Fasting

 

 

 Mark 2: 18-22

A Question About Fasting

¹⁸ Now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, “Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” ¹⁹ And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. ²⁰ The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. ²¹ No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. ²² And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.”

There's a time to fast and a time not to fast.  While Jesus was alive and traveling with his disciples, it was not the time; that would come later, and indeed it did, with more than fasting, but also with martyrdom. In view of this, we might more easily lean toward the daily "martyrdom" of fasting  rather than the latter.  Fasting is a means to an end, not the end in itself and is a tradition in many cultures, not only among Christians. It fosters discipline, it helps us to lean on God more than on a choice steak and opens the door to union with those who go hungry daily. It also does not have to be just restricting food but could be eliminating TV for a day, or turning off the radio in the car while driving, and using the time to talk to God... to pray! Why not begin some type of fasting to day, while the topic is fresh in our minds?  The sooner the better, before we forget about it.

Bro. Rene