Dennis Tuuri

Reality sermon Scripture is found in Isaiah 58:1-7. Please stand to hear the word of our Lord.

Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their transgression in the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily and delight to know my ways. As a nation that did righteousness and forsook not the ordinance of their God. They ask of me the ordinance of justice, and they take delight in approaching to God.

Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seeest not. Wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast, ye find pleasure, and exact all your labors. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness. You shall not fast as you do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for man to afflict his soul?

Is it to bow down the head as a bulrush and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will thou call this a fast and an acceptable day to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I have chosen to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house?

When thou seeest the naked, that thou coverth and let thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh.

At this time, the younger children may be dismissed to go to their Sabbath school if the parents desire that. The rest may be seated.

We’re continuing this morning with our series of talks going through the seven deadly sins this afternoon. Still trying to accomplish that. While we’re talking on gluttony still, we’re really going to be speaking today about fasting. We’ll continue with fasting next week and then move on to the next deadly sin, which is lust, that is the seventh of the seven deadly sins.

We have been talking about food and the proper approaches to food. We’ve talked about how gluttony is really abusing the good gifts of God and looking for ultimate value in the food instead of what the food is to represent to us—the word of God, the crying God, et cetera.

We’ve talked about how a preoccupation with food is unhealthy because food is given really as a good gift to remind us of God’s graciousness and not to be centered on the food. So I was thinking about that. I think a good way to remind ourselves of a proper emphasis on God’s providence in the created order is, as we’ve said before, that long life is not to be seen as a thing to be obtained by eating a correct diet.

Ultimately, long life the scriptures tell us in the fifth commandment is God’s blessing to those who honor their father and mother. And of course, by now, if you’ve been in this congregation very long, you know that the fifth commandment speaks to all superior-inferior relationships in the terms of the Westminster Catechism. It has to do really with our response to God himself, who our parents image to us.

And so it’s our submission to God in all areas of life that brings about the blessing of long life that is attached to it.

Now, we’re going to be speaking about really total abstinence of food or particular kinds of food for a particular period of time. The term that is used to describe that is fasting. And there’s different types of fastings. It’s important as we get into this topic to remember that indeed while fasting is more prominently—some people believe featured in the Old Covenant—yet fasting is also seen in the New Testament.

Jesus of course fasted for a time of preparation for the temptation in the wilderness. Fasted for 40 days and nights. He gave his disciples specific instructions about fasting. Remember in Matthew 6, he says, “When ye fast, don’t do it like these guys do.” The indication is you’re going to be fasting. He said, “But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face. Don’t be downcast in your appearance.”

Remember Tony brought us a communion talk a couple years ago about the importance of prayer and the importance to see the commands in that portion of scripture about prayer. And it goes on to talk about fasting. That same in context. So, it seems like our Savior is giving us instructions for when we fast, indicating it is an activity we’re to be doing at times.

In Acts 14:23 and in other places in scripture, fasting is seen as preparation for setting apart of office—church officers both in the selection of those officers and then also in their ordination and in confirming them and commending them to God. Fasting is also seen there after the selection as a way to pray and support those men in their new position as church officers or as missionaries.

In Acts 14:23, specifically in 1 Corinthians 7, there are references to fasting in terms of the marital relationship. But the only legitimate place for abstinence from marital relationships between man and wife is for a period of time in which you give yourselves to fasting and prayer. This is talking in a New Testament epistle. So fasting is seen in the context of the New Testament and is applicable to us.

Fasting also has relevance to the seven deadly sins which we’ve been discussing now for some months. Obviously fasting has a relevance to gluttony, the proper use of food. You fast from something because you abuse something. You want to get a proper perspective back on that thing. And so when we fast from food, it can be a very good cure for us if we’re improperly using food.

And if you’ve been convicted over the last four weeks of aspects of gluttony in your own life, then a day of fasting may well be a way to get your perspective correct again. And that’s kind of the approach we’re taking today: seeing fasting as a way to correct our value structure. And it certainly in terms of gluttony, it corrects our undue emphasis on food and the intake of food, be it a preoccupation, too much, or whatever it is—all of which is gluttony.

So fasting can help with that deadly sin of gluttony.

Additionally, it’s to be noted that as we said before, Paul said that he buffeted his body. He brings his body under him. He’s the head, it’s the tail, so to speak. He’s the master, it’s the servant. The body is to serve us as we’re serving God. And another purpose of fasting is to remind our bodies, as it were, to buffet our bodies, to be strengthened and to bring them under submission to our authority.

And so that’s another proper use of fasting in terms of the sixth deadly sin of gluttony.

Fasting also can be seen, and we’ll see this as we develop this afternoon, in terms of pride. Pride is the root—we’ve said before—of the rest of the seven deadly sins. And fasting is a humiliation of oneself and an abasement of one’s pride. And so it’s very applicable to the seven deadly sins.

Now last week we talked from Zechariah 7. We talked about a godly way—a way to glorify God in our eating—because we read there that in rebuking the people that came to Jeremiah, or Zechariah rather, he said when you fast, essentially he was saying with a rhetorical question, when you fast you’re not doing it really for me, and when you eat and drink you’re not doing it for me.

The point of Zechariah 7 as we pointed out last week is that whether we’re fasting, not eating, or eating and drinking, either way, we’re supposed to be glorifying God in that process. And there’s a connection then between glorifying God—last week that we talked about in terms of what we do at the dinner table, what we do when we eat—and glorifying God now when we decide not to eat for a period of time under his instruction.

And remember, we said there in Zechariah 7, after he tells them, “You haven’t been doing these things for me,” he said in verse 7 of Zechariah 7, “Should you not hear the words the Lord hath cried by the former prophets. He says, “Don’t come to me and ask if you’re fasting. Should you continue to fast after 70 years?” Remember what I said before by way of the former prophets?

Well, I think one of the former prophets that will help us a lot this Sunday and next Sunday in terms of fasting correctly is Isaiah 58. The book of Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah, gives good instruction in Isaiah 58 relative to fasting. It’s probably one of, if not the most central text in the scriptures, explaining the purpose and blessing of proper fasting. And that’s what we’re going to be talking about this afternoon and next week: the purpose today and then the blessing side of it next week.

Now Isaiah 58—for those of you who are somewhat familiar with that passage, and hopefully in this church you’ll correlate Isaiah 58 with a very explicit reference to reconstruction, to rebuilding. We read in verse 12 of Isaiah 58 that if you do these things, then you’ll be, you will rebuild the old waste places. You’ll raise up the foundations of many generations. Then you be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of heavens to dwell in.

Isaiah 58 has a lot of relevance to people that can see themselves as Christian reconstructionists in a time of history of deconstruction in our society. And if we want to be successful at reconstructing, at rebuilding, and building up godly foundations for this nation again to repair the breaches that have been made by Iran and slothful church, Isaiah 58 and its instructions about fasting should be very important to us.

Of course, ultimately verse 12 that I just read refers to Jesus. He’s the great restorer, the great repairer, the great reconstructor. And those who follow in his army and who march on behind him—it’s very important that they hear the instructions of Isaiah 58 that they would properly reconstruct.

It’s also important—the subject of fasting—not just to Christian reconstruction but also to Reformation Covenant Church in a personal sort of a way right now.

First, we have the context here in the state of political tyranny. And some of you may realize that yesterday one of the two major gubernatorial candidates came out supporting the initiative that would shut down the nuclear power plant at Trojan. And that’s just one indication of this woman’s great liberal tendencies and the great harm she could do once gotten into office. And the likelihood of that happening is fairly high at this point in time, in large part due to Christians not quite understanding what political action is all about.

The point is that we have a political situation that is dangerous. It’s dangerous for people that want to resist state education, for instance. And so it’s proper in times of great danger to fast for periods of time to seek God’s face.

Additionally, we’re in the process at Reformation Covenant Church of bearing office holder in the church of selecting office holders. We’ll be having a congregational meeting in a week and a half to get the congregation’s input on Doug H. as being our next deacon. And so we’re in the process of setting aside a man to that office. We’re in the process of trying to deliberate about who are the next elders in this church. And in that process, if it seems to be normative to have a period of fasting involved with that, we want to conform ourselves to God’s word.

And then of course, we have the situation, the health situation in this church with one of the little children. And there also fasting should be important to us to consider. I almost called a day of prayer and fasting for us two months ago when many of these things began to develop. But I thought it’d be good to preach first to understand what we’re doing and to get united in our understanding of this important aspect of God’s word before we proceed.

So what we’re going to say today and next week—hopefully you can see the importance that I believe should be attached to it.

And having said that, let’s look now at Isaiah 58 in the text to get what we have there in terms of God’s instructions relative to proper fasting as a proper corrective to our value system. Isaiah 58, we’ll deal with verses 1-7 this week and the rest of the balance of the chapter next week.

Verse one ends Isaiah 58 begins with a cry to tell the people of their sin—introduction to the chapter, as it were. And then secondly, we have in verse two the description of what the people thought they were doing when they fasted. Now, these things are all positive things, but the questions are all asked rhetorically with the negative being the answer. In other words, I tried to read it that way to give you a sense of that.

You know, it’s like tell these people they’re sinning and they’re going to say, “Oh, but we’ve been fasting. We’ve been doing all these things. We’ve been seeking your face. We want to know your ordinances.” No, you haven’t. He says, I’m not going to hear you cuz you haven’t been doing it correctly.

So, verse two and three gives us a picture really of the proper way to draw near—what we’re doing when we approach fasting. And so, the outline picks it up that way. Verse two specifically, I want us to look at that for a couple of minutes.

Now, in terms of this first point in your outline, to draw near is what we’re doing in fasting. Verse two says, “They seek me daily. They delight to know my ways as a nation that did righteousness and forsook not the ordinance of their God. And they asked of me the ordinances of justice. They take delight in approaching to God.”

Now, there’s six phrases there. And if you laid them out on your piece of paper in front of you, you’d see that they go A B C B A. They start with saying approaching God to know his ways to walk in obedience, to walk in obedience by knowing his ways, by approaching God. And so we’ve got a structure there of a double witness, so to speak, in terms of what proper fasting should be doing. We should be approaching God to know his ways that we might be walking in fuller obedience.

And so that’s essentially the thing we’re going to be talking about now: that correct biblical fasting is first of all to draw near to the gracious person of God. That’s the purpose of fasting—to draw near to the gracious person and presence of God.

In it be worth noting here that in verse 4, when he corrects them and says you haven’t been fasting correctly, he says you fast incorrectly, and then he says you shall not fast as you do this day to make your voice to be heard on high. Again, the point of proper fasting is if they’ve been fasting correctly, their voice would be heard on high. They’d have entrance into the presence of God. And so essentially fasting—one aspect of normal biblical fasting (there are different types, but the normal term for fasting)—one aspect is to draw near to God and to his gracious presence.

And of course, the correlate that verse points out is that if fasting is not accompanied by a desire to approach God to hear his word and to act in obedience, access is denied.

Okay. So we seek a gracious God. We seek his counsel and then we seek to obey.

Now, couple of other verses that I’ve listed on your outlines. In 2 Samuel 12:16 and following, we have David’s fasting in terms of seeking the presence of God and seeking God’s grace in the deliverance of his child who’d been afflicted. Remember, in response to David’s own sin. And so, David says that in verse 22 of that passage, they say, “Well, why did you stop fasting when the child died? That’s when you went ahead and got up and stopped fasting. Why didn’t you fast after he died?”

And David said, “Well, when the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept. For I said, ‘Who can tell whether God will be gracious to me that the child may live?’” You see, David was fasting properly to seek grace, to seek the gracious presence of God, the gracious person of God, and as a result, grace extended to his son.

The people of Nineveh, when they fasted after they came to repentance for their sins, the same sort of thing happened. The king said, “Who knows? God may be gracious to us.” There’s no deal making here. They’re seeking the gracious presence of God. And that’s part of fasting.

Esther 4:16. Esther said that she wanted to approach the king. She wanted her people to pray that God would have grace to her, and as a result that the king would have grace to her. She said, “If I perish, I perish. It’s against the law for me to approach him this way. Fast, seek God’s gracious presence for my behalf.”

Daniel 9:3. Daniel says that he set his face unto the Lord God to seek by prayer and supplication with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. David saw his fasting as approaching the gracious presence of God. Remember in the book of Joel, we went through at Christmas time, Joel 2, verse 13: “Rend your heart, not your garments. Remember when we make a confession of sin at the beginning of the worship service, hands apart—it’s a reminder to us, a visual reminder, not necessary, not law of God—visual reminder to us though that we’re rending ourselves as we confess our sins.

Joel 2:13: Rend your heart, wet your garments, and turn unto the Lord, your God. This is in the context of calling a day of fasting. They turned to God. So fasting is to seek God’s presence.

That’s why I think when the Pharisees came to Jesus and said, “Well, John’s disciples fasted. The Pharisees fast. Why don’t your disciples fast?” He says, “Hey, the bridegroom is here. Why should they fast when the bridegroom is here? When I’m gone, they want to seek my presence.” That’s when they fast. He was there with them. And so no fasting is appropriate.

And by the way, it’s probably why—a good, another good (we’ve talked about a lot of what we do on Sunday)—Sunday is the day we have the special presence of Christ through the communion and through his word being preached, and that day is a day of feasting and not day of fasting.

The historic church has actually excommunicated people who held and taught that you should fast on the Lord’s day because the Lord’s day is when in a special sense we approach God’s face, God’s gracious presence in the person of Jesus Christ. And so that’s a day of feasting and not a day of fasting—to approach God apart from those days when through our own sin or through the tribulations that God has brought upon us, his face is darkened to us, as it were. We seek him. We seek his presence by fasting.

But we seek that presence to receive his counsel, to receive his law. And that’s the second part of the first point of the outline—point B, and point number one of the outline. We draw near to God’s gracious presence. We draw near to God’s counsel. Says, “They seek me daily. They take delight in approaching to God.” Remember in verse two we’re saying there A B C B A. A is seeking God. A back here is delighting—the delighting in the approaching God. But they seek me that they might delight in my—to keep my way, to know my ways, delight to know my ways.

In the second half in verse two, they ask of me the ordinances of justice. We draw near to God that we might hear his counsel through his law and through direction—in terms of what do we do? And we quoted from the book of Acts about the sending of missionary selection of church officers. Fasting, secondly, besides seeking God, is then seeking God’s counsel, his law, and his direction for a specific period of our lives.

Deuteronomy 9 tells us that Moses fasted 40 days before he did what? Before he received the law, God’s counsel from God’s gracious presence.

Ezra 8, in the fast that’s recorded there in verse 23 of Ezra 8, we read, “We fasted and besought our God for this and he was intreated of us.” They sought God’s gracious presence. And then in verse 21, it says they proclaimed a fast that we might afflict ourselves before our God to seek of him a right way for us and for our little ones and for all our substance. We fast when we approach God to seek a right way, to seek his law and to seek his direction.

Daniel 10, David’s fast there is reported as preparatory for hearing from God counsel again. In Acts 13:2-3, there again we have them seeking direction from God in terms of the ordination of church officers or missionaries rather. In 13:2 and in other places church officers.

So the second purpose in fasting is that we humble ourselves, we seek God’s gracious presence, and we seek God’s word and his counsel as we approach him. And then third, we do all this that we might approach to a stronger sense of personal obedience. We don’t come to God for information that’s intellectual only. We come to God that’s for information that will be acted on volitionally by us.

We acknowledge God’s sovereignty, him as King of Kings. We approach his gracious presence. We seek knowledge from God—the intellectual aspect of man, our calling to be priests and know God’s word. Uh, I’m sorry, be a prophet and to know God’s word that we might then act properly as priests and act volitionally on the basis of that word to obey it.

So it has an aspect of the kingly, the prophetic, and the priestly aspect to it. And this third aspect is for personal obedience. And again in verse two from Isaiah 58, A B C—A seeking God, B seeking his ways, C obeying. He says, “As a nation that does righteousness, that forsakes not the ordinances of their God.” The volitional side to it.

Jeremiah 14:12 says that when you fast and don’t do this, I won’t hear their cry. I cry to them. They don’t hear my word. They don’t act in obedience. Their fasting falls on deaf ears. All these three aspects are kind of summed up in 1 Kings 8:35 and following.

You remember that in 1 Kings 8, we have the prayer of dedication of the temple by Solomon. And Solomon says in that section of scripture that when heavens shut up, when God’s judgments are upon us, we should seek God and we turn from our sin. And he says in verse 36, “Then hear from heaven, forgive the sin of thy servants.” We’re seeking God’s gracious presence that he would forgive us our sins. “Forgive the sin of thy servants, thy people Israel, that thou teach them the good way.” So we go to him to be forgiven—his gracious presence—thou might teach us our way, your way. We seek his knowledge. And then third, “that they should walk in these ways and then give rain unto the land.”

So in 1 Kings 8, these same three things—Jesus said, “We approach God’s gracious presence. We seek counsel that we might obey that counsel from God’s throne room. To do all these things, we are to fast.” That’s what Isaiah 58 says. And to do these things, it’s summed up in verse 3.

“Wherefore have we fasted?” they say. “Have thou not seen us? Where have we afflicted our soul and thou takest no knowledge?” To accomplish the access to God and his law, we might obey it. They fasted. And that was proper. That’s what they were supposed to be doing. He was saying they were hypocritical. They didn’t really do it. But the point is that we should be doing it. And so he judged them for their failure to do it.

Now, it is important to notice here a couple of things that fasting throughout the scriptures—and you’ve already seen it in some of the references I’ve read—is relative to fasting associated with weeping and with mourning. Why? Confession of sin. It’s associated in word associations now through about the Old Testament and New Testament with prayer, seeking God’s face, with sackcloth, ashes and earth, and with rent garments. Why?

Because when we acknowledge our sin and we make confession of our sin, then we acknowledge that sin is death to us. And so we put the death of ashes on us, the death of the earth, the death of rending ourselves into our garments—the way that we’re supposed to be ripped into if we fail to keep covenant with God. And so it’s important to know here that when you go to God to seek these things, it is a heartfelt—you are accompanied by a heartfelt appreciation for your own failure to measure up to God’s word and the resulting death that is properly yours as a result of that disobedience.

It’s interesting to go back to the situation with David fasting for his son. We read in verse 16 that David fasted and he went in and he lay all night upon the earth. Verse 17, the elders of the house arised. They went to him to raise him up from the earth. But he wouldn’t. And neither did he eat bread with them. And then in verse 20, after the son dies, then David arises from the earth and he washes. He anoints himself and he changes his apparel. He goes into the house of the Lord and worships.

Having sought God’s gracious presence and having obtained grace from the throne room—even in David’s case, David was brought back to life, as it were. His son was not. His son was not delivered from death. But still, David left the presence of God with God’s grace upon him. And that symbolizes him from laying down on the earth, from prostrating himself, from dying, not eating dust, et cetera. God then raises him back up—and even arises from the earth. He cleanses himself—the forgiveness of God. He anoints himself—a picture of God’s blessing. He changes his apparel—Jesus’s justification upon us, his imputed righteousness. We are now holy to enter into the house of God as David did and worship to give him praise and to acknowledge his sovereignty in all things and his justice and righteousness and grace.

And David does that again. Paul in Acts 9:9, after his blinding, he went three days without sight. Did neither eat or drink—three days, a picture of death—and then resurrection at the end of that period of time.

Now the other side of this is they fast. And the other term used in Isaiah 58:3 is that they afflict their soul. And then in verse 5, God says, “Is it such a fast I have chosen a day for a man to afflict his soul?” And if you don’t know the rest of scripture, you might think God is kind of putting down the idea of afflicting our souls, but he’s not. He’s saying that I do want you to afflict your souls, but the picture of that is not simply the external obedience.

This phrase afflict one’s soul is commented upon by J. Alexander in this text from Isaiah 58. He says that the second member of this first clause—in other words, “is it a day for to afflict his soul”—is not part of the contemptuous description of a mere external fast, but rather belongs to the definition of a true one as a time for men to practice self-humiliation.

He doesn’t ask whether the fast he chooses—as a day for a man to afflict himself, implying that it is not, which would be destructive of the very essence of a fast. But he asks whether the fast he has chosen as a time for men to humble and afflict themselves is such as this—their actions, a time of simply external self-abasement.

See, Alexander says, and he’s right: the very essence of the fast is to afflict your soul, self-humiliation and abasement before God and his holy majesty. That is evidenced by these external actions of fasting, ashes, earth, prostration, et cetera. These externals are important. We don’t want to be nominalist and just say that we don’t want to say that the actions that God tells us to do are not important because the reality is behind them—the actions are important. We also don’t want to say that if we do the actions, that’s all you have to do.

You see, they come together. The idea of the covenant there—the externals, important as they are, and don’t lose that fact—are not the end in and of itself. The end is self-humiliation, the abasement of our prideful attitudes. You see, seven deadly sins—first deadly sin, the root is pride. Fasting brings that pride down and humbles us before the mighty hand of God, either for our personal sin or for situations which we have no control over but that God is causing to come upon us that are very difficult for us, and we seek his face and grace and counsel and wisdom and obedience.

Remember, we said that the greedy man swears by the gold of the temple instead acknowledging the presence of God behind that gold. The gold is a picture of the value of God. Yet hung up at the picture of the value of the gold—you’re an idolater. They swore by the altar. What was not by the altar? What was on the altar? The sacrifice. The thing they got to eat. And if we place ultimate value in the food instead of what’s behind that—the food being a picture of the man of Jesus Christ, the grace and peace and joy of the spirit and the kingdom in the spirit and of the Father’s will.

Jesus said, “It’s my food to do his will and of the word that be sweeter to our taste than the meatest thing you can taste.” We don’t realize the stuff behind it. We become idolatrous. And if fasting is simply self-humiliation in terms of externals while we put our confidence is our own lack of food, we become idolaters again. You can be an idolater by simply abstaining from food and thinking that in that somehow is true value.

Zechariah 7, I think is referred to perhaps at least somewhat in 1 Corinthians, where Paul says that whether we eat or whether somebody decides to eat or decides not to eat—they do these things for the glory of God. Ultimately, these things are not end in and of themselves. Fasting of course was a specific purpose in contradistinction to food. Fasting is the absence of blessing and rejoicing. It’s a very picture of that. It’s an acknowledgement of sin. It’s an acknowledgement of judgment, or it’s simply the acknowledgement of the need for God and his grace and under failure to understand what he’s doing in life seeking his face.

It is an act of seeking of these things in particular times of extreme need. And so it’s important that we understand that God has given us these vehicles. In Psalm 69:10, this same phrase—essentially at least the same thoughts—the psalmist says, “When I wept and chastened my soul with fasting, that was to my reproach. Did the people made fun of me as a result of this.” But the point is he again connects fasting with the chastening of our souls.

All this comes forth from the Pentateuch. Leviticus 16 is the only place where a fast is upon the nation. And that fast was in preparation for the day of atonement. Leviticus 16:29 says, “This shall be a statute forever unto you, that in the seventh month, and the 10th day of the month, you shall afflict your souls and do no work at all, whether it be one of your country or a stranger that sojourneth among you.” That term afflict your souls means to not eat any food. And so, the idea of fasting was built in to the sacrificial system and the day of atonement.

And that tells us something. You know, you come across these fasts in scripture. Where are these things coming from? Why do they know they should fast? They know because Leviticus 16 says you fast in preparation for the day of atonement. Fasting is connected with the death that is required in relationship to sin. And the atonement that must be made by somebody else other than ourselves. We can’t pay that price.

It’s the symbolic death that we then get resurrection from when the atonement of Jesus Christ—picture the sacrificial animals—is made. So when we fast, it is a prayer. We are again. It includes this affliction of the soul and awareness of our own sin and a self-abasement of ourselves before God and his majesty. It recognizes that death is the proper penalty for that sin. And it recognizes we have need for another to save us and redeem us so that we can hear God’s word. He can raise us back up and then go forward in obedience.

Just like what we do here at church on Sunday—the prayer of confession. God says you’re forgiven. We rise back up, as it were, to new life in Jesus Christ to hear the word that we’re then going to take into the rest of the nations. That’s what fasting is a picture of.

So to accomplish this gracious entrance into the gracious presence of God to hear his word and to obey that word, we fast—afflicting our souls. This results in something. And if it doesn’t result in this thing, then it is not true fasting. What does it result in? It results in verse six, the eight elements that God says are characteristic of the fast that he chooses.

We read there that the fast that he chooses is to—I’m going to list eight things here. To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burden, to let the oppressed go free, and they break every yoke. Four things. And now another four things. Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seeest the naked, that thou cover him, and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh.

Isaiah 58:6-7. This is the proper fast. Eight elements, two groups of four. The proper fast is demonstrated. It results in justice. That’s the term for those first four elements: justice. Loosen the bands of iniquity of wickedness. Undo the heavy burdens. Let the oppressed go free. Break every yoke. Get rid of injustice.

The result of a proper fast is justice in those first four elements. What is justice? What does it mean to break every yoke to do the bands of how do you do these things? Everybody says that’s great. And the liberation theologian says what that means is class warfare. But justice is defined as applying the law of God to a situation. It’s the law that brings freedom. It’s the law of God that gives us the model for what perfect justice is. Every penalty receiving its just recompense.

Criminal justice is defined by applying the word of God. And justice means breaking the bands of injustice. The church today in America and ignoring the law of God has brought about injustice, not justice. And so, the proper fast results in the application of God’s law, the only standard and means of justice that there is in the land.

Going back to Zechariah 8, remember he said, we’re looking at these passages cuz he said, look what the former prophet said. And this is what Isaiah said. And he reminds them of this back in Zechariah 8. In Zechariah, he says that they told do in uh that the word is—let’s see—in Zechariah we read that the word of the Lord came to Zechariah saying, “Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts saying now listen, execute true judgment show mercy and compassion every man to his brother oppress not the widow nor the fatherless the stranger nor the poor and let none of you imagine evil against your brother in his heart for things alternating though execute judgment show mercy don’t oppress.”

How are they oppressed? They were pass through courts of injustice and injustice. So to show justice is to not oppress the widow. And then again, let none of you imagine evil against your brother in your heart. You’re to extend grace to your brother. You see those two elements again. The purpose—the first half of those is justice. Again, Zechariah repeats that the essence of the true fast. The result of it will be to execute true judgment, not oppressing those who are defenseless in courts of law, and as a result loosening the bands of wickedness by applying God’s law.

The second thing that comes out of that, though—remember I said there were two sets of four—the second side is loving kindness, has said God’s grace, his mercy, his tender mercies to us, and that’s what we’re supposed to see as a result of our fast as well. Yes, it’s justice and loosening injustice. But secondly, those last four clauses: it’s to deal your bread to the hungry, bring the poor who are cast out into your house, when you see the naked cover him, and that you hide not yourself from your own flesh.

Having sought God’s grace, we seek God’s grace for the purpose that we may extend that grace to others. And fasting results in justice and it results in the demonstration to others of loving kindness. God’s grace is ministered through his law. And so the result of proper fasting is God’s law and God’s grace brought together as one. We try to break those apart. We get rid of the whole essence of what the fast is supposed to accomplish.

Again, in Zechariah—remember I said there it went A B—”execute true judgment show mercy. Oppress not the widow, don’t imagine evil against your brother. Extend grace to him.” In other words, same thing is said. There’s two elements essentially: God’s justice and God’s grace and loving kindness.

Now notice here—these are the great commands of God. Remember in Micah 6, remember it’s the book of Micah, what are the three things that God requires of man? It’s to do justice. It’s to love loving kindness, the extension of God’s mercy and grace to others. And what’s the third thing? To walk humbly with God.

We walk humbly with God by fasting. We go through self-abasement and self-humiliation through the fast as a model for what we’re to do the rest of our lives that we might do those things: to do justice and to love mercy.

Now, if those two great things—to do justice and love mercy—are what we are called to see as a result of our fast, remember that turns us out outward. That turns us outward from the church to go out and demonstrate grace and loving kindness—has said, one of the great requirements we have. It turns us outward from our families. It’s not enough to affect reconstruction in a land just to have strong families or just to have a good comfy church. You got to get out.

And if we don’t fast with those things in mind, then we’re not fasting biblically. Why do we want church officers? So that we can have good things here? No, that kingdom work might be done and we might turn our hearts outward to the communities around us and take God’s word and be the repairer of the breach. We fast, we afflict our souls, we walk humbly with God that we might do justice, that we might love loving kindness—not just be forced to turn outward, but love to minister to other people, love to get out of our homes and out of our church and get out there and minister to people. That’s what we’re called to do.

Now, I know it’s important build strong family, strong churches. We all know that. I’m just saying that the proper fast turns us outward instead of always going inward.

If we have no law or no grace, then we don’t have proper biblical fasting. That is the result of what it was. Remember the Pharisees were the ones who said, “I fast twice every week.” But they perverted God’s law.

Gary North’s most recent—well, one of the recent books on the Judeo-Christian ethic is a really good book. Some of my radio shows this week are going to deal with the concept of conservative traditional Judeo-Christian ethic. We sometimes get fooled into thinking the Pharisees were the fundamentalists or the evangelicals of Jesus’s day. No, not true.

The Pharisees relied upon the Talmud and inspired commentary on the scripture, not on the Old Testament. They didn’t love God’s law. They didn’t love justice. Why were they so unjust? Couldn’t they read? Of course they could read. They were reading the wrong thing. They were looking at their commentaries, their traditions. Remember Jesus said, “You make void the law of God.” And their fasting was ridiculous then because they weren’t doing it to seek God’s justice, his counsel from his word. They certainly weren’t abasing themselves. They were proud of the fact.

And they certainly didn’t extend grace then to other people either. They did just the reverse. They tithed. They wouldn’t take care of their own parents. They didn’t love showing grace and kindness and loving kindness and God’s grace. And that’s why the Pharisees fast is so hypocritical.

Proper fasting turns to God to understand his law, to understand his counsel and wisdom for a situation that we might obey it and as a result of obeying it do justice, to break bonds and bands of iniquity and to demonstrate God’s loving kindness in the context of the communities that he has called us into serve.

We have access to God if we do those things. Book of Zechariah says that they refused to hearken when God gave them the counsel that I think is the counsel I’m giving you this afternoon and myself as well. This is the word of God. They refused to hearken. They pulled away the shoulder. They stopped up their ears that they shouldn’t hear. They wouldn’t hear the counsel. They made their hearts as in a damned stone lest they should hear the law and the words that the Lord of hosts sent in the spirit by the former prophets.

Therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of hosts. Therefore, it has come to pass that as He cried and they would not hear. So they cried and I would not hear, sayeth the Lord of hosts. I scattered them as a whirlwind among all the nations.

That’s the charge to us. This is what God says is the essence of our fasting, what we’re to achieve and what we’re doing. We hear these things and we approach fasting in a biblical way and approach the decisions that we have to make in this church and the problems, the tribulations that God brings into our lives in a proper sense, then we’re blessed. And if we’re not, we’re cursed by God and sent out. We become part of the howling wilderness.

Fasting is about value correction. It’s about growth in grace. It acknowledges that sometimes our sins bring upon us a dullness to hearing God’s word. And it says we’re going to set apart things. We’re going to go through symbolic death, as it were, that we might hear that word of God and be raised up. Fasting acknowledges that there are times in which our sin hasn’t brought us into any particular difficult sense situation. But God has. Why does God bring us stuff such as what we’re going through politically in the state? Why does God bring a family such a sick child that seems so hard to bear? Why do these things come upon us?

Well, the word of God says he’s going to mature us through all this. These things are being done for his glory and for our strengthening. And if we can’t see that, if we can’t acknowledge that, then God says, “Set aside time to fast, to get your minds functioning again, humiliating yourselves, humbling ourselves before God, acknowledging that we need his grace to respond correctly to these situations. We need his grace to grow, his counsel, his word, and being pledged to walk in obedience.”

If we fail to do that, then instead our prayers, our fasting become offense to him. If we fail to afflict our souls truly before God, seek his word obediently, then we become cursed and not blessed.

God is maturing us. He is bringing corrective actions into our lives. He afflicts us and he does that we might seek his face. We might humble ourselves, that we might walk humbly with him, that we might indeed do justice and love mercy.

Let’s pray. Almighty God, we thank you, Lord God, for salvation. We thank you for Jesus Christ. We thank you for this day in which we celebrate his resurrection, bringing us back to life. We thank you, Lord God, for the grace that you minister to us from this word. Thank you, Father, for causing us this day to attend to this word. Help us, Lord God, to keep what is good, to throw out the chaff that was spoken, to maintain the good, and then to seek your face through fasting and prayer individually and corporately and in other ways in these decisions that we face and the guidance and counsel that we need from you and from your scriptures.

Lord God, we love you. We thank you for your scriptures. Help us to attend to them. Help us to turn our backs on gluttonous behavior and on indulgent behavior and centering ourselves too much in our own things and our own lives. Help us Lord God through prayer and fasting to turn outward and demonstrate grace to others that we might indeed be called the repairer of the breach.

In Jesus name we ask it. Amen.

Any questions or comments, please go up to the microphone. That helps the recording as well as people being able to hear what you’re saying.

Dennis, in your studying, what have you found in the way of the mechanics or duration of fasting that you’d like to comment on?

Okay. Question has to do with the mechanics or duration of fasting. There’s lots of different types of fasting in the scriptures. The long extended ones are 40 days of course, twice currently by Moses, once by our Savior, and once by Elijah. Then there are also a seven-day fast, three-day fast, portion of day fasts. The typical one seems to be one day or until the evening came or maybe a couple days. The length of fast seems to be related to the importance of the event. But normatively, I think normally fasting is not an extended three or seven day. It’s a single day. It usually has to do with cessation from food as opposed to cessation from water, although we know with Moses it was both food and water.

So there’s lots of different continuum of lots of different periods of time. The only required one of course was the one-day fast preparatory for the day of atonement.

Any other questions or comments? Don’t be shy. Don’t let the microphone scare you off. Let’s get rid of it if that happens.

Now, last week in my communion talk, I dealt with Matthew 14 where he says that it’s sealed with healing. Of course, that’s probably next week’s sermon or something, but he dealt—he said that this kind does not come out with a prayer and fasting, not just one instance in the Bible where they link prayer and fasting. And I was—I assume that they’re equally as important. And would you comment on that, please?

Okay. The question has to do with prayer and fasting being linked to the scriptures. That’s true. They are often…