Fasting

Sometimes we overlook the obvious. For example, the rhetoric of religion often centers on this idea that we look for God. This makes God seem so far away, as if we must exert enormous energy to find Him. In truth, He's right there, waiting for us, even when we fail to look.

A while ago, I decided to fast on Thursdays. I felt like it would be a way to learn dependence on God because it often feels that when we're satisfied, either with a full stomach or with the status of our lives, we feel less inclined to look to God. However, at those times when everything seems to be going wrong, we understand the need for God.

So, I gave up food on Thursdays. What I learned was this. God meets us where we are and teaches us what we need to learn when we are able to understand it.

When I started the fast, I was thinking of how we sometimes find ways of calming ourselves, sometimes through food, when we should really seek calm by turning to God. But, as I fasted, I saw the the food problem was, for me, pretty insignificant when I compared it to the many other things I put before a relationship with God. But, it wasn't until I took away food and turned to God that I could see the other areas of my life that God wanted me to change.

In his book, Basic Christianity, John Stott writes,

"The Christian knows that the nearer he approaches God, the more he becomes aware of his own sin. In this saint somewhat resembles the scientist. The more the scientist discovers, the more he appreciates the mysteries which await his discovery. So the more the Christian grows in Christ-likeness, the more he perceives the vastness of the distance which separates him from Christ" (38).

As I prayed and fasted, I slowly began to see how, over the course of many years, I had worked on constructing a pretty strong wall to keep God (and sometimes other people) away from me. And, the thing is, I began to see things I didn't really like. Suddenly, it became obvious to me that I had a lot of flaws. I was vain, materialistic, selfish, and at least half a dozen other bad things.

I looked around my home at all the things I surrounded myself with. I had tons of magazines that told me I needed to have gobs of expensive possessions, clothes I never wore, more makeup than I could ever possibly use. Those are things that obviously have no lasting value and things that serve no purpose other than to maintain a negative system of values.

But, they're not the only things that do that. I started looking through boxes of old papers--things I wrote as an undergrad and as a grad student in English. Stacks of papers with glowing comments on them, papers I'd been so proud of. But, the thing is, as I looked back over these papers, it was as if they meant nothing to me. It was nice to know my work had been appreciated, but all I could see as I looked at those old papers was how proud those comments had made me, how they'd made me feel like I was complete, even at times when I was anything but.

So, where was the nice warm fuzzy feeling that Christianity was supposed to give me? When I confronted how completely distant I was from being like Christ, how this troubled my ability to relate to people as I should and to be a good Christian, I certainly felt anything but calm.

One night, after thinking about how completely askew my focus had been for so long, I went to bed and had a horrible night's sleep. I woke up the next morning, and all I could think was, "How on earth am I going to fix this? This is a real problem. I'm all these things--selfish, proud, arrogant--and I hate all of it. How can I be a different person?"

And, then it came to me. The most obvious answer. You just do. That's the calm that comes from being a Christian. The answer makes so much sense and is so clear. It's this:

"Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new" (2 Corinthians 5:17).

So, the answer to how to change is simply that you change. Through Christ, you allow those parts--the selfishness and all of it--to die away. This ability to let the old self die away is part of the promise and hope of Christianity. It's so obvious that we must be careful not to overlook it.