Should Christians fast? (Ep. 26)

Should Christians fast today? If so, why—and how?

In this episode, Pastors Chris and Tony explore the biblical practice of fasting. They discuss what Scripture says about fasting in both the Old and New Testaments, how Jesus viewed the practice, and why fasting is a matter of Christian freedom rather than a divine command. Along the way, they address common misconceptions, practical ways Christians might incorporate fasting into their devotional lives, and how fasting can serve repentance, prayer, and a renewed focus on Christ without becoming a work of self-righteousness.

Whether you've never fasted before or are simply curious about what Lutherans believe, this conversation offers a balanced, biblical look at an often misunderstood spiritual discipline.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Those who who spend time online will notice kind of a resurgence of the discussion of spiritual disciplines amongst Protestants, even amongst Lutherans, talking about various spiritual disciplines that at one time it appeared that we we didn't talk about, we didn't practice very often, and now saying, Hey, can we bring some of these things back? One of the big ones is fasting. Fasting is talking talked about not just as a dietary means, but a spiritual discipline. So we thought it'd be beneficial as confessional Lutheran pastors within the state of California to have that conversation. This is Double Portion, a podcast where twin Lutheran pastors discuss Christian living and studying scripture. My name is Chris Fluge from the Pastor of Grace Lutheran Church in Yor Belinda, California, and joined by Tony Fluge, my brother, pastor at Christ the Vine Lutheran in Temecula, California, so Tony, what is fasting?

SPEAKER_01 1:27

Well, fasting quite literally is refraining from food for a portion of time. I mean you you think of it in the word breakfast. Break the fast. And so typically I think when people refer to fasting in this sense, we're talking about with religious intentionality. Fasting is not just a Christian thing. There are other religions that have used fasting as a part of their worship or observance of their religion, but it is undeniably a Christian thing. This is throughout the Old Testament, this is in the New Testament, it's in the history of the church, Christians fasting. And so going without food for a period of time to devote extra time to prayer meditation on God's word. And so we're not talking about intermittent fasting as a fad diet, or we're not talking about how Joe Rogan or Theo Vaughn advocate for fasting to help clear their minds or to strengthen their discipline, although I think there is some connection with some of these things. But when we're talking about fasting, we're talking about it as used by Christians throughout the history of the Christian church as explained in scripture, as dedicated time away from food, self-denial, and uh toward meditation and prayer.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Yeah, I think it's important to recognize this definition because there are times where fasting is is done totally as a dietary thing or a medical necessity, right? You're you're going to have a surgery and you need to fast for a certain amount of hours. Sometimes the the definition of fasting is a little bit broader, and it's not a total fast from food, but it's a fast from certain foods or for certain types of foods. Some people will go on a juice fast and only drink liquids. I think more often than not, when Christians think about fasting, uh, it is primarily not eating at all. But if it is a fasting that includes some eating, it would say an intentional discipline, even while you're eating that. You kind of give the caricature of that fast of sorts that happens in Roman Catholicism where they don't eat certain types of meat on Fridays, and then people will often poke at the abuse of that because you go to the local bar in Wisconsin, and then you have a fish fry on a Friday, and there are people that are gorging themselves on deep fried fish on French fries and drinking a lot of beer, and then say it doesn't seem like you're truly disableing the intent of self-denying of what you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 4:39

I enjoy the fish fry and and want that, yeah. Although there are some people who, like in the season of Lent, will only eat during like sundown hours or something like that. That is a practice, so it's not just the red meat fast.

SPEAKER_00 4:52

Yeah. Yeah. So when we talk about fasting, there can be a broad definition. We'll probably primarily focus on that intentional not eating of food, perhaps for certain amounts of time, for the sake of spiritual discipline. And it's something that the scriptures talk about, it's something that the Lutheran confessions talk about as well. So I think one of the perhaps classic examples that we should talk about is what Jesus says in Matthew chapter six. So here is Jesus addressing fasting. He says, But when you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others 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. So as Jesus is talking about fasting, he talks about doing this for personal benefit, but not for recognition. So when we fast, what we don't want to do is we we don't want to bring a bunch of attention to ourselves and say, look at me, I'm such a wonderfully disciplined Christian. But instead, make it so that no one knows. Now, this doesn't mean no one at all can know, right? You might need an accountability partner. So imagine one of us might be fasting and then we talk to each other about it for that encouragement, or we talk to our wives about the fast for that encouragement while we are fasting. But if you are fasting, or you take on a sort of a fast during Lent, it doesn't need to be public discussion all the time. And avoid bringing attention to it in every circumstance so that it's not just that people look at you and say, Well, what a wonderful person. But one final point is Jesus says, but when you fast, not if you fast. Granted, that's taking the English terminology here and not the the Greek. But how Jesus is talking about this is he's not saying like fasting isn't something that Christians do.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Fasting is something that Christians do.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:39

So it's something we should think about further.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

And and so here's a section that someone might point to in opposition to that, and they'll point to Mark chapter three, and it was Jesus' disciples being Jesus being questioned about fasting, and says verse 18, starting with verse 18, now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Jesus, How is it that John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not? Jesus answered, How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot so long as they have with they have him with them. But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast. No one sows a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, otherwise the new piece will pull away from the old, making the w the tear worse. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins, otherwise the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and so just kind of interesting. It gets connected with Jesus being Lord of the Sabbath and why why they don't follow the Sabbath stuff in the same way that the Pharisees did. But one thing I wanted to highlight here is that at this time that Jesus is presently with them, that is not a time for fasting, that's a time for rejoicing, feasting. This is the the bridegroom is present. And and so the thing though he says is like there's a time where I'm not gonna be with them. And so right now, when Jesus is walking around teaching and preaching, they're not fasting. But he talks about like you when you fast, giving guidance on fasting, and and he he says that time will come again. So this is a thing that Christians do, Christians will will fast, or or at least this is an opportunity for um a benefit of the Christian to fast.

SPEAKER_00 9:26

So then a Christian practice might be in line with what Jesus is saying there is perhaps a Christian will fast during Lent and feast during Easter. And to show the connection that you have made, and that this is what's followed through in the early church, I want to bring to Acts chapter 13. So here it says, Now in the church of Antioch there were prophets and teachers. Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, Mannion, who had been brought up with Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit had set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. So while Barnabas and Saul, probably the biggest known names there, are still there in Antioch prior to going off on this mission, the Holy Spirit has this for them. What were they doing? They were worshiping the Lord and fasting. And then after the Holy Spirit speaks, it says, So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off. So fasting was a part of the this spiritual discipline practice in Antioch there. And important to recognize it's connected to worshiping the Lord and it's connected to prayer. But it is something that Christians did.

SPEAKER_01 10:56

Yeah, we see it again in the next chapter, chapter 14, verse 23. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church, and with prayer and fasting committed them to the Lord in whom they had put their trust. We see that prayer and fasting. And so when we see fasting in the New Testament, especially, we want to highlight this connection between prayer and fasting. And so there's even an interesting section in Mark chapter 9, where there's an alternate reading that includes it's talking about the casting out of demons, and it says this type of demon is only cast out by prayer and fasting. And so I believe it's like the NIV, and some others do not include that as they don't believe it's original to the text. But then I think it's like the NKGV following the tradition of the KJV, does have the and fasting. We don't need to get into the textual critical reasons why they one chooses to keep it one, another doesn't. But this idea of and fasting, prayer and fasting being such a common connection. And so it isn't necessarily it's not the fasting, but it's like this idea of that dedication to the Lord going hand in hand between prayer and and fasting. And so putting these things together, it's not merely the act of of of self-denial, it's also that opportunity for uh increased um devotion and dedication and focus on on the heavenly matters.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

Yeah, I think that's an important aspect for us to bring out about fasting, is there there's a clear intent to it. So then I think of Joel's probably a good book that talks about some of these old testament practices because he says, rend your hearts and not your garments. So he calls out the false actions, but then Joel also calls them to fast. So then it's not the act in itself that is the the big thing, but it's what you're doing in that fast. Is you're you're dedicating that that headspace and that time to the Lord, to prayer, to reflection and meditation.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

And so I think we've made a biblical argument here that fasting is within the realm of things that Christians can, maybe even, I don't know, ought is the right word, but can do. It's it's very biblical. We could spend some time talking about our Lutheran confessions. The Apology of the Augsburg Confession uh talks about how in the midst of the human traditions, like it's not something that we mandate, but we certainly don't get rid of it. The small catechism, Luther's small catechism talks about it being a beneficial practice, especially in preparation for the Lord's Supper. So we have a history within our own Lutheran church of this being something that Christians do. Now, of course, we understand this is not salvific. We're not saying that we save ourselves through doing these things. And this is something we talked about in the podcast previously. It's reductionistic to boil everything down to does am I saved through doing this or not? Like that is just it's not a good way of approaching a lot of these matters. Like, all right, well, what's the bare minim in order to be saved or something? And and then like, okay, after I believe in Jesus, that means I don't need to do anything. Well, that's obviously not the way the the scriptures present the Christian faith. We are saved by by grace alone through faith alone, of course. Yes, we're we're holding to that. But as one who is saved by grace alone through faith alone, the this this faith will be accompanied by works. So we're looking at what God's word has to say about guiding our life, our lives of faith. And so, can someone go to heaven without fasting? Of course. But could this be a beneficial thing for the Christian? And and so firmly upholding that this does not save us. But what could this look like in a beneficial matter manner for the Christian? And why might this be beneficial? So maybe first we'll talk about why it might be beneficial, and then we can talk about what this might look like.

SPEAKER_00 15:17

Yeah, I think the the reason why it might be beneficial, especially in our context, and I I'm not pointing my finger out on everyone else. I recognize that I I'm in this context too, and I struggle with this many of these same things. But we are so not used to denying ourselves of any of the luxuries or d desires that we want, right? If if you want ice cream, you don't even need to drive to go get it, right? You can door dash or Uber Eats that ice cream to your house. Yeah. Like we are so used to at the click of a button fulfilling every one of our whims and desires. We we don't have to wait until 6 p.m. on a Thursday evening to watch our favorite TV show. We can binge all of that in one night. So we live in a society in which we gratify all of our desires. So it can be beneficial for us to practice self-denial. And I think practicing self-denial in a field that is has less at stake. Right? So if you need if you need to learn better self-denial in the realm of sexual immorality, there's a lot more to stake if you sleep with that prostitute, right? Like that's a big deal. That's a the that that's sin, all sin is sin, but that's a big life-shattering sin. Yeah. But when it comes to practicing self-denial in the role or in the realm of fasting, you know, if you are fasting for 24 hours and you you give in and you eat something at 9 p.m. before you go to bed, what happens? Well, you you learn, okay, I I I I I need to practice this some more. You'll be okay. It's not going to end your life. It's not, I mean, we we would actually struggle with this a little bit. Like, is it even necessarily a sin? Yeah. It's not that big of a problem if you are fasting and you end the fast because you were just too hungry to continue. Yeah. You're okay. But it's a good practice of self-denial in a low-stakes territory as you are sitting in the office and say, I'm not gonna eat this.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:07

They bring cake, okay, but I'm not gonna have the cake. And you can practice that self-denial. I really want to have that snack right now, but I'm gonna choose not to. And then to couple it with prayer. Yeah. Uh, we so often as Christians are always saying, I wish I prayed more than I do. But imagine if you're on a fast and every time that you were hungry, you took that as an opportunity to go to the Lord in prayer. That could be a wonderful blessing to you.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

Yeah. So I think of that idea that you're talking about our desires are constantly being gratified. We're constantly getting what we want. Even the other the other day, I lost my AirPods, and I I use my AirPods all the time. I like to listen to audiobooks, I like to listen to podcasts. When I go to the gym, I like to listen to something. Just constantly using these headphones, these AirPods, I lost mine. And I'm trying to think what what am I even gonna do without them? Because I just use them so much every day. And and so then I looked around at the different options online and I saw if I ordered them on Amazon, I could get them before I had a long car ride. Long story short, uh, my our radio doesn't work in one of our cars anymore. And we had a long car ride, and I ordered them because and I got them like four hours later. And so like instant gratification, that that lack of self-denial. Now, as adults, we think like, oh whatever, like I I wanted it, I can get it, why not? But think of how we teach and train children. If a child always gets what they want, that's gonna be very damaging to the child in the long run. If they're not taught that like sometimes you don't get what you want, sometimes you have to wait for things. And and so it's good for us to continually be taught these things. Like you don't always get what you want. But in our world of abundance, that's just not our reality so often. We so often do just get the things that we want. So uh this is that intentional training ground to say to to learn to say no to ourselves. Then I think another thing to even consider in all of this is I mean, maybe an unintended benefit, but we do live in a world of gluttony and and to take that seriously and and say food does not rule me. And and I think so many in our world think food does rule us. I I eat whenever I want, I eat because I'm bored, I eat the junk food that I want, and and it's just kind of like give up and just I'm gonna we're constantly, like constantly eating junk food in in this world. And I I mean again, this is me, and and so it's good to maybe curb against that gluttony as well, uh, of helping to teach myself, no, food doesn't rule me, food is not my master. I can say no. Um so there's a couple of the benefits of one teaching us patience, another teaching us that that food does not rule. And then as you were talking about, that that training ground, that battleground for for spiritual warfare, training me to to say no to something inconsequential so that I can say no when it's necessary. And there are there's research that talks about this, how fasting can actually be beneficial for like those who are struggling with maybe like pornography addiction. Um they're saying they're learning to say no to the flesh. My desires don't win. I'm going to serve God above all.

SPEAKER_00 21:50

Yeah. Yeah, I think that's an important lesson for us to learn. And just as children need to learn this discipline, so so do we. It makes me think of an instance. Where a child asked the the mother about dessert, and the mother's response was, You already had dessert. And then the response was, No, that was that was lunch dessert. I want I want dinner dessert now. So then you can just create this mindset of like, it doesn't matter what I've had already, what do I want right now? And then to have to learn that self-discipline. I'm saying no, and this is something we need to we we need to learn when we're young and we're we need to continue to learn. I want to add on to the diet aspect of this, because sometimes I've I've heard people say, like, if you're giving something up for Lent and the purpose is to lose weight, maybe you you've lost the purpose. I would caution giving that discouragement for it. Because if if the recognition is that I need to lose a little bit of weight for my health to live a life that's glorifying to God, then there's nothing wrong with that to say that I'm gonna use this fasting opportunity to also play into that. If it's totally vain, then that then that's a problem. But maybe sometimes it can it can be said like that this is vain, but it's not actually vain. I'll I'll give an example. I I have a goal of losing a certain amount of weight, and part of it is to look better for my spouse. I feel that my my spouse is she's she's beautiful, and I I want to present myself in a way that I best can for her. Is that vain or is that loving? Obviously, that creates a very challenging conversation for us uh to talk about, but sometimes people j they'll dissuade fasting in the sense of dietary reasons because of vanity. Yeah. And it's true, let's avoid vanity, but let's not let's let's have that conversation on the other end.

SPEAKER_01 24:05

And on the other end of things, like a complete disregard for the body is not biblical or scriptural either. Like uh to just say it doesn't matter is is wrong. We are called to steward these bodies, our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. We are to take care of these bodies that God has given us. So to say, well, it's just vain, so do it, therefore do it, don't do it. Another thing people advocate is like, well, it's an unhealthy relationship with food. And I think that predates the fasting. Like, if so a lot of people do have unhealthy relationships with food, and and whatever, maybe I probably do as well. Like I I eat a lot of junk food and then I feel bad about it, and then I try to rededicate myself and I'm a yo-yo dieter. Like it wouldn't be the implementing of fasting that would give me an unhealthy relationship with food food. I already have an unhealthy relationship with food, and I'm trying to fix that. And so that's one other thing that people will say. And so there is benefits, and we're not scientists, we're not doctors. There's people who will advocate for the health benefits of fasting, of how it can be beneficial to different metrics that help to track our health, uh, how it can be helpful for weight loss, how it can be helpful when it puts your body into a state of autophagy. Don't know all of that, and that's maybe alleged, so I don't know if some scientists might push back, but there are people who will say like there's this cellular rebuilding process that is beneficial through fasting. So there there could be some side benefits of that as well. That's not even necessarily like the main goal that we're talking about here.

SPEAKER_00 25:43

Yeah. Talking about the health benefits, I do think there's an aspect of this that needs to be addressed to some extent for our society because people often have overreactions to things that are going on, and we as Lutherans do want to stay in our our narrow Lutheran middle and to avoid being so reactionary. So there was a time of body positivity that I think our culture has very much swung for many on the other side. So it's much less of body positivity if that person would be characterized as and like according to BMI as morbidly obese, uh like that people would want to talk about. Like, well, let's talk about their their health and not just assume that that one thing determines how healthy they are or not. There's still a lot of validity to that conversation, because if someone's cholesterol is good and their uh their blood pressure is good and their uh daily ability is still good, then uh okay, yeah, there is room to talk about just because they have a higher amount of body fat doesn't mean they're the most unhealthy person in the world, or even doing things that are so detrimental to their lives. But from that body positivity, there has been a swing on the other side where there they once said, like people pastors never talk about gluttony from the pulpit. To now you have social media Christian influencers who who will say things like you cannot be overweight as a pastor, or even like as a as a Christian, you cannot be overweight. And we do want to be cautious and careful that we we don't overcorrect and speak in ways that are not helpful, speak in ways that are not necessarily true. Yeah. So there there's a principle in scripture of stewardship, and your body is given to you by the Lord, and the Lord desires faithful stewardship. But if we we want to be careful that we don't fall into this territory where where now all of a sudden we we go from an over-emphasis on body positivity to an over-emphasis on skinniness, and in both sides, we are not truly hitting the mark of glorifying God through stewardship.

SPEAKER_01 28:29

And just quickly with with this, and no, it's not really the main point, but weight loss, especially, is one where when people get heaped on with guilt, that can just lead them to quit. And like, I guess it's not gonna work, especially because weight lossing is a is a frustrating journey, uh, which is filled with a lot of setbacks and a lot of failure, and and so you you're doing really well and you don't lose any weight and get frustrated, and then you see your family member who just eats junk food and eats poorly all the time, and that person is as skinny as can be, and it's it's frustrating and it can lead people to just like quit. And so that's where it's like, let's have some sensitivity about this issue of weight loss in particular, in particular, and think about how we can best care for these bodies that God has given us. But I I want to get back to fasting. We talked about like the biblical argument for it, it's in the Bible, it's encouraged, it's encouraged in our Lutheran Confessions. We talked about why we might do it. So, how might a Christian do this? What might this look like? I I guess I had a couple of thoughts. Like we could talk about specific like that food fasting, but I also think like maybe we could take this principle into other areas of life. But maybe do you have any thoughts about like that food fasting?

SPEAKER_00 29:43

Yeah, I think, well, first going to uh Luther's small catechism as he talks about the Lord's Supper, and he says that fasting and other outward preparation can certainly be of benefit. Now he's saying that's not where the efficacy comes from in the Lord's Supper, but it can be beneficial to fast prior to the Lord's Supper. So that this is something where I think we have to have the balance because, well, Martin Luther says that the Apostle Paul also says, like, if you're really hungry before the Lord's Supper, eat food so that you're not abusing this meal. Yeah. So in our context, where you're not going to be able to grab a bunch of wafers and uh and drink too much from the chalice or drink too many of the small cups of wine, it seems like that would be less of a temptation to selfishly indulge ourselves while receiving the Lord's Supper. But it could be a beneficial practice to say, on Sunday mornings on the Lord's Day, I will fast prior to the service, and then I can have that time for r for self-examination and reflection and prayer, and then have that first thing that I eat be the bread and with and under is Jesus' body and the blood and with and under is Jesus' blood, or the wine and with and under is Jesus' blood, and what a wonderful blessing that could be to receive that. So I think that's one instance in which fasting is we shouldn't say it's required, yeah, but could be a benefit.

SPEAKER_01 31:24

And that that was something, I mean, like the Bible says you're not supposed to talk about your fasting, so that's a hard thing. How do you talk about fasting when you're not supposed to talk about it? But for the point of teaching and not for the point of showing off, this is actually a practice that I kind of practically stumbled into. It wasn't intentional at first. It was at first, it was really just I don't like preaching on a full stomach. And it just like makes me I don't want to feel like bloated and uncomfortable during the service. And I'm one I I for one am a person who has always just been kind of comfortable skipping a meal here or there. Like I don't feel overly hungry. So I I it was just something that I just always saved eating until after church, and then it was something that became intentional after I'd already been doing it, when I realized, like, oh yeah, this is something the small catechism talks about. And and so I think that that's one way that Christians could do it. They could do something maybe like on an Ash Wednesday or Good Friday as a practice that people will do of fasting and an intentional day of prayer and and using that fasting alongside of it. I might encourage someone, if this is something they've never done before, maybe just start with like one meal that you're gonna you're gonna fast for. And then if you as you get more experienced and and know yourself, maybe that's something you can expand, but like right away. Because like we don't want someone like fainting because they've never skipped a meal before, and and they try to do it.

SPEAKER_00 32:49

Again, this is for the purpose of teaching, but to say this was not a a huge practice within the Lutheran church while we were growing up. We had we had a mom who was particularly fond of uh what giving things up for Lent, so that was a practice, but when it came to day-long fasting for non-dietary reasons, that was not something I was f really familiar with until I had been a pastor for a little bit. Yeah. And so then the the first time I wanted to fast for more than just a short period, I was in contact with you because it was tremendously difficult to to go the entire period of time without food.

SPEAKER_01 33:40

But I can really see the benefit of like having to say no. And and so it's like going so I'm hungry, going to God in prayer for strength, having to say no to my desires, saying, Jesus is Lord, my body is not Lord. Like there there is an obvious benefit, it keeps these things on your mind consistently. Talking about like I preached a sermon yesterday where I talked about how we can just get stuck in our monotony of life that we don't really think about others, we don't really think about faith and all these matters. Well, you have to when you're you're constantly thinking in that way, if you're in fasting intentionally. And so there can be a benefit. I would say, like, if someone's never done it before, like this is probably the case for a lot of Lutherans. Well, maybe you start a little simply, and maybe it is just maybe a good practice, even health-wise, like I'm gonna fast after dinner before until breakfast, and and I'm so I'm not gonna do that unhealthy practice of snacking, and I'm gonna take some time at night to intentionally read scripture, meditate on the truths of God's word, and pray. Like that'd be a really wonderful practice, and maybe you could build up to doing it something a little longer. But I also wanted to move to kind of just like an idea of like fasting, not necessarily just food, but just like withholding desires from yourself, which I think can be a good practice. And unfortunately, in the Lutheran church, there were there was such a resentment towards anything that was perceived as Catholic that people said, no, we can't do that because we don't want to earn our our salvation. One of the things I I caution people, I understand why we don't like using the word Catholic, but our Lutheran confessions call us Catholic. So let's let's be careful, like, oh, that's too Catholic. Well, like this is what we called ourselves the Catholic means like universal.

SPEAKER_00 35:30

Yeah, that's too universal church.

SPEAKER_01 35:32

That's yeah, so like and a lot of times things that are talked about as Catholic, it's really an anachronism. It's talked about things that this is just like the universal church, like Rome being supreme is after that. So let's be careful about saying that's too Catholic, because like let's understand what words mean. If there's things, bad practices of the Roman Catholic Church, well, okay, yeah, we don't want to we don't want to do that. So then a lot of people would look at something like fasting or giving something up for Lent and say that's too Catholic. And and they kind of mock the idea of like, well, you're saying no to yourself, and that's making you equal Jesus who died on the cross. It's like, well, maybe someone has an improper idea of this that they're making themselves suffer, but there is really a good way that you can do it to say no to yourself, similar with the the food. And so if someone's a little uneasy about the idea of food fasting because of different concerns about eating culture or diet culture or whatever it might be, maybe you could fast from technology for a little bit, maybe you could fast from social media for a little bit, maybe you could fast from TV for a little bit, maybe you could fast from other things that you enjoy just to say no, and it it would actually be beneficial. Like it would probably be good if some more Christians fasted from TV or uh social media use for a time period to teach themselves no, I don't need to give them to these things, or fast from alcohol for a little bit. I've heard someone say if you feel like you need to uh give up alcohol for a lent, that probably means you're an alcoholic. Like, well, or maybe you're just it's a beneficial practice for the time being, I'm gonna say no to myself. You don't need to be an alcoholic to enjoy having a drink, and maybe you're like, no, I'm gonna fast from this and say no to myself. And it might actually even be kind of hard because it's like, you know, I have this routine of Friday nights, I like to have a beer at home and and I'm gonna say no to that right now. Um so I think that there's some different ways that we could practice this that might be beneficial if someone's a little uncomfortable with the idea of food fasting. Well, maybe you you buy a brick, this device that can brick your phone so you can't use social media and and fast from social media for a little bit. Maybe you you delete the app that you want to stop using for the for the period of Lent so that you don't use these things, so you take a break from it, so that you teach yourself my desires don't win. My body's not Lord, my desire's not Lord, Jesus is Lord. I think there's benefits.

SPEAKER_00 38:09

And I think I would make that tie of don't just delete the app, don't just brick the phone, don't just give up diet soda, but use those and go to the Lord and depend on him. It's it's a time to say, and not to say my my strength is what wins, but it's his strength and my dependence on him. So when you really want that diet soda to say, no, like I'm gonna depend on God, I'm gonna look to him. When you really want to use your phone, say no, like I'm gonna pray to the Lord right now. I'm I'm going to study his word. Yeah. So not saying this is a time to learn about my own strength and my own ability to overcome and say, oh wow, I I can do more than I thought I could. No, I'm gonna look to him and rely on him.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

And then maybe one caution with this, like giving up things for Lent or fasting, don't do this from things that are sinful. Like then if it's sinful, just don't do it. Like you can't say, well, I'm gonna stop doing it for a little bit and then I'm gonna go back to it, or something like that.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

You can't you can't fast from premarital sex. Like stop. Just stop doing that. You can't fast from porn. Stop. Yeah, you can't fast from sin. Drunkenness. You just you you you just need to confess that sin, look to the Lord, and then uh by the power of the Holy Spirit, who remains and abides with it within you, to go forward and and flee that life from of sin, like Jesus in John 8, go and and sin no more, leave your life of sin. That that's our desire. It's not to say I'm gonna take a momentary rest from this simple thing. It's saying, no, I I I I want to take the approach of Joseph, how then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?

SPEAKER_01 40:09

Yeah. And so I think we could probably wrap up this conversation and and just reminding people again, we're not saying this is a a meritorious work towards salvation. We're not saying that this is necessary or mandatory, we're saying that this could be a beneficial thing for Christians that Christians before us have done, that is talked about in scripture, that's talked about in our Lutheran confessions, and and could potentially be a benefit to the individual as they look to say thank you to God for all that he has done and serve him in all that they do.