The fast you're after

This isn't the first post to talk fasting, and I'm sure it won't be the last. So as you munch on these words, think: balanced diet. There's huge value in exercising spiritual discipline in the area of food. That's why Jesus was into it. It's pretty much the first thing we're told he did following his baptism; it was off to the desert and into the wilderness with no provisions. This didn't make Jesus a poor planner—he knew what he was doing. Food remains a big deal right through the Bible. Probably because it's a big deal to us period. There's apples in Eden, quail in the desert, feasts of tabernacles, withering fig trees, water and wine in Canaan, living water by the well and bread and wine in the upper room. And food everywhere in between. Food all over the shop. We're pretty keen on it.

Because of our reliance on food, fasting from it drags up a whole bunch of stuff. In many ways it takes us to our most vulnerable and revealing. Food can cover our weaknesses quite nicely. Not eating reveals the shape of our hearts. (Of late, I think I may have developed a 'thali' shaped heart.)

Many people have a 'comfort food'. Mine used to be a large potato and gravy and five bread rolls from KFC. Yet, as the name implies, our comfort foods are there to comfort us...a band-aid for our ailments; emotional and spiritual. When we deny ourselves food, those ailments, thorns in the side and weaknesses in us come closer to the surface. Ready to be dealt with or cause us even more bother. The removal of food will do that.

And yet, my plan isn’t to get all culinary. I want to talk fasting but not food. Because it reads to me that God sees more than one kind of fast. Generally, our fasting is about deprivation, yet that's not the only fast God talks of. He calls us elsewhere.

In Isaiah 58, the prophet talks about fasting. In fact, he contrasts fasting with fasting. It seems that the folks in the ‘hood were getting supercilious and self-righteous in the kudos that came their way through fasting. It was revealing their hearts nonetheless. Isaiah 58:4 reads:

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.

They were getting feisty because the thing that they were doing to promote their humility was all ending in tears. And, rather than paying attention to their performance, God seemed to be lending a deaf ear. I can see the Israelites scratching their heads. They knew the formula, they had it figured. Go hungry, trigger God’s blessing. Open sesame – we’re in.

And yet Isaiah turns around and with a vote-losing move that gives prophets such a bad rap, let’s them know that they have it all wrong. They’re engaging in a fast that God wants no part of. What kind of fast is God after?

6-9"This is the kind of fast day I'm after:
to break the chains of injustice,
get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
free the oppressed, cancel debts.

What I'm interested in seeing you do is:
sharing your food with the hungry,
inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
being available to your own families.

Hmmm…a little harder, that fast. A day or two without food for blessing, sure it’s inconvenient, but you get what you’re after. But we’re not talking a day or two here, we’re talking a revision of worldview. Food doesn’t even come into it (unless you’re exploiting underage workers in a fast food restaurant).

I hear the voice of Jesus reverberating through the words of Isaiah. The sheep and the goats along with the greatest commandment are roaring through these verses. Isaiah grabs our heads and forcibly swivels them around saying, ‘not this, but this’. Yes, there’s much to be gained from the exercising of the spiritual discipline of food-fasting, but it’s not the ‘kind of fast’ that God has chosen for us.

I got all lent-y a while back (in many ways I’m still there). I talked about ‘holy habits that bring us closer to God’. Here are the holy habits God asks us to cultivate: love justice, dump exploitation, free the oppressed, forgive debt…and then: share food, keep open house, clothe the needy and hang out with your clan.

Spiritual discipline and service can be intoxicating. There’s quite likely a touch more kudos to be gleaned from leading worship in church contrasted with putting clothes on the cold…or staying home and being a good father. And there's more notoriety to be gained from preaching to a crowd, than there is of letting your penny-less friend know that he doesn't have to pay you back. Not that you can’t pursue both. Not for a moment.

It just seems that God gave Isaiah a pretty good assessment of the human condition. Our need for self-affirmation and our need to make our mark. We love the 'big thing' but Isaiah was driving a knife into the heart of the deal. Food-fasting was a public deal (one of the reasons Jesus gave the instructions he did in Matthew 6:16) yet the fast that he was calling the chosen ones to was a fast that brought about the restoration of humanity. It's the fast we're called to today. Love justice, love mercy, walk humbly with God. And, while you're at, you'll be part of a worldwide clean-up day that ushers in the Kingdom 'on earth as it is in heaven'.

It's a little more difficult to identify the '5 easy steps to the restoration of Eden' compared to '5 easy steps to fast your way to God's blessing' but I think that's part of the deal. In some ways, Isaiah is clinical in its incisiveness: look beyond yourself with God-eyes to the world around you. Be responsible with what God has put in you to be a specific agent of change in these areas but don't neglect your general duty either. Don't let the attractiveness of any of these get in the way of being 'fully-human'. And becoming fully human means becoming fully the humanity that was intended for us from the get-go (prior to apple-eating).

All this reminds me how far I can drift from God's intent through the things I deem important.

Yeah, fasting's good. I'm all for it. But the fast we're ultimately called to is a fast that ends up enlarging our hearts, not making us hungry. It brings us closer to the heart of God because our praxis resonates with his cry. It makes us more aligned and whole because we become more on about the stuff that God is on about.

Simple? Nope. Noteworthy to those around us? Probably not. There seems to be just a wee upside though:

Do this and the lights will turn on,
and your lives will turn around at once.
Your righteousness will pave your way.
The God of glory will secure your passage.
Then when you pray, God will answer.
You'll call out for help and I'll say, 'Here I am.'

Worth a shot I reckon.