“In a culture where the landscape is dotted with shrines to the Golden Arches and an assortment of Pizza Temples, fasting seems out of place, out of step with the times.”
- Richard Foster “The Celebration of Discipline”
Lent is historically a time for fasting. For some, it has become water-cooler conversation. “So, what are you giving up for Lent this year?” and then we come up with some little of inconvenience (like giving up dessert or soft drinks or TV, etc) so that we can say we are participating.
Truthfully, fasting is a forgotten art in Christ’s church. Perhaps we’re too busy to worry with it. Maybe it stirs up images of emaciated fanatics living the desert or that it just isn’t a very Presbyterian thing to do. Or maybe we’ve grown more attached to food (and the speed at which we get it) than any other culture in human history. As Foster notes, just look at how many restaurants you pass driving down a city road. Do you remember when going out to eat was a rare and special treat?
Of course, fasting is not primarily a test of our self-disciplined (for me, it is more often a painful reminder of how self-disciplined I’m not). Rather, fasting is a way to make space for God. By removing a meal or a distraction, time is made available that is given over to God. For example, if you choose to fast one lunch a week, the time normally spent at the lunch table is spent in prayer, scripture study, journal reflections about your walk with Christ or even devotional reading (i.e., C.S. Lewis).
Fasting is the way to clear some expectant room for God to land in our lives. Every time your stomach growls in hunger, you have an inescapable physical reminder of our hearts aching for God and you can take a quick moment to pray for faithfulness or to pray for others. The same applies when we fast something other than food: when we want the fasted thing, we allow that ache to turn us to God instead, who supplies all of our needs. And the more often we bump into God this way, the more we will find our lives oriented toward him. Because that is what Lent is really about: to turn away of old ways that keep us from following Christ and to fix our eyes on Jesus more than ever before. Fasting becomes that palpable reminder to do just that.
“Yet even now, says the LORD,
return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
rend your hearts and not your clothing.
Return to the LORD, your God,
for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love…” Joel 2:12-13
Friday, February 27, 2009
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