So here I am, running low as I move through the world, and finding that I no longer know how to interact with said world. I need the Holy Spirit to come into my life powerfully and miraculously. I can’t do this without Him. So I’m fasting.
About two weeks ago, I read a little book by Derek Prince called Fasting. And I read it because I was feeling a growing urgency to fast (see what I mean about the Lord completely preparing the way?). Prince basically teaches that God gave us fasting as the way to humble ourselves before Him as we petition Him. The call on me to fast was confirmed by the Lord through my life word.
When I was first saved, I was desperate to be completely His and scared that I would mess it all up. I begged Him to give me a word that would tell me what to do on the most BASIC level. He gave me Joel 2:12-13 in the Amplified.
Therefore also now, says the Lord, turn and keep on coming to Me
with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning
[until every hindrance is removed and the broken fellowship is restored].
Rend your hearts and not your garments and return to the Lord, your God,
for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in loving-kindness;
and He revokes His sentence of evil [when His conditions are met].
The depth of love and wisdom in these verses astonishes and comforts me. I memorized these verses and they are planted in my heart as God’s personal answer to my heart’s cry – my life word.
I’m fasting “until every hindrance is removed.” He’s called me to do it, “and He revokes His sentence of evil [when His conditions are met].” So I’m empty and awkward and discombobulated . . . and fasting. There’s no way that I should be able to do this right now; I mean, I’ve got NOTHING to draw on. Yet here I am. I take a step forward into nothingness, and grace is there. Grace catches me and carries me and keeps me from falling. I don’t know anything right now, but I know grace because I know Jesus.
I trust that He’s here, even though I can’t feel Him. I trust that He’s holding onto me, even though I feel anchorless. I trust Him. And that trust has been built by every interaction I’ve had with Him in my whole life – not just since I was saved. We have a real relationship, with real conversations and real confrontations. Everything is topsy-turvy and I feel dead and stupid, but I know my God.
So I’m fasting out of obedience and desperation. I’m trusting His personal word to me and coming to Him with all my heart, asking for the broken fellowship to be restored. And I continue to wait for the Resurrection Life I need so urgently to rise up in me.
