Fasting to Honor God

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Narrative: Welcome to Insights on Healing Podcast. Our Episode title is, “Fasting to Honor God.” You will learn that fasting should not end up in quarreling and conflict, but it should be done to honor God by loosing the chains of those who we have oppressed.

My name is Joan M. Blake, author, and I am your host. Insights on Healing Podcast includes the reading of scripture, praying, reading from one of my books,  telling  stories or interviewing individuals, who through the healing power of God, found purpose in their lives. I pray as you listen to this episode, that God would bless you and provide you with the hope that you have been longing for.  Today’s podcast is taken from the book of  Isaiah 58: 1-11. I am reading from the NIV version of the Bible.

Isaiah 58:1-11

 Fasting to honor God

58 “Shout it aloud, do not hold back.
    Raise your voice like a trumpet.
Declare to my people their rebellion
    and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.
² For day after day they seek me out;
    they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
    and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
    and seem eager for God to come near them.
³ ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say,
    ‘and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
    and you have not noticed?’

“Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
    and exploit all your workers.
⁴ Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
    and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
    and expect your voice to be heard on high.
⁵ Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
    only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
    and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
    a day acceptable to the Lord?

⁶ “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
    and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
    and break every yoke?
⁷ Is it not to share your food with the hungry
    and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
    and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
⁸ Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness^[a] will go before you,
    and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
⁹ Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
    with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
¹⁰ and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
    and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
    and your night will become like the noonday.
¹¹ The Lord will guide you always;
    he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
    and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
    like a spring whose waters never fail.

Reflection:

Fasting before the Lord should not be taken lightly. It is a time to pray for transformation, to think about those who are less fortunate than you are, it is a time for you to be free from oppression and also free those who you have oppressed. It is a time for God to do a new thing in the life of believers.

Prayer: I pray for every person listening to this broadcast that if you are oppressed in any way, to seek the Lord through fasting. I pray that God will break every yoke that has kept you in captivity in the name of Jesus and set you free.

Thank you for listening to “Insights on “Healing” Podcast. If you like the Podcast, please be sure to click the subscribe button on my website at joanmblake.com. You can also subscribe wherever you listen to your podcast. May God bless and keep you in Jesus’ name, Amen.