What Is Fasting?

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: This podcast episode was produced for the glory of God and is brought to you in part by the Revive Our Hearts Monthly Partner team.

Dannah Gresh: Our quest to feed ourselves can turn into a struggle for control! Here’s Erin Davis.

Erin Davis: Imagine being hunter/gatherers and being desperate to find a meal to feed our family. Then we would know: “Okay, unless God provides what we need, we’re in real trouble here!” That is our reality . . . we’re just a little detached from it.

God’s saying, “Give this over to Me. Let me work in this area. Let me show you a better way.”

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Choosing Gratitude, for September 28. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Nancy: When it comes to the issue of food, it can be hard to find the right balance. I know it is for me. We can slip into making unhealthy choices, and then we can feel guilty and can swing to the other extreme in an attempt to course correct. 

So you have overeating and undereating and this pendulum to the point where we can actually do great physical harm to our bodies. Our guest today, Erin Davis, says that this is not the Bible’s picture of fasting and feasting—swinging from one side of the pendulum to the other.

To help us with this, Erin has written a devotional book called Fasting and Feasting. Erin is no stranger to Revive Our Hearts. She helps host our weekly video podcast Grounded. If you’ve not heard that or seen that, you need to—you’ll want to. Erin and her husband, Jason, both serve on the Revive Our Hearts staff.

I hope you caught yesterday’s episode of Revive Our Hearts. Erin and my cohost, Dannah Gresh, introduced us to the concept of healthy rhythms in our lives, including in the area of food. Erin reminded us that food is meant to be an object lesson to point us to the only One who truly satisfies—and that is Jesus.

If you missed that episode, you can always head to the Revive Our Hearts app or to our website ReviveOurHearts.com to get caught up. Now, let’s listen together as Dannah and Erin continue to help us understand God’s view of fasting and feasting.

Erin: My fortieth birthday was in April of 2020. I actually think big life moments are great opportunities to fast. So if I live to an average age, forty would be kind of a halfway point to me.

I had talked to my family and said, “Guys, I think I want to enter into a forty-day fast.” I had done one other forty-day fast when I launched the women’s ministry at my church. I just felt like I wanted to do that again as just an act of showing the Lord how intent I was to dedicate the second half of my life to Him.

It’s on my calendar . . . and then March of 2020 happens, which was when the world shut down from this new threat. It was new at the time—COVID 19. It was also when we decided to launch Grounded.

So I went to my husband and said, “I don’t know if I should fast. Everything feels topsy-turvy, and now I have this new area of emphasis of ministry. I just don’t know . . .” 

Dannah: We were working a lot of extra hours!

Erin: A lot of extra hours! And if you remember, there was a lot of fear about food. Like, you couldn’t get frozen pizza, and all this weird stuff. So I kind of thought, “Uh-oh!’

Dannah: We were wiping food down when we brought it home, scrubbing it up! It was crazy!

Erin: Right!? We were doing all of that, yeah. But what Jason knew, and what I knew . . . I’m not even sure if you knew this Dannah. We certainly haven’t talked about it publicly. My oldest son, Eli, whom I couldn’t adore more, he and I have just historically had a tense relationship.

I don’t know if we’re too much alike or too different, but we have just butted heads. I knew that I did not want the second half of my life to have that kind of relationship with my son. And to point back to the earlier episode, it was of this kind.

We had tried things. I’d read the parenting book. We had even gone to counseling—just he and I. There wasn’t any one thing; we just struggled to get along.

Dannah: When we were talking yesterday about when Jesus said to the disciples who tried to deliver a demoniac, “This kind doesn’t come out except through prayer.” And we also talked about fasting yesterday. (see Matt. 17:21, Mark 9:29)

And so, you had tried everything, and you still had this kind of relationship that you wanted to be delivered of [the tension] in your relationship with your son.”

Erin: Right! I wanted a tender, close relationship with my boy. And so, Jason knew that was one of the reasons I was fasting, one of the things I was taking to the Lord as I was considering the second half of my life.

This is probably why he said, “Go ahead and do it, Baby!” He knew this was a point of tension in our family. So I did it! I entered into that fast forty days before my fortieth birthday—which would have been about mid-March 2020.

We were birthing this effort—Grounded—which we did daily. It was a tremendous amount of time and energy and brain power. So the Lord used all of that during that fast. I just feel like I had such clarity from the Lord.

I’m so thrilled to report somehow—it’s mysterious, but somehow—the Lord did such a healing work between Eli and I! Now we have a normal relationship. I’m his mom, he’s my kid. We definitely sometimes have to disagree, but whatever that was between us, it’s gone! The Lord delivered us from it!

Dannah: Wow! Erin, I have to ask, you probably have Eli’s permission to tell this story, right? 

Erin: I do. I try not to tell my boys’ stories without asking. So I did pull him in right before we hit “record.” I asked him if I could, and he said, in his many words, “Sure!” I don’t think he cared. But we’ve talked about it a lot. We’ve talked a lot about how grateful he is that there’s been healing.

Dannah: I need to coach him up because, you know, there are lots of pastors who have to pay their children when they use them in illustrations. He might not know about that yet, so I’ll fill him in.

Well, Erin, you bring up a really complicated and maybe one of the most misunderstood spiritual disciplines: fasting. We talked yesterday about some of the reasons why maybe we don’t practice it, how necessary it is to practice a rhythm of it. But why do you think that is? What are some of the misconceptions that we have about fasting?

Erin: Well, it isn’t really normalized, so it feels like a very weird thing to do. And then, there is a passage in Scripture where Jesus is talking about, “When you fast . . .” (see Matt. 6:16) It’s just assumed we’re going to.

But He contrasts the way Pharisees fast with the way that we might fast. It almost sounds like He’s telling us that it has to be a secret. I don’t actually believe that’s what He’s telling us. But He’s saying, “Don’t tell everybody. The Lord will reward you. Don’t make your face look sick. Don’t go around saying [mournfully], ‘I’m fasting, I’m fasting.”

I think we have taken that one little passage about fasting and over applied it so that nobody is ever talking about fasting when they fast. Well, if nobody is ever talking about it, then we don’t know if anybody is ever doing it.

Also, I think the food and diet industry has really hijacked something that is supposed to belong to God’s people. I mean, there has been a lot of talk just in recent years about intermittent fasting. We’ve discovered it as this miracle health thing.

And I chuckle inside because I’m like, “Oh, yeah . . .Scripture’s been telling of that for thousands of years!” But now it gets associated with weight loss. And as God’s people we know that our bodies are temporary. We know we’re not supposed to obsess over our weight.

Then we go, “Uh, should I be fasting if it’s associated with weight loss, is that the same thing as an eating disorder?” So, we’ve been given a lot of confusing messages for sure. It can be hard to extrapolate the good that God has for us in Scripture. So I confess, it’s confusing!

Dannah: Can we just get a quick definition for fasting, just so we’re all on the same page, Erin?

Erin: Yes, fasting is denying yourself food for the purpose of seeking the Lord. So, what I do is when I’m fasting and when I get hungry, my first prayer is, “God, help me to hunger and thirst for righteousness like I am physically hungering right now. Let my spirit have hunger pains where I know I need the Lord, I need His Word!”

Now, I will say that almost always in Scripture, fasting is from food. The one exception I can think of is in the New Testament where Paul is talking about married couples denying each other or denying themselves their sexual relationship for a period of prayer and seeking the Lord. That’s the only exception that I can think of.

So a lot of times when we talk about fasting, now we’ll say, “Well, it doesn’t have to be food. It can be social media. It can be television.” Those might be really good things to deny yourself of, but I think the reason why it’s food in Scripture is because food is essential to life. (We might think it is, but social media is never going to be essential to life. Watching television is never going to be essential to life. Coffee is never going to be essential to life.)

So there is a level of intensity where it is like, “I’m going to remove this thing from myself—if I don’t eat I will die—to express urgency here or the level of my dependency on the Lord.”

Dannah: I love that. So, Erin, if food is essential to life, why would God ask us to withhold it?

Erin: Well, I think, again, that points us to the fact that there are two rhythms—fasting and feasting. Then there’s just kind of your everyday Tuesday, when you eat a ham sandwich. Not everything has to go into those two extremes. God doesn’t call us to fast until we die.

Dannah: Or even until we grow sick.

Erin: That’s right. In college I had a full-fledged eating disorder. I was anorexic. I was very, very thin. That was not a God-honoring fast, because that was about me being skinny. That was not about me seeking the Lord. All of this requires walking in the Spirit.

We might think of this concept and we’ll go, “Okay, God, give me the rules. How many days do I fast? What do I eat or not eat when I fast? What do I eat when I’m done fasting? What do I pray?” Well, that’s not the Christian life for the most part. It requires us to walk in the Spirit, to seek the Lord. I am not an expert on fasting, but this is a spiritual discipline that is a really important part of my life.

I’ve done two forty-day fasts. I’ve done one-day fasts. I’ve done ten-day fasts. I’ve done two-day fasts. There’s not just a rule book that we follow here, but we do seek the Lord in this and ask Him to give us guidance.

I think food in general is meant to point us to the fact that we need God. The fact that that need-meter goes off so often . . . We lose a little bit of this because we go to the grocery store, right?

Imagine being hunter/gatherers and being desperate to find a meal to feed our family. Then we would know: “Okay, unless God provides what we need, we’re in real trouble here!” And that is our reality, we’re just a little detached from it.

I think it is like so many things that are a big part of our life. God’s saying, “Give this over to Me, let me work in this area, let Me show you a better way!” 

Dannah: It’s all about turning our hearts to Him, and there are different ways you can fast. The Bible has different examples. For example, the Daniel fast. He was choosing to withhold himself from the rich foods of the king’s table and instead eat only vegetables and grains and water—those things that God had created.

So, it’s all about turning our hearts to Him, that is what it’s about. It’s not about the food, it’s not even about the withholding of food. It is first and foremost just saying, “I’m hungry for You Lord; teach me what that means. Teach me how to feast on Your presence. Teach me how to feast on Your Word!”

Erin, take us to a passage that wherever we are fasting might help with our “strength training” in this area of spiritual discipline.

Erin: Well, there are so many passages that we could go to, but I think if you are looking for the foundational passage on fasting—especially if you are a Christian who’s wrestling with is this for me or is it not for me? Should I be fasting, should I not be fasting?—the place to go is Matthew chapter 4. This is where we see Jesus—the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the Messiah! We see Him enter into a forty-day fast. I won’t read you the whole passage. You can read it yourself; it’s Matthew 4:1–11.

I do want to just pull out some things that jump out at me regarding Jesus’ fast. This is a famous fast. He heads out into the wilderness, but I think there are some really interesting things. First, Jesus’ fast followed a moment of victory. 

So, if you just go a little bit before this happened in Matthew 3, what was going on in Matthew 3 was Jesus’ baptism. And that is, of course, that moment where the Father booms from heaven, “This is my Son with whom I am well pleased.” And the Holy Spirit descends like a dove.

Jesus moved from that moment, which had to be such a powerful moment of affirming what Jesus had come to earth to do, to enter into this fast. So, there was a gap between that moment in the river, which really was a commissioning, and when His ministry actually began. He spent that moment fasting.

Which reminds me, Dannah, of my forty-day fast that we mentioned and my other forty-day fast that I talked about. Both of those preceded really intense seasons of ministry. I’m so grateful for what God did to prepare me during the “wilderness” fasting times. And He did the same thing for Jesus.

Second, this fast preceded—or was actually in the midst of—a really intense battle with the devil. You know the story. The devil kept coming to Jesus and tempting Him, and the first thing he tempted Him with was food.

So, I think that when we are in an intense spiritual battle, it feels like maybe the battle has ramped up. We can look at this and say, “Fasting is a Christ-like response to spiritual battles.”

The third was that Jesus fasted for forty days and forty nights. Not all fasts have to be for forty days and forty nights, but there’s a lot about forty in Scripture, so I think that’s an interesting connection.

Dannah: You mentioned that Jesus was tempted by food; that was the first thing the enemy tempted Him with. So He’s out there. He’s in the wilderness, and there wasn’t a grocery store around the corner . . . or a Sheetz. 

Erin likes to come to Pennsylvania to visit me because they have these amazing convenience stores where you get gas and food. For some reason, Erin likes them.

Erin: You can do the MTO sandwich!—Made to Order! I love ’em!

Dannah: Yep, there was no MTO in the wilderness where Jesus was. In fact, Matthew 4:2 says, “And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.” Our sweet Jesus was hungry. He had hunger pangs in His belly. 

But that first temptation was the tempter saying, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread” (v. 3). I think this is really important, because when we fast we are going to feel tempted, we are going to feel tempted by the apple, the banana, if you’re doing a juice fast.

If you’re doing a Daniel fast, you’re going to be tempted by the potato chips. I’m just saying, not from experience or anything! Maybe you would not be tempted by the potato chips, that would be me being tempted by the potato chips with a nice slab of cheddar cheese on the top! 

Erin: You’d be tempted by the “peach-ios!’ 

Dannah: The peachy rings, right! How does Jesus respond to that temptation, because it’s not how I am accustomed to responding. I am learning to respond this way. But what does Jesus do when Satan says, “Just make the rocks bread and eat them; just do that.”

Erin: Yes. Let’s read the whole passage.

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit [which is, again, that walking in the Spirit that we talked about] into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. [Which I love, you’re right, it shows His humanity.] And the tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." (Matt. 4:1–3)

And I have written in my Bible that temptation number one was food and comfort—which we see in other places in Scripture. Was it Jacob and Esau? Esau gave up his birthright for a bowl of stew! (see Gen. 25:30 and 34) 

Dannah: Stew, oh stew!

Erin: I mean, when we’re hungry, yeah, we forget what’s at stake.

Dannah: “Forget my future, forget all my needs. Just give me food!”

Erin: Yes, that’s right! “Give me the food,” was really what Satan was tempting Jesus here with. You know, “Give up Your self-control! Take the comfort. Let me give you comfort right now.”

But [Jesus] answered, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” (v. 4)

That “It is written,” is really important.

Dannah: Very important!

Erin: Jesus was quoting Scripture back to the tempter. Jesus knew the Word, He knew who God was before He went into the wilderness of course, because He is Himself God, but then He quotes Scripture back to the enemy. He isn’t denying that He could turn rocks to bread any time He wants to.

He could turn rocks into Pop Tarts, which wouldn’t be invented for thousands of years. He’s Jesus, He could do whatever He wanted. But He’s saying, “I am more than food. I am more than my cravings. I am more than what I put into my mouth.” We say that all the time, “You are what you eat.”

And Jesus is saying, “No, I am not what I eat or don’t eat, I AM the Son of God, and I will live by what God feeds me.” Which is truth, and in this case God was asking Him to come and be the Messiah.

So there is a whole lot wrapped up in this interaction here. There are many, many layers of what’s happening, but I also think there is a lot of application for us to just say the same, “No, I’m not defined by what I eat or don’t eat. I’m defined by God’s Word, His truth.”

Dannah: The thing for me in that passage is just really that, Jesus runs to the Word. I’m afraid to say that a lot of times when I am facing that temptation, when I fast, I don’t run to the Word.

I said yesterday when I’m fasting and feeling discomfort, I’m tempted to run to my screens and start scrolling, to distract myself. I find numbness or medication in another place. And this just reminds me, “Hey, if Jesus needed to run to the Word when He was tempted to break His fast, you can expect that Satan is going to put some stones in front of you and say, ‘Turn this into a loaf of bread.’” Now, for me, that’s almost always potato chips. That’s why you won’t find potato chips in my house when I’m fasting!

But whatever your “loaves of bread” is, let me encourage you: the next time you’re tempted to break that fast and miss out on what God is pressing you to learn and experience, to miss out on the hunger being directed at Him and for Him, run to the Scripture, run to the Word!

Jesus had it memorized; He knew the Word. Maybe you do, and maybe you don’t. If you don’t, just open your Bible. But, run to the Word! 

Erin: Yes, and there’s something so practical here. Temptation is not sin. If you start a fast and you do feel tempted by food, that doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. It means you’re human! Jesus Himself in His human state when He was here on earth, He had the temptation to prioritize food over other things.

Apparently a loaf of bread was sounding really good to Him on day forty-one, which I don’t blame Him. So I do think if you are new to fasting and you start out and you’re like, “Whoa! My cravings are all over the place!” or “Suddenly I can’t stand to drive by Burger King because I smell that charbroiled burger!” That doesn’t mean that you are not doing something right. It just means you’re human.

There is much for you to learn as you deny those temptations and keep what you promised to the Lord, if you do the fast that you told Him you’d do.

Dannah: I want to tell you about a fast that I did many, many years ago. It would have been when I lived in Rolla, Missouri, right around the corner from you, Erin. I was just learning to have, I guess, a dynamic prayer life. I didn’t know how to do that with two babies.

At the time I was working—not full-time—but more than I probably needed to because of my gifts and my abilities and my bandwidth. The Lord was working to bring me back to my home with my kids.

But temporarily I decided, “I need to spend time with the Lord instead of my friends at lunchtime.” I didn’t even know I was entering into a fast. But I went to Rolla’s Lions Club Park—a park in the middle of town—and sat under a tree every day.

Instead of having lunch, I would take a smoothie-type drink and talk to Jesus under the tree. I didn’t know that was fasting. But I want to tell you that after about six months of doing that five days a week (with some breaks here and there because I still spent time with friends), I was a different person!

There’s no way to describe it. I mean my resolve in my relationship with Jesus was different. My contentment and joy in life was different. My stress level was considerably down. My depression and overwhelmed feelings were abating, going away. It was such a dramatic change in my life!

God began to give me the strength to confess secrets and sins—some of them were far in my past. They weren’t even like current sins. I was getting the strength to just say, “This is who I am,” to my husband and even to my mom. My husband and my mom would tell you that it was like I was experiencing Jesus for the first time, the change in me was so dramatic.

What I know is that, to this day, the hunger and thirst I got for Jesus during that six months continues to this day! My favorite time of the day now is really early in the morning before Bob gets up, watching the woodpeckers at my birdfeeder.

I spend that time with the Lord with my hot tea or coffee, and I am just satisfied in Him. The days that I do that, I feel like the road of life just rises up to meet me. There might be hardships in that day but I’m equipped for them, and there is joy in my heart.

And the days I miss it, I could be a grumpy-pants. Erin Davis, you’ve been around when I’ve been a grumpy-pants, and you know it’s true!

Erin: I plead the Fifth! We’ve both been around each other. Yes, I know that feeling. I mean, there is a part of me that would love to fast all the time, because there is such a difference in my heart. But obviously, the Lord hasn’t called us to that. We wouldn’t make it if He did!

But I do know what you’re describing, and that’s really my heart for women with this book. I have this question in my heart: What could the Lord do with tens of thousands of women who fast? 

And the answer is, there’s nothing He couldn’t do.I mean, there’s nothing He can’t do anyway, but it blows doors off! Nancy says, “Roof off, walls down!” That’s what it does! There’s peace in it, there’s learning in it, there’s growth in it. It really is not a “shoulda.” It’s a “coulda.” It’s a gift!

Dannah: It’s a get to. We get to!

Erin: We get to, not a got to. That’s right! I would love to just share some of what the Lord did from that forty day fast we started talking about.

Dannah: Please! 

Erin: We’ve been talking about this really as training. Jesus used it as training for all He was about to do. I expected in that fast, I thought the Lord was really going to speak to me a lot about His calling on my life, and reaffirm what He has next for me, and maybe give me a new mission and a new passion. That’s not what He did in those forty days.

What He did in those forty days was, I experienced a tremendous amount of conviction of sin! Now, I’m talking about some big skeleton in my closet that I knew was there. I’m talking about a lot of things I didn’t see in my flesh, and a lot of it had to do with my relationship with Eli!

I wanted to just say, “God, You gave me this difficult kid!” And that’s not true. What’s true is that I had some things that I needed to repent from. Then it went beyond that, beyond my relationship with Eli, into other relationships. I mean, it was forty days of repentance and turning and repentance and turning.

I got to the end of that forty days and I thought, Well, it wasn’t what I expected! Here comes my fortieth birthday!

Months later my youngest son, Ezra, when he was just one wandered pretty far from our house. We couldn’t find him.

And we were like, “Ezra! Ezra! Where are you?!” We all had this panic. Then we spotted him! He was pretty far away in a field, just a dot. He’s a fearless kid. So I started running towards Ezra, and my need to get to him was so great that first I threw off this kind of vest I had on. Then I kicked off my shoes. Then I tore the earrings out of my ears. Because I had to get to my child quickly, I had to throw everything off.

I got back to the house, and the next morning in my quiet time with the Lord, some dots connected for me—which that period of fasting was training. God was throwing off the things that He needed to peel off of me so that I could run the next lap of the race with speed and with vigor and with determination.

So it was a season of training, just like Jesus’ season of forty days was a season of training. The Lord used that to grow my spiritual muscles for what He has next for me. I think that is one of the things He does when we fast.

Nancy: That’s Erin Davis talking with Dannah Gresh. Erin will be back in a moment to pray. It may be that fasting is something you’ve done before, and our program today has encouraged you and re-ignited your desire or maybe helped you reset your rhythm of fasting.

Or maybe you’ve never tried fasting before. You might want to start by just taking a lunch hour and getting away with the Lord for that time that you normally would have spent eating and talking with friends.

Take that time to talk to Him. He’s your Best Friend. Spend that time with Him. Maybe you could do that once a week, or maybe you could start expanding the time or how often you do that. The point is communing with the Lord in a more focused, concentrated time that’s free of normal distractions like eating, and reminding ourselves that we need Jesus. We need the Word of God more than we need physical food itself.

I want to encourage you to ask the Lord how He might want you to practice the spiritual discipline of fasting. And perhaps while you’re fasting, you could use Erin’s book to help prompt your praying. The title is Fasting and Feasting: 40 Devotions to Satisfy the Hungry Heart. 

This week that book is our thank-you gift to you when you support Revive Our Hearts with a donation of any size. As you may realize, Revive Our Hearts is supported by the donations of listeners like you. We so greatly appreciate the prayer support and the financial support as well.

To make a gift, visit us at ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959. Be sure to ask about Erin’s book Fasting and Feasting when you contact us to make your donation. 

Well, if eating food that tastes good makes you feel guilty, you’ll want to be sure and tune in to Revive Our Hearts tomorrow! Erin will remind us to turn the pleasure of eating into a prompt to worship the God who created that pleasure in the first place. Now, Erin’s back to pray for all of us as we learn and grow in the discipline of fasting.

Lord, You have a race for each of us. You’re the One that called our lives with You a “race” in Your Word, and races take preparation. So, I pray for my sisters. I just continue to see that picture of tens of thousands—maybe hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of women who follow You around the world—fasting! I pray for You to use that to sharpen us as we run the race of faith. 

So, I pray for that woman who is listening who has never fasted. I pray that You would show her what this looks like in her life. I pray for that woman who’s listening who forgot about fasting. She fasted ten years ago. She fasted when she first became a believer, but she forgot how You can use this in her life. I pray that you will give her real clarity about her next steps as she walks in the Spirit.

We love You. We give all of our lives to You. It’s in Your name I pray, amen.

Revive Our Hearts, with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is encouraging you to fast and discover freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ!

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.