Fasting

How Long?

One of the big questions that fasting beginners have is, "How long should I fast?" The answer to that is both simple and difficult. The simple answer is, "Fast as long as God tells you to fast." Unfortunately, that is not as easy as it sounds for some fasting "beginners" because they don't know how to hear/recognize God's direction regarding their fast. Most people don't hear that clearly when they first start to fast and they fine-tune their hearing of His fasting directions over time.

So here are some general guidelines. Many times God wants us to start with very short fasts to learn how to fast -- maybe one day or two days, or in some cases just one meal. Occasionally He wants us to "jump into the deep end of the swimming pool to learn how to swim" and will call us to a much longer initial fast.

My first-ever fast was for 10 days. It began because I started noticing a discrepancy between what I read in the Bible and what I saw at church. In the Bible, there were physical healings and deliverances and freedom from oppression and miracles. But I was not seeing any of that at the church I attended at that time. I became increasingly troubled by that and finally decided I would fast and pray regarding it. I really had no idea what I was doing; I'd never fasted before and I'd never met someone who had. For some reason, the idea of ten days felt strongly right to me. I believe God dropped that impression of ten days into my spirit. But if you asked me at the time, I would not have thought that God instructed me to fast for 10 days. Ten days just seemed like a really good idea to me at the time; it "felt right."

When I started fasting, I was not sure what was required and what was not allowed. I did a lot of scripture memorization because that seemed to go along with fasting and prayer to me. I did not learn that this wasn't necessarily a part of fasting until much later. I also started with only water and sugar-free soda. About four days into the fast, someone told me that they had heard it was OK to drink fruit juice on a fast, so I started doing that as well. I really did not know what I was doing and I really did not know how to hear God's direction and leading, but God managed to direct and lead me anyhow. That is because His ability to communicate is greater than our ability to hear wrong.

I believe that God has a lot of grace for fasting beginners. He is delighted that they are willing to obey Him; to deny our flesh by fasting. He is so happy about this that He will usually give lots of grace to cover honest beginner mistakes. And He fine-tunes us over time, so that we get better at hearing and following His direction regarding our fast.

Fasting For Weight Loss

If you are trying to fast to lose weight, that is a bad idea. Don't do it. It would be wiser to invite His Lordship into your eating and diet, then work together with Him on some reasonable weight loss program. God loves to be invited into this type of thing, and He has a way of bringing His Lordship into your weight loss program and making you successful at it.

Fasting is not a good way to lose weight for a number of reasons. First, weight loss is not a pure motive for fasting. Remember that God looks at the heart and He cares a lot about our motives. Fasting should be to seek after God, to draw near to Him, to discern His will, things like that. When we fast for bad motives, it irritates God. Look what Jesus said to the Pharisees who made great show of their fasts, trying to get people to think they were super pious and holy. Jesus said in Matt. 6:16, "When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show men they are fasting. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full." In other words Jesus was saying that since their primary motive was to impress others, that was the only thing that their fast would accomplish. It was not a holy fast before God.

God also addresses impure fasting motives in Is. 58:1-12. I won't include the whole passage here, but let me summarize it for you. God started by bawling out the Jews for their transgression and then He got specific about how their fasts were a transgression to Him. They talked about their outward actions, such as fasting, being pious, but their hearts being unrighteous. God found that very distasteful. He told them that even though they went through the form of fasting, He would not answer their prayers because of their selfish motives and the sinful condition of their hearts.

God said, in verses 2b-3a, "They take delight in approaching God. 'Why have we fasted,' they say, 'and You have not seen? Why have we afflicted our souls, and You take no notice?'" God goes on to tell them, in verses 4 and 5, "Indeed you fast for strife and debate, and to strike with the fist of wickedness. You will not fast as you do this day, to make your voice heard on high. Is it a fast that I have chosen, a day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head like a bulrush, and to spread out sackcloth and ashes? Would you call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord?"

The answer to God's rhetorical question is, of course, "No." The value of fasting is not the denying yourself food, it is humbling yourself and setting your heart to be right before Him and then behaving in ways that please Him.

But even if you did not get in trouble on the motivation, fasting is still a very poor way to lose weight. For starters, you might not lose much weight on a fast, depending on what type of fast you select. You might be surprised to discover how many calories are in some of the fasts, such as the fruit juice fast. Lets say that you drink 2 10-oz bottles of apple juice (which is the common size individual serving bottles come in), 2 cups of unsweetened pineapple juice, and 3 cups of orange juice. That is really not much to take when you are on a juice and water fast. You have ended up consuming 900 calories, which is only 100 calories less than you would consume on a thousand calorie a day diet. So even though you are not eating anything and you are not getting the balanced nutrients you need, it would take a 170 lb. person 22 days to lose 5 lb. And it would take a 150 lb. person 29 days to lose 5 lb. So fasting will not necessarily give you fast weight loss.

Let's look at the weight loss from a water-only fast, which is one of the strictest and most difficult forms of fasting. A 150 lb. person who did a 21 day (3 week fast) would lose 9 lb. This is not as rapid as most people expect.

If you try to fast to lose weight, you are setting yourself up for great failure. Most people will gain back all of the weight they lose from a fast and even gain a bit more. That is because most of the weight you lose on a fast is muscle tissue, not fatty tissue. So you have increased your fat-to-muscle body ratio, which in turn lowers your metabolism. The higher one's metabolism is, the more calories they burn when "at rest" like sleeping, sitting, etc. If you lower your metabolism by fasting, then when you go back to your old eating habits (after the fast is over) your body will gain weight on the same number of calories that used to just maintain your weight; e.g., you can eat the same, or in some cases even eat less than what you ate before the fast, and still gain weight.

In addition to metabolism issues, your body chemistry (electrolytes) gets way off when you fast. If you do a water-only fast for more than just a few days, your magnesium and potassium levels can get off and your heart might lose it's ability to regulate your heart beat. This is a very dangerous way to try to lose weight.

Is It A Secret That I Am Fasting?

Some people are concerned about Matthew 6:17-18 where Jesus said, "But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to men that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

I will develop this in a lot more detail in the lesson on corporate fasts. But for now, suffice it to say that Matthew 6:16 prefaces who Jesus made this comment to. This was addressing people who's main motivation to fast is to impress others and look spiritual. If that is one of your motivations for fasting, then by all means keep your fast a secret between you and God. Allow Him to work with you to change your motivation.

But if looking pious and impressing others is not a primary motivation, then you are not under a restriction to keep your fast a secret. At the same time, you should not make it a point to tell everyone you know that you are fasting. But there may be people who need to know. For instance, your immediate family may need to know why you are not joining them for meals. SO you will need to explain to them that you are fasting. And if a friend invites you for dinner or tries to make a lunch date, you can be truthful about why you can't accept the invitation. Explain to them that you are on a fast and that you will be available to join them for a meal on such-and-such a date after your fast ends.

Generally I use the "need to know" criteria to decide whether or not to tell someone I am fasting. If there is any reason they need to know, then I tell them. Otherwise I don't mention it. For instance, if you have to refuse a meal invitation, you may need to explain why so that they are not offended. If you are fasting and praying for someone and God speaks to you about them, you may need to disclose you are fasting for them and then share what God said to you about them. Stuff like that.