.

Uh, we are going to cover those remaining two in the next two weeks. Now, quickly, again, if those are the, I’m nerding out, just stay with me. If those are the basic reasons to fast, the next question I obviously So the question that we continuously have is, how often should we fast? And the way I view fasting with church history and reading the scriptures, is I see it in two forms.

You have fasting as cadence, or like a rhythm, and fasting in crisis. So first, it’s a cadence thing. The dream for our church. And I am idealistic, I understand that. But the dream for Passion Creek is that we lean into this practice so much this month, that it forms us so deeply, that it becomes a weekly thing.

During the time of Jesus, actually, the Jews would fast twice a week. And so the early church adopted that same model, but with a twist. I love it. The Didache, which, by the way, was one of the first Christian writings outside of the New Testament. It was a great little book on just like how to live the Christian life.

And I do want to just like speak against the lie that fasting is for the spiritually elite. The Didache in the early church, when you got saved, one of the first things you did was fast. It’s not something you wait 10 years for. They would even say before you get baptized fast for two days in preparation because there is so much truth behind spiritual warfare when you make that decision to get baptized.

So the didache lays out what you should do when you begin to follow Jesus. What we’re doing in all these practices, they shouldn’t be for elites. This should be for you and for me. says the following, though, in this little book. It says, quote, Do not let your fasting be with the hypocrites, for they fast on Monday and Thursday, but you should fast on Wednesday and Friday.

That’s why I don’t think this is scripture. First of all, the hypocrite, if you’re fasting twice a week, you will not hear me call you a hypocrite unless it’s like a Pharisee, but we’ll move on Wednesday. So why Monday, Thursday, that was the Jewish calendar. And so the early church was like, we’re not Jewish.

We’re the new covenant. Let’s be cool. Wednesday, Friday, we’re the best and so Wednesday was because that’s when Jesus was betrayed by Judas. So in solidarity with Jesus there, Friday’s because of course good Friday where Jesus was crucified for our sins. But this doesn’t, wasn’t just for the early church.

We see this as an expectation even all the way up to the 1700s. John Wesley, shout out to him, he said the following, I fear there are now thousands of Methodists, so called, both in England and Ireland, who, following the same bad example, have entirely left off fasting, who are so far from fasting twice in the week, as all the stricter Pharisees did, that they do not fast twice in the month.

You know who you are. What excuse can there be for this? I imagine he didn’t have many friends, but this was his level of expectation, and how far are we from that? J. W. Richards, I already quoted him previously, it’s in his book called Eat Fast Feast. He argues this cadence is rooted in history, and it’s actually really good for you medically.

Quote, a careful outsider observer, circa A. D. 600, would have noted that Christians ate modestly on most days, ate little or nothing on Wednesdays and Fridays. This is my favorite part of the quote. And feasted on Sundays. I hear you. Yeah, we’re still a fist feasting people. We still believe in hospitality and it’s such a good balance He actually goes on to argue in his book I think it’s such a good read that fasting is actually hear me harder for you and me in the West than all of history and it’s because of how the Capitalist market is designed and what they have made for you to not just eat but to graze all day and the types of foods that we eat make us so dependent, even if we take four hours off, our stomach just craves it.

I was just talking to somebody right before, I never ask permission so I can never say the guy’s name, but we were talking before and he even just mentioned how he stopped drinking soda for the past 30 days and it’s hard in the beginning, right? But even after 30 days, he tried one yesterday. He’s like, this stuff is gross.

And that’s what happens. But that first initial shock really is hard. But then he goes on to argue, this should be our new food rhythm. Quote, right away, you’ll start to acclimate yourself to the pattern that you should follow for most of your life. Regular eating much of the time, which I think we don’t know what regular eating is right from again, this can be.

So triggering and so please know that some of this is in jest. I know that some of us struggle with eating and so please know we’ve put that in the guide. We understand some of us can’t fast and just want to make sure that’s clear. But so regular eating much of the time, fasting some of the time, and feasting every so often.

But there’s also times, so that’s the cadence and my desire is maybe, just maybe, you and I begin to fast once a week as a group. Like our together groups kind of pick a day and we all fast that same time. But the other way to fast is when crisis hits. When it feels like you have no idea what to do next or where to go next, you fast.

When you are burdened about the salvation of your neighbors and loved ones, you fast. When someone is sick or dying, you fast. We’re gonna focus a lot on the crisis part these next two Sundays. We want to be a church that fasts in crisis, but the dream is for our church is that we develop a cadence of fasting that consecrate ourselves for the presence of God alone.

Without a mind, quickly turn with me to Matthew chapter six. Matthew chapter six is one of the times Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount talks about fasting. It’s pretty fascinating. He assumes that we’ll fast. He actually mentions three practices, prayer, fasting, and generosity. Look what we’ve done. And September was generosity, now is fasting.

And in May, if you stick around, we’ll talk about prayer. Three cornerstone practices to the Christian faith. Many of us, though, as we’re about to read, we read this passage and think the only point is to fast in a way that nobody knows about it. But I actually think there’s a deeper meaning. Matthew 6, verse 16.

Whenever you fast, don’t be gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so that their fasting is obvious to people. Truly, I tell you, they have their reward. But when you fast. put oil on your head and wash your face so that your fasting isn’t obvious to others, but to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you a few quick observation.

One, Jesus doesn’t command us. Actually to fast, but he assumes that we will. So I will not, throughout this month and my life, never command you to fast, because who am I if Jesus didn’t do that? But I would hope, like Jesus, we invite you into it. Number two, just a quick observation, he says don’t look miserable.

Richard Foster argues one reason why Jesus says not to look miserable is because you aren’t. Now, yes, the first time you’ll fast, you’ll want to eat your arm off. I get it. But if this becomes a rhythm in your life, you will soon forget those early pains. And it will become some of the sweetest, most profound blessings in your life.

Look how you actually feel on the inside. It is such a joy. to fast. But number three, and most importantly, an observation from these three verses, is that it’s the Father who is the reward. It’s to see the Father and for the Father to see you. That is why we fast, to commune with our Heavenly Father. John Piper, he helps us tremendously on this.

I think, again, we get so focused on doing this in our closet, we miss the whole point. He says the following, being seen fasting and fasting to be seen are not the same. So I love it. Some of you have said like, this is awkward because if I talk about fasting in group, I’m already breaking Jesus command about doing it in secret.

I think His heartbeat here was to the Pharisees. The heartbeat here was, we can do this in community. But always check your heart and your spirit. If you’re boasting about fasting, then you should stay quiet. But if it’s a genuine, how are you doing? How is this working? Here’s how I’m struggling. What a joy it is to do that in community.

But we go down that rabbit trail so long about oh, nobody should hear about me fasting. I don’t want to be rewarded if other people see me. We forget the whole point of fasting. Jesus is saying it’s to be with God to prove that point. That’s why a few chapters later in Matthew chapter 9 Jesus answers John the Baptist disciples because they’re probably hangry when they go to Jesus because they say, Hey, Jesus, how come your folks don’t fast?

We fast, the Pharisees fast, and your guys, you’re feasting all the time. And he answers by saying, look, he will, they will fast soon, but when the bridegroom is here, it’s time to party. Which is the point of saying why do we fast is because we sense his presence. We, we long for him, but we know he is not in the here and now.

There is a distance between us and so we fast in order to close that gap. So according to Jesus, why do we fast? I think put simply, it’s to linger in God’s presence, or to put theologically, it’s to deeper your union with God. Deeper union is alluding to this doctrine, one of my favorite doctrines called union with Christ.

This is, I believe, foundational to the gospel and all theology, and like a diamond, it has many different. And every time you turn and think about union with Christ in a different way, it’s stunningly beautiful, beautiful. But let me explain two basic elements behind union with Christ. First, union with Christ refers to right standing with God.

This is primarily what I learned about union with Christ when I was growing up and I’m so grateful for it. In other words, when we confess and surrender to Jesus as Lord and Savior, we are united with God. Christ in his death, in his burial and his resurrection. He fully adopts us as his own and we gain his inheritance and his righteousness becomes our own.

We are legally justified in Christ. And so this union is once and for all. And hear me Fasting does not add or take away to your right standing with God. Other religions would say you need to fast in order to secure your salvation. It’s how you appease an angry God and make sure that you’re in right standing in perpetuity.

We do see, let me be fair, in the book of Jonah, Jonah tells the Ninevites to repent, and how do they repent? They both, they respond in faith, and alongside of their faith was the practice of fasting. But hear me clearly, it’s by grace, by grace we are saved through faith, not through fasting. Fasting may accompany it, but it’s not it.

So let me put it this way, fasting does not earn you God’s love. So now you’re thinking, then why do it at all? Cause food is pretty great, and if I’m already righteous Righteous, right? Look, the other element to union with Christ is light living with God. Take that phrase from Jesus in Matthew 10, 28, that his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

To reference our message just a couple weeks ago, right standing is getting you into heaven, but light living is getting heaven into you. Rosario Butterfield put it this way, although all believers have this union, if you do not exercise your faith. Build it up, make it strong, depend upon it, engage in all the means of grace, which we would say is fasting, one of them, as often as possible, the blessings of it might not flourish as God intends.

When union with Christ is not enjoyed, the cares of the world, does that remind you of our Mark 4 passage, the chokeholds, the cares of the world sneak up and steal our joy in the Lord and weaken our faith. So again, let’s look at Psalm 63. And let’s see how David, this psalm, is not to guarantee right standing with God.

That has already been secure in Christ Jesus. But he is experiencing light living in the desert because he is seeking to deepen his union. Verse 1 again. God, you are my God. Notice the personal possessiveness. I eagerly seek you. I Thirst for you. My body faints for you in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water.

So I gaze on you in the sanctuary to see your strength and your glory. My lips will glorify you because your faithful love is better than life. So I will bless you as long as I live. At your name I will lift up my hands. You satisfy me as with rich food, and that’s, by the way, fasting is. You are more important than food.

So this satisfaction I look for in food, I’m actually finding it more in you. My mouth will praise you with joyful lips. There is one Hebrew word in the middle of this prayer that transforms David’s joy in life. In the desert, is he excited and filled with hope because he heard he’s getting his throne back?

No, he’s not sure that’s even coming. Is he happy and excited because he has a ton of food? No, many commentators would argue he has no food. It’s just that God was his food and his sustenance. Then the key word here, what is it? What is the key line in this prayer? It’s faithful love. Your faithful love is better than life.

And that Hebrew word is Chesed. There actually isn’t one English word that describes chesed. So you’ll see in your translations oftentimes loyal kindness, loving kindness. Steadfast love, your mercies, your faithful love. Paul also realized when he was writing in Greek that there was no one Greek word to describe hesed.

And so that’s why he wrote all of first Corinthians 13. He took this word agape and said, let me describe hesed. So hesed is love and love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It keeps no record of wrongs. This whole description of first Corinthians 13, he’s trying to communicate something the Hebrews have always known.

About Chesed. But what does this Chesed love really look like. It’s one thing to gain a definition of it. It’s another to step into a powerful story in scripture, one that shows us what it means to To have a God that is relentless in his pursuit of loving us. And one of the many stories we see in scripture that I think communicates Chesed really well is the story of Hosea and Gomer.

Anybody ever heard of Hosea? He’s a prophet, minor prophet, meaning it’s a short book in the Old Testament. He’s a prophet and man. Here’s his, uh, calling. His assignment was to marry Gomer, who already at that point was a prostitute. But God said, hey, marry Gomer, because I am going to show you what my love is like.

And so despite Hosea’s undying faithfulness, you’ll read in the story, Gomer cheats on Hosea time and time again. Gomer, uh, I mean, Hosea doesn’t deserve that. Hosea is a wonderful husband. But Gomer just can’t seem to wean herself off the pleasure principle long enough to see what’s on the other side, to see the beauty of Hosea.

And now a lot of us, when we read that story, we need to be reminded, you and I are not Hosea. We aren’t the ones chasing after God, hoping that he loves us. That’s a misunderstanding many of us have of fasting. No, we are the ones who find ways, time and time again, to run the other way. Where we, in the words of Jesus, get caught up and choked out by the worries of this age, the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desires for other things.

And yet, this hesed keeps pursuing us all the more. David, in another psalm, Psalm 23, his most famous psalm, said in verse six, Only goodness and chesed, faithful love will pursue me. Other translations say, will chase me all the days of my life. Brothers and sisters, we are Gomer, but we have a Hosea who is faithful in pursuing us.

But here’s my invitation to myself and to others. What if we stop being like Gomer? What if we stop pursuing the indulgences of this world and open our eyes to see the beauties of the gospel? Not in a way that we can earn it. We can never earn it, but it’s already ours. To put it another way, look, we don’t fast to make ourselves more precious to God.

We fast to make God more precious to us. Put it another way, fasting doesn’t earn you God’s love, but it does turn you to God’s love that was already yours in Christ Jesus. To adapt a line from Richard Foster, he said this about prayer, but the same can be said about fasting. Fasting isn’t about gritting your teeth, it’s about falling in love.

Because your faithful love is better than life. You supply me as with rich food. So how do you know that you’re deepening your union with God? Let’s put it another way, how do we know fasting is actually starting to work? Let me encourage you, it’s very likely you won’t have this David moment this week.

Maybe you will, but stay encouraged and keep pressing on. But let’s look at verse one, I think this gives us a clue to know how it’s working. God, you are my God, I eagerly seek you, I thirst for you, my body faints for you in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water. How do you know fasting is taking its root?

How do you know you’re deepening your union with God? When your thirst for God outweighs your thirst for water. When your hunger for the Father is so much more than your hunger for food. The last few months I’ve been trying to lean into this practice even more. I have had this as a regular routine in my life since 2018, but I’ve been trying to crank it up a notch because I think that’s what pastors should do in order to, you know, ethically teach from this position.

So since October in specific, I’ve been, um, fairly consistent in going out on a run, fasting more often, and using that time to pray. But pretty quickly I started to feel this weird ache in the morning. Now, it’s not because I was running a 5K. It’s not that kind of ache. It was like a soul ache. And so, I would like, literally, I couldn’t wait to get outside and just run and then walk and talk to God.

And every day, it wasn’t depression because there was still a joy in the middle of it. But it was, it was a straining. I think the best word would be an agony. So I was doing this over and over, and I remember sometime in December, I finally had a chat with God. I said, God, I am coming to you. Can you take away this agony?

Like, I, I get it in the beginning, but can you be kind to me? Like, I’m so thirsty for you. Can you just satisfy me with your presence? Can I just get over this, this borderline depression? And God, in his gentleness, removed that ache and took away that thirst. A couple weeks later, I look at my Apple watch and notice I haven’t ran in a while.

I looked at my prayer journal and noticed that it was empty. And I started to say to God, can you give me that ache again?

See, what we see here in verse one, and I hope this is encouraging to you. It’s actually a sense of God’s absence that’s a sign of God’s presence. How do you know you’ve been invited to enter into his presence? You miss him. Do you miss him? My prayer for our church is that we’d be a people that senses his absence and does whatever it takes to draw closer to him.

If it means skipping in and out, I’m in. In and out. Okay, I’m sorry. But, I’ll do what it takes. What would it look like if our church was so aching for the presence of God that we all got here early to pray over the space? What would it look like if our Saturdays turned from once a month to every Saturday?

What if it was, guys, we can end at nine, but you can go, but what if we stayed and lingered because we ache for his presence? We thirst for him. Our, our bodies are fainting for him. And I get it. This is so hard because there’s so many. Pseudo pleasures to run to, to remove the ache. But where does that lead us?

So this is why we are inviting our church to fast. Fasting takes time. It takes a whole lot of grace. And you will cheat. I’ve done that often. Alright, Lord, I’ll eat at five. Till three. Uh, you know, I, I did as much as I could, Lord. These kids are wearing me out. So up at formedyjesus. com slash fasting, you will practice fasting and process it in your groups this week.

Here’s what this week we’re hoping that you do to take up this invitation. Number one, choose one or two days. Ooh, two to fast this week. Blame Pastor Caleb, not me. Number two, during your normal mealtime, pray. If you’re like me, I do get distracted, and so the only way I can do that is to go out for a walk.

So I encourage you to do that, so like, you’re killing the game, right? You’re like, not, you’re like, less calories and walking? Come on, you know? We are ready for summer, okay? Number three, memorize John 15, 5 through 8. I actually think this is Jesus’s metaphor of Chesed, because Chesed has this idea of being attached.

And, uh, the vine and the branch is, it has no life if it’s not fully attached. And Jesus is saying, we have attached, uh, I have attached myself to you, but will you attach yourself to me? And so, memorize that. So it’s another great way to, on that walk, just have a screenshot or write down. It’s even better.

On a paper, John 15, 5 through 8, and say it over and over, and whatever comes to the surface, bring it before God. And the last big encouragement we want to encourage you with, we did not come up with this. Saints have used this throughout church history, but when a hunger pain comes up, use this breath prayer, more than I want food, Lord, I want you.

More than I want food, Lord, I want you. One last encourage, no, let me give you two more encouragements and we’ll be done. In the beginning, hear me, you’ll be more focused on your reunion with food than you are on your union with the Father. Trust me. But that’s a part of the process. Keep leaning in. Keep setting your gaze on God.

Get honest with Him. This is why we say we train to become like Him. Because it takes time. My last encouragement to you is you don’t have to do this. If this feels like a duty, if this feels like you’re earning God’s love, don’t do it this week. Fasting is not a command in scripture. So you don’t have to do it now.

Don’t be rude about it. Don’t be like, Oh, you’re fasting this week. Like encourage the saints in Christ Jesus who are seeking to actually do this. And in group, don’t be so cynical that you’re making people feel bad that they tried. And I do hope you try, but you don’t have to. And that’s the beauty of the gospel.

It’s not a series of to do lists. It’s just a bunch of invitations. Your right standing is secured if you’ve put your faith and trust in King Jesus. But the invitation’s on offer to continue to lean into that light living. To not just try to get into heaven, Jesus did that for you, but to practice the way of Jesus so heaven gets more and more into you.

Let’s pray.