Voter’s Guides are Available in Ministry Galley. I encourage each one of you to vote. Today we conclude our series Seven Practice of a Healthy Christian. And our focus this morning is on the mouth. I call on our church to a Week of Prayer and a Day of Fasting for World Missions. For this reason November 4-11 is a special week and November 11 is a special day. As you prayerfully consider this, I am asking you to do four things.
1. I’m Calling on you to pray Luke 10:2 at 10:02 am and 10:02 pm.
“The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (Luke 10:2).
Set your alarms on your clocks, your egg timers, and your smart phones. Regardless of how you remind yourself, I want our entire church praying at 10:02 am and 10:02 pm for world missions. You’ll receive some beautiful prayer cards next week for missionaries. Use these to pray for these men and women at 10:02 am and 10:02 pm.
2. I’m Calling on You to Pray for 24 Hours on Saturday, November 10 – Sunday, November 11.
You can sign up for a fifteen-minute prayer time by going to www.nrhbc.org/24. You can pray wherever you are. I encourage you to use the World Mission Week Prayer Guide in today’s Worship Guide.
3. I’m Calling on You to Give to our $75,000 Goal for the World Mission Offering on Sunday, November 11.
The children are helping out by their “Quarter Mile” campaign. Again, our goal is to raise $75,000 for missions in One Day. I ask every one of you to give something – even if it’s just a quarter. Pray specifically about what the Lord would have you give. We’ll announce the total by the end of the third service on November 11. I’m so eager to meet our World Mission’s Goal of $400,000 by the end of the year.
4. I’m Calling on You to Fast for 24 Hours.
As we pray for 24 hours, I am calling on you to fast for these same 24 hours. Many of us will fast from food while others will fast from TV or social media. Let me go over those four things again.
1. I’m Calling on you to pray Luke 10:2 at 10:02 am and 10:02 pm.
2. I’m Calling on You to Pray for 24 Hours on Saturday, November 10 – Sunday, November 11.
3. I’m Calling on You to Give to our $75,000 Goal for the World Mission Offering on Sunday, November 11.
4. I’m Calling on You to Fast for 24 Hours.
My goal today is to create a greater hunger for Christ that you are currently experiencing. I want you and I to hunger for His presence with greater passion. I want you and I to hunger for God more than the nice, gentle pleasures such as TV-watching and Internet-surfing… …family meals and gardening… …reading and decorating… …traveling and investing.
I want you to leave here sensing that something is missing and you want more of God. Why Should You Fast? Fasting is the pushing back from some form of physical gratification, for a short time, in order to achieve a greater spiritual goal. Fasting is not just focused on food. Instead, fasting is about the appetite. While I introduced this topic thinking about the mouth, I could have just as easily pointed to the finger that controls the remote control that controls your life. Fasting is about pushing back from anything that is a substitute for God.
1. Warning! Sharks Are Looming!
The deep, probing notes of Steven Speilberg’s classic film is but two notes (E and F) and each note represents a chilling effect as JAWS comes from underneath the deep waters for his victim. The “da-dum” is the most widely recognizable music score in movie history. When you think about fasting, it might be appropriate to hear the musical score for the movie JAWS playing.
Let me explain why this relates to fasting. Placing attention on fasting is dangerous business. Placing attention on our performance is dangerous. There were two men standing in the Temple. One said “I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get” (Luke 18:12). The other man standing in the Temple that day said, “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’” (Luke 18:13b). There is a strange wickedness that passes for religion throughout history. Unconverted people come into church with a real desire to change and only find ways to further corrupt their hearts by following external commands at the expense of leaving their hearts as black as before. The first man’s sin was simple: he wanted others to view him as religious. He wanted others to view him as moral. He wanted the feeling of superiority.
Fasting also receives a special warning from the lips of Jesus: “that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret” (Matthew 6:18). Fasting to be noticed is hypocrisy. There is a danger in doing the spiritual habits we’ve talking about throughout this series. When you do them, some of you will break your arm patting yourself on the back. The danger is to silently gloat. Listen to one more time to the words of Jesus found in Luke 18: “The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortionists, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get’” (Luke 18:11-12). On more than one occasion, Jesus calls the Pharisees “vipers” (Matthew 12:34; 23:33; Luke 3:7).
Christianity is first an internal religion and then (and only then) is it an external religion. But if you do an end-run around the internal change of heart that Christ makes at conversion and focus only on the external, then you’ll be a hypocrite. And Jesus considers hypocrisy more dangerous than a one-ton shark coming at you from underneath the surface of the water. Jesus considers external first religion (hypocrisy) to be more dangerous than swimming with the sharks without a shark cage. Hypocrisy receives the death sentence from the lips of Jesus. If you do religion for the benefit of others then you are by definition a hypocrite. If you were to look up the word hypocrite in Webster’s Dictionary, then you’ll see a picture of a guy who is more worried about what others think of him that what God thinks of him. And if you do fasting to be seen by others, then hear the soundtrack of Jaws. You are in dangerous waters. So I repeat: Placing attention on fasting is dangerous business. Placing attention on our performance is dangerous.
Today’s Text is found on page 1027 in your pew Bible:
And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4 But he answered, “It is written,
“‘Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 3:16-4:4).
Leaving aside the dangers of fasting, let’s push on to why fasting makes the list of spiritual practices.
2. Fasting to Whet Your Appetite
It’s important to note that Fasting is a spiritual discipline that is not limited to Christianity only. The Muslim holy days of Ramadan are a month long observance where fasting from food, drink, and sex between sunrise and sunset. Jewish adherents recently observed Yom Kippur (Tuesday evening and Wednesday, September 25-26, 2012). It marks the holiest of days in the contemporary Jewish calendar. And to observe Yom Kippur, Jewish people fast for about 25 hours. Christians have fasted for centuries. The Didache, a manual of church instruction from the beginning of the second century says: Let not your fasts be with the hypocrites, for they fast on Mondays and Thursdays, but do your fast on Wednesdays and Fridays. (7:1)
In other words the early church sought to distance itself of the emptiness of fasting without losing the value of the practice. So Christians have a long history with fasting. Yet in contrast to our Muslims and Jewish friends, the reason Christians fast is to whet our appetite for Jesus. Our fasting is unique because it has to do with who Jesus is. The scene is an important in Matthew’s Gospel because it signals that John the Baptist is about to move from center stage. Now the spotlight will shift to focus on Jesus. The scene is the baptism of Jesus by what the New Testament calls the forerunner, John the Baptist. John receives his name because he baptized, or immersed, people for the purpose of the remission of sins. Jesus is baptized not because He is a sinner; indeed, Jesus never sinner nor did He even think an incorrect thought.
Matthew is the only Gospel writer to record the conversation between John the Baptist and Jesus. The conversation goes to show why Jesus was baptized and John’s hesitancy in baptizing Jesus. Jesus is baptized to obey God’s will: “John would have prevented him, saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?’ 15 But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.’ Then he consented” (Matthew 3:15-16).
Jesus is identified with sinners everywhere and He’ll later die on behalf of these sinners. More could be said about this but for the interest of time, I press on. As soon as Jesus is baptized (see verse 16), the heavens opened and the Spirit of God descended on Jesus as a dove. For a brief moment, the barrier between this world and heaven was set aside so that there could be some form of communication between the two.
Luke says it more explicitly than does Matthew: “and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased’” (Luke 3:22).
This is one of the few times in the New Testament where all three members of the Trinity are present (see also Matthew 28:19). God the Father speaks. The Son is baptized. And the Holy Spirit descends. All Three are One and all three are God. The text signals that the Spirit is empowering the Son as we’ll see in just a moment from Matthew 4:1. God’s voice says, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).
God Himself has broken His silence. It’s the Father’s strong endorsement of His Son. This is a flashing neon sign for everyone to see that this is the start of a new age. Everyone knew that Jesus was unique from every other human. This was the dawn of a new age, an age where the long-awaited Messiah had finally appeared. Jesus arrives on the scene and this is His inauguration if you will. This is His coming out party where the throngs of people will soon learn of His identity.
“And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” (John 17:5)
This is when the Father specially recognizes His Son before everyone.
John the Baptist, who was an eye-witness, said:
“And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.” (John 1:34)
The next part of the story could only have come from Jesus and it points to our topic on why we should fast.
“Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.” (Matthew 4:1-2)
The text says that Jesus leaves the waters promptly and entered for the desert to fast.
Jesus’ quick exist was prompted by the Holy Spirit.
Here we arrive at our first reason for fasting.
2.1 Don’t Fast When the Son Has Come
Jesus fasts in our text (Matthew 3 and 4) for altogether different reason.
We’ll return to His reason in a few moments.
But for the moment, turn to Matthew 9:14-15 or page 1034 in your pew Bible.
“Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, ‘Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?’ 15 And Jesus said to them, ‘Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.” (Matthew 9:14-15)
The reason why you should fast is the same reason why Jesus’ Disciples didn’t fast. Jesus’ disciples didn’t fast when they were with Him. Why? Because Jesus Himself says, “I am the bridegroom.” Jesus gives us a word picture. This picture is pregnant with meaning and it is connected to the very words the Father spoke over Jesus as His baptism.
The Son of God is unique. This is why God’s voice speaks out loud at Jesus’ baptism so all could hear how special Jesus truly is/was. He is the Son of God. He is the Bridegroom. He is Jesus, the Messiah. And generations have longed to see Him. I cannot help but think of the narrative of Jesus’ birth where we learn two people, Simeon and Anna, had longed waited to see the Messiah:
“Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. 26 And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ” (Luke 2:25-26).
Then we meet Anna:
“And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, 37 and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. 38 And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem” (Luke 2:36-38).
He is the Husband of His people. He is so stunning that Jesus said, you just cannot fast now in this situation. It is too happy and too spectacularly exhilarating to fast when the Bridegroom is around. Fasting is for times of yearning and aching and longing. But the Bridegroom of God’s People is here. After a thousand (1,000) years of dreaming and longing and hoping and waiting, He is here! You cannot fast when at long last the Son of God has appeared.
2.2 We Fast because the Son Has Gone
“Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.” (Matthew 4:1-2).
“Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, ‘Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?’ 15 And Jesus said to them, ‘Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast” (Matthew 9:14-15).
Jesus fasted because He was about to face three years plus of public ministry. We fast because the Bridegroom is gone and we long to see Him again. When Jesus was present, there was feasting but after He leaves, we fast. We fast because we long to see the Bridegroom again (Matthew 25:1-13). We’re created to see Jesus; we long to see Jesus as John did in Revelation 1:12-20. God has taken Jesus away until the Second Coming. And any and every believer fasts because of a homesickness for the Savior.
Remember, My goal today is to create a greater hunger for Christ that you are currently experiencing. Fasting is akin to the soldier who savors his wife’s letters while he is away at war on a foreign field. His physical appetite is threatened by a stronger hunger. Fasting is the yielding to a higher hunger. A hunger for the delight in Christ. God isn’t honored when we begrudgingly go to heaven because it’s better than hell. Our hunger for God is so intense that we lose our appetites for other things. But we also fast to increase our hunger for God. We fast because our intensity for Jesus is gone and we need it back. Jesus is gone but many of us don’t miss Him. Why? Because we’re love with other things. Fasting delivers us from the danger of being mastered by other things. Nice, gentle pleasures such as TV-watching and Internet-surfing… meat and potatoes and gardening… reading and decorating… traveling and investing. It’s the trivial and simple pleasures of the world that pave the path to hell. Our most deadly appetites are not for the poison of evil but the simple pleasures of the world. Collecting and hobbies and shipping and exercising are deadly substitutes for God.
3. Fasting is a Weapon of War
And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4 But he answered, “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God’” (Matthew 4:3-4).
Jesus is quoting from Deuteronomy. “And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:3).
God is quoting His own book at this point. God, the author of Sacred Scripture, is repeating Scripture. The Father quotes part of Psalm 2:7: “The Lord said to me, “You are my Son…” (Psalm 2:7b). And the Father quotes part of Isaiah 42:1: “…in whom my soul delights…” (Isaiah 42:1). At the beginning of verse four, Jesus says these words: ““It is written…” I call on you to memorize Scripture because Jesus memorized Scripture. Manna was a test to see if Israel would love God and his grace more than bread even miracle bread.
Satan tempts Jesus in the wilderness to use his power to do what God did, make manna. Fasting is aimed to cultivate a hunger for God. But fasting is also aimed as tool of spiritual warfare to fend out Satan’s temptations. Some of you have yet to see sin’s addicting power broken because you have not fasted.
Summary of Today’s Message
Are you practicing disciplines to be seen by others? Or for your hunger for Jesus? Do you fast for spiritual power to break sin’s addicting power over you?
