The Grove 10 Years – Week 9

With that, can we dive into God's word? Yes. Amen. We've been working our way through a series of our four pillars, and I've been so blessed by this. I think it's been about six or seven years as a church that we've worked through our DNA. And this fall, we just felt the importance to reinstill that into our hearts and minds, and just refresh and remind you all as to what we are about here at the church, here at the Grove Bible Chapel. And so we've been doing that, and we've been working our way through this pillar, persistent prayer, over the last few weeks.

And I would just say this. I would just say that the most Christ-like Christians that I have known in my life are the most prayerful Christians. And the need for persistent prayer in the body of Christ is huge. Prayer is a fundamental, not a marginal situation. It is central, not supplemental, and it was so for the early church. And it showed not only their dependence on God, but their heartfelt conviction of who God was and their desire to be intimate with him in prayer.

And that gave shine to their witness and their lives. And I don't know about you, but I hope that we would be a body of believers that, because of our communion with the Lord, it gives us shine in the community for the glory of Christ as we go out as salt and light into this community. And so, that's the reason we're looking at prayer. We're looking at persistence prayer. We're not trying to exhort you to something that the scripture doesn't exhort us to.

Paul did multiple times when he exhorted us to pray without ceasing. He does often throughout the New Testament. It is a mark of our utter dependency on God. And then Christ. Christ lived a life of prayer. He modeled that in front of his disciples. He taught his disciples how to pray. He taught us how to pray. Pastor Jason looked at that a few weeks ago in Matthew, chapter 6. And so, in the end, we have the example of others. We have the example of Christ in the scriptures.

But we also have the example of the early church who was committed to prayer. Acts, chapter 2, it says they devoted themselves to prayer. They devoted. The word devoted there literally means they set a time, and they were there. Think about that one. I would say it's an embarrassment on the church in North America that prayer meetings, prayer times, are the fewest attended of anything else in the church in North America. If I were to say we're going to have a prayer meeting on Wednesday night, very few will be there.

I get it. People are busy, whatever, but we don't prioritize what we've been commanded to do. That's a heart issue. It's a heart issue, Church. And God wants our heart. He wants to commune with us. He's after our hearts, and prayer is utter dependency upon God. It is a defining feature of who we are in Christ. And why would we not come to him in prayer? It's unlimited access to the limitless source of life and power. And so I ask the question because in Matthew, chapter 6, he begins in verse one where he says, "Beware of doing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them.

Otherwise, you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven." Are we, as a people of God, holy, or are we hypocritical? Are we real, or are we fake? Do we desire God's glory, or do we desire self-glory? Are we more concerned about the praise of men than we are the praise of God? And in Matthew, chapter 6, Jesus hones in on the heart with three simple vignettes that attack hypocrisy. It attacks the fake and the false givers, number one, verse two.

It attacks the fake and the false prayers of those who are praying, and Pastor Jason looked at that passage a couple of weeks ago. And it attacks the fake and the false fasting that was taking place in that day. And look at verse 16. He says this in Matthew, chapter 6, verse 16. He says, "Now, whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do. For they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting.

Truly, I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face so that your fasting will not be noticed by men but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." And so this morning, I want us to look at what it means to fast. And I thought you said we were talking about persistent prayer. Well, we are talking about persistent prayer, but you cannot fast without praying, but you can pray without fasting.

And in the Bible, he's talking here about fasting, and I thought it would be appropriate for us to look at that from a biblical perspective and a biblical point of view. What is fasting? Who's to fast? Where is fasting in the Old Testament? How long should one fast? How often should one fast? Is fasting commanded of us as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ? Now, I would just say that fasting's become a phenomenon. It's become a fad in our society, has it not?

I just out of coincidence or out of curiosity went to Chat the other day and I said, "Give me all the books on fasting for physical well-being." Not spiritual, physical well-being. There are 574 books on fasting. Cellular repair and foggy or whatever they call it. Metabolic health and insulin sensitivity, inflammation, chronic disease prevention, digestion health, health aging and longevity, water fasting, prolonged fasting, fast. Listen, I'm not negating that these are probably-- I'm not saying that this isn't helpful.

It probably is helpful. That's not biblical fasting. It's not the intention of biblical fasting. That may be something that you may feel is healthy for you, and if so and you have a doctor's orders, whatever, go for it. I don't care. But don't call it biblical fasting. So what is biblical fasting? Biblical fasting is a heart issue, and that's what Jesus was getting at in Matthew, chapter 6. When you give, don't be like the hypocrites. When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites.

When you fast, don't be like the hypocrites. It's a heart issue. And so our big idea this morning is fasting is an issue of the heart. It's an issue of the heart. Fasting is the subject, but the heart is the goal. And in context of Matthew, chapter 6, our Lord is primarily concerned about the aspect of the subject, one aspect of the subject, and that was the tendency to do things in order to be seen by men. And we all do that, don't we? We need to examine our heart because we all do things to be noticed by men.

And what he's saying is when you give, don't be noticed by men. When you pray, don't be noticed by men. When you fast, don't be noticed by men. So what is a biblical fast? What does it mean to fast? Well, first, fasting means an abstinence from food for the sake of certain special purposes like prayer, meditation, and seeking God's will. In other words, fasting is only abstaining from food for the sake of pursuing Christ. The Greek word nēsteia literally means not to eat.

Total abstinence from food. I would say that few things reveal the human heart more than fasting. Few things reveal the human heart more than fasting. Fasting and magic games, okay? It's true. 30 times fasting is mentioned in the New Testament. 30 times. Don't be laughing, you Sixers fan over there. It means that we are attempting to starve the physical in an effort to feed the spiritual. That's what fasting is. However, it's never commanded in the New Testament.

Prayer was commanded in the New Testament. Paul said we are to pray without ceasing often. Giving's commanded, but fasting is not. Was fasting ever commanded? Yes. When? In the Old Testament. Leviticus commands the people to fast when? One day a year. One day a year, the people were commanded, the Jewish people were commanded to fast from sunrise to sunset on the Day of Atonement. It was a day when the priest would enter into the temple and make sacrifice for the people, and they were to fast from the morning to the evening on that one day every year, commanded by God.

Nowhere else. But fasting is a means for our bodies to remind us how much we need to eat. And when it's reminding us how much we need to eat, it's really reminding us in that time of how much we need Christ, how much we need intimacy with Christ, praying with Christ, to intimate with Christ. Now, by the time Christ came on the scene, fasting had been completely altered, it had been enhanced, it had been perverted, all in an attempt not to do the right thing according to the command of God, but to do something that brought favor to themselves, draw attention to themselves.

We see that in no greater place than Luke chapter 18. In verse 10 it says, "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying these things to himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like the people, other people, swindlers, unjust adulterers, and even like this tax collector. I, I, I fast twice a week. I pray. I tithe.' But the tax collectors, standing somewhere in the distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his chest, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner.'

" And Jesus says, "I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other, for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted." See, the issue of fasting was not to stand in the street corner and tell how great you are because you're fasting. It was an issue of the heart. Anything else would be hypocritical. The Pharisees, they would fast on two days. They would fast on Mondays, and they would fast on Thursdays.

You say, "Well, why Mondays and Thursdays?" Well, they would argue that they were fasting Mondays and Thursday because Mondays and Thursdays were the days that Moses was given the Law. But, the reality is that they fasted on Mondays and Thursday because Mondays and Thursdays were the day of the market in the square. And so they could present themselves during that time and be like Eeyore, like, "Oh, woe is me." Right? You know anybody like that? Every time you see them, they're like, "Oh."

It's so exhausting. And what they're trying to do is they're trying to just drum up attention to themselves. This is the issue of Matthew chapter six. And Jesus is calling it for what it is. It's hypocrisy. And this is often the case with self-righteousness, isn't it? Man loves to take what is meant to honor God and twist it in such a way as though it appears to men to honor themselves. Self-glorification. Self-praise. All of this instead of what it's supposed to be, and that is self-denial.

And so enters in the reality of the need for the church, for the people of God, to fast. Fasting, then, saying no to the flesh and saying yes to the spirit. Saying no to self-glory, but saying yes to glorifying God, to God's glory. So where did this all get skewed in the church in North America? Why is fasting such a foreign thing that's spoken of, or not spoken of, or not properly applied to the church in North America? Well, I would suggest to you that this happened years ago when the Reformers came into play and began to see the hypocrisy of what was happening in the church in Rome, and they instead said, "Hey, listen, we're not going to do that thing on Wednesday.

We're not going to do that lent season because it's hypocrisy." It was showing themselves. And instead, they took the pendulum of fasting and took it over here and said, "We're not going to do it." The Puritans, however, they tried to bring it back. The Puritans say this of fasting. They said that fasting was for the purpose of or equal to soul fattening. Fasting was soul fattening. I love that thought. But what about fasting for other things? Other things outside of food.

Is that biblical? Like social media or fasting from golf or fasting from something that's taking you away from the reality of communion with the Lord. You name it, I don't care. Those things might be good. But it's not biblical fasting. Biblical fasting is abstaining from food for the purpose of spiritual fattening. That's it. You say, "Well, wait a second, because 1 Corinthians 7 talks about a marriage, and it says that a husband and wife, for the sake of prayer," and some translations say prayer and fasting, but fasting is not in the original manuscripts, but says, "For the sake of prayer, would abstain from intimacy because, for a time."

So isn't that like a type of fast? It may be a type of fast, but it's not a biblical fast as mentioned here in Matthew 6. Fasting is a food issue, and fasting is a food issue to reveal a heart issue. That's what's going on. And for the true believer to fast is to enlarge our soul, but for the hypocrite, the unbeliever, fasting was to enlarge one's pride. Say, well, how did they do this? How was this enlarging their pride by fasting? What does it say?

It's like they put on a gloomy face. They disfigured their face. The word means render oneself unrecognizable. Why would they want to be unrecognizable? Because they wanted to be unrecognizable because wanting that would show them more recognized. It's this false hypocrisy. It's this fakeness. It's no wonder that Christ in Matthew chapter 23 confronts the issue when he says this. He says, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.

In this way you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness." I would just say, that is not what you want to hear from the Lord. And that ought to be cause for us to examine our hearts this morning. Is there any attitude of self-glory in your heart? You see, self-glory is the root of all hypocrisy. Test yourself. Do you desire to be noticed by others? The hypocrites, as they fasted, seek recognition of others to produce spiritual pride.

And let me just say that that was and still is today devastatingly blinding Why? Think about it. Because the Pharisees were face to face with the Lord, and they did not see him for who he was or who he is because they were hypocrites. They were blinded. And so I want us, as a church, as a people of God, not to be blinded. Second Corinthians 4:4 says, "The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving." Oh, may it not be in this room.

But we have to be honest with ourselves, church. Within us, I believe all of us, I'm not speaking to you, I'm speaking to we. We all fall short in the area of desiring self-glory. What are some ways we desire self-glory? One of my pastor friends came up with this list, and I stole it from him. Number one, symptoms of self-glory. Number one, I speak a lot but listen little. I critique others but can't handle criticism myself. I'm overly controlling and I can't delegate.

I struggle to recognize other people's success because they're jealous or envious. I care deeply about other people's opinions of myself. I experience little gratitude. I am self-reliant and self-dependent, and I am unwilling to serve in low positions. Any of those apply? I would just say this. A symptom of self-glory could be this simple. It could just be, I breathe. Because innate in us is a desire for self. And it doesn't take long to see that little six, seven, eight-month-old live that out.

That's the first thing you see in a child, the desire for self-glory, self-service. And so I believe we're all guilty. I believe we're all hypocrites in some way during times in our lives. But God was concerned about that in the area of fasting. And God spoke in Zechariah, chapter seven. He says this. He says, "Then the word of Yahweh of hosts came to me saying, 'Speak to all the people of the land and to the priest saying, when you fasted and mourned in the fifth and the seventh month these 70 years," 70 years, "was it actually for me that you fasted?"

I love that because he's like, "I couldn't see that in your heart." "And when you eat and when you drink, are you not eating for yourselves, and are you not drinking for yourselves? Are not these the words which Yahweh called out by the hand of the former prophets when Jerusalem was inhabited at their ease, along with its cities around it, and the Negev and the Shephelah were inhabited? Then the word of Yahweh came to Zechariah, saying, "Thus has Yahweh of hosts said, 'Judge with true justice, and show loving kindness and compassion, each to his brother.

And do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the sojourner, or the afflicted. And do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.' " See, that's what they were doing. They were judging injusticely. They weren't showing loving kindness and compassion to their brothers. They weren't helping the afflicted. But what do they do? Look in the middle there. It says, "But they refused to give heed and turned to a stubborn shoulder and dulled their ears from hearing.

And they made their hearts diamond hard so that they could not hear the law and the words which Yahweh host had sent by His Spirit, by the hand of the former prophets. Therefore, great wrath came from Yahweh of hosts. And it happened that just as He called and they would not listen, so they called and I would not listen," says Yahweh of hosts. "But I scattered them with a storm wind among all the nations whom they have not known. Thus the land is desolate behind them, so that no one was passing through and returning, for they made the pleasant land desolate."

How sad is that? Because they had a heart issue. Their fasting was not a pure heart. It was a selfish heart. Isaiah 58, similar situation, says this. "Why have we fasted and you do not see? Why have we afflicted our souls and you do not know? Behold, on the day of your fast, you find your desire and oppress all your workers. Behold, you fast for contention and quarreling and to strike with a wicked fist. You do not fast like you do today to make your voice heard on high.

It is a fast like this which I choose, a day for a man to afflict himself." That's what God was after. That's not what they were doing. "It is for bowing one's head like a reed and for spreading out sackcloth and ashes as a bed. Will you call this a fast, even an acceptable day to Yahweh? Is this not the fast which I choose: to loosen the bonds of wickedness, to release the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free and break every yoke?

It is not to divide your bread with the hungry and bring the afflicted homeless into the house. When you see the naked, you cover him, and do not hide yourself from your own flesh. Then your light will break out like the dawn, and your recovery will speedily spring forth, and your righteousness will go before you. The glory of Yahweh will be your rear guard. Then you will call and Yahweh will answer. You will cry and He will say, 'Here I am.' If you remove the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger and spreading wickedness, and if you offer your soul to the hungry and satisfy the soul of the afflicted, then your light will rise to the darkness and your thick darkness will become like midday.

And Yahweh will continually guide you and satisfy your soul in scorched places and fortify your bones. And you will be like watered gardens and like a spring of water whose water does not fail." See, God is after the heart. The issue was that outward religious activity fell far short. God wanted it to come from a pure heart. And they were fasting to be blessed, but their lives were a mess. Selfishness, oppression, quarreling, mistreating one another.

An outward religious ritual rather than a true expression of sincere repentance and dependency on the Lord. And that didn't impress God at all. He wants a fast accompanied by humility, repentance, justice, mercy, generosity. That's what he's after. And that's why I believe in verse 16, he says, "Now whenever you fast." There's the implication, if you will, that we should be fasting. And I think that that's a forgotten thing in the Church today. He says, "Whenever you fast," that means you should be fasting at some level.

Now, I would say, don't go home and call your mom and say, "I'm going to fast for the next 10 days," and you have a health condition that doesn't afford you that privilege. Don't do that. If you have a health condition that you can't fast, then don't fast. But if you're able, then you may want to apply this truth. Jesus had fasted, remember, for 40 days and 40 nights before he was brought into the wilderness, led into the wilderness to be tempted by the evil one.

But what about the disciples of Christ? When they walked with Christ, were they fasting? Matthew chapter nine says this. It says, "Then the disciples of John came to him, asking, 'Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?' And Jesus said to them, 'Can the attendants of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the day will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and they will fast.' " Do you see what Jesus just said?

Jesus just said, "Hey, listen. They're not fasting because I'm here. I'm present. We have intimacy now together here." He says, "There's coming a day when I, the bridegroom, will be gone. And when that day comes, then they will fast." Guess what that means? We should fast at some level with the right heart attitude. But understand something. Here's the deal. Fasting is always connected to prayer. You don't just fast, you fast and pray. You can pray without fasting, but you cannot fast without praying.

Throughout the entire scripture, every instance of fasting, it's always accompanied by prayer. This is critical because fasting has a permanent partner, and that partner's name is prayer. It's because we deny the flesh to pursue the Spirit. There's reasons for fasting in the scripture. We see it throughout the scripture. Repentance is one of those. Joel chapter two speaks to that and says, "Yet even now," declares Yahweh, "return to me with all your heart and with fasting, weeping, and wailing.

And tear your heart and not your garments." He says, "Rend your heart. Now return to Yahweh, your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in loving kindness, and relenting concerning evil." You may have sin in your life that you need to repent of. And maybe it's going to take denying the flesh for a season to reveal that sin so that you can bring that before the Lord in repentance. There's another reason for fasting in the scriptures that we see.

It's fear. One of those passages we mentioned a few weeks ago, I thought out of 2 Chronicles chapter 20 was a situation like that, where Jehoshaphat recognized they're surrounded by the armies and they're fearful. What does it do? It says they were fearful. And what did he do? He ordered a time of prayer and fasting so that they could get wisdom and they could be relieved from their fear. I love this one in Jonah chapter three. In Jonah chapter three, the people of Nineveh, of all people, the pagans, the unbelieving.

Says this in chapter three, "They believed the message that was given to them. And the people of Nineveh believed in God, and they called a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them. Then the word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, laid aside his mantle from him, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat on ashes. And he cried out, said, 'In Nineveh, by the decree of the king and his nobles, do not let man, animal, herd, or flock taste a thing.'

" He even went further than the people. He went to the herds. He said, "Do not let them eat. Do not let them drink. But both man and animal must be covered with sackcloth and let men call on God with their strength, that each may turn from his evil way and from the violence which is in his hand. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn away from his burning anger so that we will not perish." What an incredible response to the truth of God. And we all know what happened.

Esther. Situation in Esther chapter four. Mordecai had come to her in verse 14. And Mordecai, broken over what he had heard was going to come upon the Jewish people, he says to Esther, he says in verse 14, he said, "Listen, this could be such a time as this. This might be why you're here." And then he says, "Then Esther said for them to respond to Mordecai, 'Go, gather all the Jews who are found in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day.

And I and my young women will also fast in the same way. And thus I will go in to the king, which is not according to the law. And if I perish, I perish.' So Mordecai went away and did just as Esther had commanded him." Amazing. Fear brought that about. How about this? Protection. Protection's another reason we see fasting in the scriptures. Direction and protection. In Ezra chapter eight, you have this situation. It says this, it says, "Then I called for a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from him a direct journey for us, our little ones, and all our possessions."

They were on the way to go, and they wanted to know the safest route. And they had their entire families with them. And it's like, what's the fastest and quickest way? And it says this, "For I was ashamed to ask from the king for a military force and horsemen to help us against the enemy on the way, because we had said to the king, 'The hand of our God is upon all those who seek him for their good, but his strength and his anger are against all those who forsake him.'

" Don't you love that? In this situation, they didn't want to call on the king for protection because they had told the king that the people who fear God have their protection. God is their protection. They didn't need man to protect them. They trusted God. What they needed was to pray and fast that God would give them direction as to the safest route. Which God did. We see also fasting in the scripture for mourning. Mourning. We see that in 2 Samuel chapter one.

After Saul and Jonathan were dead, it says, "David took hold of his clothes and tore them, and so also did all the men who were with him. And they lamented and wept and fasted until evening for Saul and his son Jonathan and for the people of the Yahweh and the house of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword." Mourning is often correlated with fasting. How about this? Desperation. David cries out in 2 Samuel. Desperation. In chapter 12 it says, "Then Yahweh smote the child that Uriah's wife bore to David, so that he was very sick.

David therefore sought God about the boy. And David fasted and went and spent the night lying on the ground. And the elders of the household stood beside him in order to raise him up from the ground. But he was unwilling and would not eat food with them. Then it happened on the seventh day that the child died. And the servants of David were afraid to tell him because the child was dead. For they said, 'Behold, while the child was still alive, we spoke to him, and he did not listen to our voice.

How then can we tell him that the child has died? He might do himself harm.' And David saw that his servants were whispering together, so David discerned that the child had died. So David said to his servants, 'Has the child died?' And they said, 'He has died.' So David arose from the ground, washed, anointed himself, and changed his clothes, and he came into the house of Yahweh and worshiped. Then he came to his own house, and he asked, and they set food before him, and he ate.

Then his servants said to him, 'What is the thing that you have done? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but when the child died, you arose and ate.' Then he said, 'While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept, for I said, "Who knows? Yahweh may be gracious to me, that the child may live." But now he has died. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.' " I want you to notice this one.

Because David cried out in desperation that God would bring healing to his child. And I want you to notice two things. Number one, first, God did not answer this. David prayed and he fasted, but God did not answer. God doesn't always answer our desires the way we want them to be. But I want you to notice what David does. He worshiped. He prayed, he fasted, and then he got news of the death, and he worshiped. That's the heart attitude that God is after in each of our lives.

So David, in desperation, cried out. There's a final reason I find in scripture that people fasted and prayed, and that is for wisdom. For wisdom. In Acts chapter 13, you see this. The early church, they're gathered together in Acts chapter 13, and it says, "Now there were at Antioch, in the church that was there, prophets and teachers, Barnabas and Simeon, and who was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch and Saul.

And while they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.' Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away." So they're praying that God would show them to have wisdom as to who to send into the mission. And the answer comes to them, "Set apart Barnabas and Saul, send them out." And they do. They pray, and they fast, and they send them out.

Also in Acts chapter 14, you see it again. The church gathered together and it says, "And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, having prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord in whom they had believed." And so wisdom in selection, you see that also in fasting. But there's a warning, Church, with fasting, there's a warning. Everybody say, "There's a warning." There's a warning. We must never fast for the sake of direct results.

That is extremely dangerous. You never fast for the sake of direct results. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones spoke to this, and I think he said it so appropriately. He said this. He said, "The moment we begin to say, 'Because I do this, I get that,' it means that we are controlling the blessing." That's dangerous. This is to insult God and to violate the great doctrine of his final and ultimate sovereignty. No, we must never advocate fasting as a means of blessing.

Amen. And I would just say that what I hear in the Church of North America is, "If you fast, God will do this for you. If you fast, blessing will come." I don't see that in the scripture. There are times where I see it, but I don't see it consistently, and I would never want to ever tell you that fasting is going to give you what you want. It is not a vending machine that you put your coin in, and you choose a selection from. Fasting is an opportunity for us to humble our heart before Almighty God and allow His Spirit to direct our path.

And so as we have discussed what biblical fasting is, and we've looked at many biblical examples, how often should we, as believers, fast, and how long? How often should we do it, and how long should we do it? I would just say this. The point of the text is that that's between you and God. I don't believe there's a prescribed direction for us as to how often. We see in the scripture, the only one time it was commanded, it was from sunrise to sunset, one day.

One day a year. But we see in the scripture 40 days, we see 3 days, we see 7 days, we see 10 days. The issue is the heart. The issue is not the duration, but is the pursuit of Christ. It's the pursuit of Christ. And that's why I think Matthew 6 ends with verse 33. It says, "Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you." But if the heart's not right, if our approach to God is unholy and hypocritical, then we run the risk of receiving the news that Jeremiah speaks of in Jeremiah 14 when he says this.

"Thus says Yahweh to this people, 'Even so, they have loved to wander. They have not kept their feet in check. Therefore, Yahweh does not accept them. Now, he will remember their iniquity and punish their sins.' So Yahweh said to me, 'Do not pray for the good of this people. When they fast, I am not going to listen to their cry. And when they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I am not going to accept them. Rather, I am going to make an end of them by the sword, famine, and pestilence.'

" Wow. That's pretty severe. God does not want a hypocritical heart. God does not want hypocritical lives. God wants our heart to be wholly His. Let us not be a people who have high levels of activity for God but low levels of intimacy with God. And maybe you're here this morning, I believe you're here by divine appointment to be reminded by God that you need Christ. You need intimacy with Christ. But our approach has to come out of humility. Our approach has to come, like David's in Psalm 51.

When he said this, he said, "For you do not delight in sacrifice; otherwise, I would give it, Lord. You are not pleased with burnt offerings. The sacrifice of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. O God, you will not despise." In David's great confession, he recognizes that offerings and sacrifice is not what He's looking for. He's looking for a broken heart, a contrite spirit. In our home, in our office, I have painted around the top of our office Isaiah 61 verse two.

And I love this verse because it says this. It says, "But to this one I will look." If your antennas don't go off when you hear God say, "To this one I will look," then your wood's a little bit wet. Okay? Because I want to know, God, who's the one you're going to look to? Who's the one, God? He says, "To this one I will look, is to him who is humble in spirit and who trembles at my word." Church, are we a people who are humble in spirit? Do we tremble at His word?

Fasting is an issue. It is a heart issue. I believe James chapter 4 really gives us a picture of this. In James chapter 4, he starts out, and he's talking about the quarrels amongst them, and what's the source of those quarrels, and it turns out it's their pride, and their pride is destroying them. And he gets to chapter 4, verse 7, and he says, "Do you not know that I desire the spirit that I've placed within you?" It's easy to read that verse and not see what he's saying.

What God is saying is, "Hey, listen, believer. I have placed my spirit in you to commune with me. I desire that communion with you." But what's it take? It takes verse eight. "Draw near to him, and he will draw near to you," James says. Church, may we be a people who humbly draw near to God. May we be a people who desire to commune with the Lord Jesus Christ intimately. He goes on, he says, "Be miserable. Mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning, your joy into gloom."

Why? So that when you come to Him, you're not coming in pride or hypocrisy. You're coming in holy, heartfelt repentance and dependence on the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And when we do that, I believe God hears our cry. I believe it's why John exhorted the Church to abide in Christ, to remain in Christ, to stay close to Christ. And in saying that, there's reasons, because when we're close to Christ, Christ produces in us what we cannot produce in ourselves.

And that is the fruit of the spirit of God: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control. Maybe this morning, Church, maybe it's your opportunity to say, "I'm going to take a step forward in my spiritual walk with the Lord Jesus Christ." Maybe this morning you're going to humble yourself and you're going to say, "God, I'm going to give a day to denying the flesh for the desire to build up the spirit within me for your glory, God."

Maybe that's your opportunity today. Maybe today you need to come down and you need to pray, "God, I'm going to do this. Help me do this. I'm going to commit to this today." Maybe there's someone else in here this morning who listening to this, understanding that your heart has been the heart of a hypocrite. You've professed Christ, you've been a member of church most of your life. You've gone to church, you've attended Sunday schools, you've done all that.

But in the end, he's not your Lord. You've not yielded and submitted yourself unto him as Lord and Savior. You've not embraced him by faith. You've not repented of your sin and embraced him. Now listen, fasting for you, apart from that, would be a waste. It would be useless. There would be zero value, spiritually speaking. So you've got to get your heart before a holy God right before you would even attempt to take a step forward in this spiritual discipline.

But here's the good news. He loves you. He desires the spirit that he's placed within you to commune with you. And so maybe this morning, you need to come, you need to pray, you need to confess your sin before God, and you need to repent and embrace him by faith, and trust Christ as Savior and Lord. So I'm going to stop talking. That's a good thing. But I don't want you to run out of here, because when I stop talking, I believe the Spirit starts talking, and he's a lot better than I am.

And so I'm going to pray and ask God's Spirit to move in the hearts of all of us this morning. Father, we thank you for your Word. Oh God, we fall short of your glory. We fall short of your glory every day, God. We get it mixed up, God. We think that we're too important. We desire the "Well done, thou good and faithful servant" from you. And so we put on self-righteousness, God. We talk about all the things that we do for you, and yet our hearts are far from you, God.

Oh God, forgive us. And for any in this room this morning, God, who don't know you, they've never repented of their sin, they never believed unto the Lord Jesus Christ, Holy Spirit work in their heart. Even right now, lead them unto yourself, God, that they would come, that they would confess their sin before you, that they would repent and they would trust you for their eternal state, God. Help them today not to put themself in a situation, Father, where you have to bring through discipline or some other means into their life to get their attention, God.

For any in this room that know you but have been living as if they don't because they want the glory, God, lay it down. Maybe lay it down. You're the one that deserves the glory. We sung of that this morning, God. Oh, Father, Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, do what I cannot do. Speak now to your children. In Jesus' name. Amen.