FASTING

By T Motsepe

Fasting is ceasing the pursuit of self pleasure to find what pleases God.
Fasting is abstaining from food, at times also water, along with other pleasures in order to seek God or his other attributes or grace.

Fasting is the suppression of the flesh to give the spirit ascendency.

Fasting is denying the self its pleasure to find the pleasure in God.

Fasting shifting from natural provisions to divide provision for sustenance.

Fasting is declaring who is God between the stomach and the Lord.
Fasting is the cornerstone of humility.

Leviticus 16:29 AMP
[29] “This shall be a permanent statute for you: in the seventh month (nearly October) on the tenth day of the month you shall humble yourselves [by fasting] and not do any work, whether the native-born or the stranger who lives temporarily among you;
https://bible.com/bible/1588/lev.16.29.AMP

Ezra 8:21 NIV
[21] There, by the Ahava Canal, I proclaimed a fast, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask him for a safe journey for us and our children, with all our possessions.

Esther 4:16 NIV
[16] “Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.”

2 Samuel 12:16 NIV
[16] David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and spent the nights lying in sackcloth on the ground.

Zechariah 7:5 NIV
[5] “Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?

https://bible.com/bible/111/zec.7.5.NIV
Fasting can happen in different contexts, either individually, where you fast alone or corporately, when you fast with others in agreement.

Luke 2:36-37 NIV
[36] There was also a prophet, Anna, the daughter of Penuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, [37] and then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying.

What can you expect when you are fasting.

• spiritually increased intensity in spiritual attacks.
• physically
  adverse physical effects
  improved overall health.

how to prepare for a fast and conduct one?

The genuine sobriety of the mind comes when our minds are renewed against the influence of worldly desires.

Fasting is the maternity ward of vocations and ordinations.

Many individual callings have been birthed and realised during fasting
Acts 13