Answers · Prayer & Hearing God
What is fasting, and how do I start?
Fasting is going without food for a set time in order to give yourself to God in prayer. The Bible does not treat it as an exotic practice for a spiritual few. Jesus taught about it in the same Sermon as giving and praying, and His instruction is aimed at the heart of the one fasting, not at the audience:
"But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face; That thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly."
— Matthew 6:17–18 (KJV)
Isaiah 58 keeps fasting honest. God refuses a fast that is only an appetite paused while life goes on unchanged; the fast He has chosen does something — it loosens bands, lifts burdens, and sets the oppressed free:
"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 ye break every yoke?"
— Isaiah 58:6 (KJV)
Joel shows the posture: "turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning" (Joel 2:12). So to start, keep it simple, and keep it His: give one meal to prayer instead, and spend the hour you would have eaten in prayer and reading; when that is familiar, try a day. Let it be between you and your Father, who "seeth in secret," rather than an announcement. And if health makes going without food unwise for you, take counsel first — the same hours can be given to prayer in another way, and God, who looks on the heart, will not mistake the offering.