Re: The Health Benefits of Fasting

There are many examples of fasting in the Bible. It is clear that some of them were dry fasts. I can post different biblical fasting stories from time to time. They are too numerous for me to do it all in one day. What I love about them is that they were done for spiritual purposes. They combined fasting with prayer and great things happened in lives of people. Those are some great stories.

What's even more awesome is that people are applying these same principles in their lives today and are also receiving great supernatural breakthroughs. Lives have been changed drastically because of fasting and prayer. I always feel like I've wasted a good fast if I first don't do it for spiritual reasons. The health benefits will come anyway.

Some people think it is wrong to tell anyone if they are on a spiritual fast. They get this from Matthew 6 where Jesus speaks about those who fast hypocritically. The message Jesus was trying to get across is to not fast hypocritically. He speaks about fasting in secret to avoid fasting like a hypocrite. This has put many people in bondage because they do not understand the real meaning of the message. Sometimes people have to tell others when they fast. Sometimes they need support or help when they fast. I have done spiritual fasts where I have told no one in my real life, but I have posted about it on the Internet because I thought support would help me through it. Others seek help and support from people in their real lives. Some people feel they have to tell to avoid telling a lie which they feel is displeasing to God. You may need to tell people you live with because they will wonder why you are not eating. I don't think Jesus meant legalism in his message. I think most people who do individual spiritual fasting try the best they can to keep it secret as Jesus said, but it is best to not get into bondage over it if you do need to tell others. The idea is to not brag about it to others like the Pharisee in Luke 18 did. This is an example of a hypocritical fast. The point Jesus was trying to make is to not do it for show, but to do it to seek God. We need to remember that God looks on the heart. He will be able to see if we are doing a fast hypocritically or not. Some people will criticize at the slightest hint of it not being in total secret. They are missing the whole meaning of the scripture.

One thing that I would like to point out is that there were corporate fasts as well as individual fasts in the Bible. Of course, it is clear that corporate fasts were not done in secret. I don't know how that could even be possible with so many people joined together fasting. This does serve to help us understand the meaning of the words of Jesus when He said to do it in secret and that is that the important thing is to be sincere before God with fasting. He is looking at our heart - our motives.


Here is an example of a corporate dry fast from the book of Jonah that changed the course of people's lives in a whole city. They didn't do it in secret, but they were very sincere in seeking God. God saw this and answered their cry.


Jonah 3:5-10

Living Bible (TLB)


4-5 But the very first day when Jonah entered the city and began to preach, the people repented. Jonah shouted to the crowds that gathered around him, “Forty days from now Nineveh will be destroyed!” And they believed him and DE CLAREd a fast; from the king on down, everyone put on sackcloth—the rough, coarse garments worn at times of mourning.[a]

6 For when the king of Nineveh heard what Jonah was saying, he stepped down from his throne, laid aside his royal robes, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes. 7 And the king and his nobles sent this message throughout the city: “Let no one, not even the animals, eat anything at all, nor even drink any water. 8 Everyone must wear sackcloth and cry mightily to God, and let everyone turn from his evil ways, from his violence and robbing. 9 Who can tell? Perhaps even yet God will decide to let us live and will hold back his fierce anger from destroying us.”

10 And when God saw that they had put a stop to their evil ways, he abandoned his plan to destroy them and didn’t carry it through. Tweet