Consecration

The word consecration speaks to the whole ethos of fasting:

Consecrate a fast,
call a solemn assembly;
Gather the elders
and all the inhabitants of the land
to the house of the Lord your God,
and cry out to the Lord.

(Joel 1:14, ESV)

The verse doesn’t say to start a fast or engage in a fast; it says to consecrate a fast. When we fast, a restful, quiet, calm, solemn, and consecrated demeanor should be our disposition and heart posture. In fasting, we hold our hearts before God with silence and trembling, waiting for His fiery judgment to cauterize all that does not belong to or please Him. 

I’ve seen so many people initiate fasts but fill their days with movies, music, or entertainment to distract them from the discomfort of the process. That is a diet, not a fast. That is merely abstinence from sustenance. Anytime we do what we want when we fast simply means we have missed the overall point and therefore have fasted amiss:

“Why have we fasted,” they say, ​“and You have not seen?
Why have we afflicted our souls, and You take no notice?”
In fact, in the day of your fast you find pleasure,
And exploit all your laborers. (Isaiah 58:3 NKJV)

“In the day of your fast you find pleasure.” What an indictment! Fasting is and should be an utter affliction of our souls before God, accompanied by a godly sorrow at the house of merchandise we have made our hearts — and His home. 

Abstinence from food is not fasting; consecrating ourselves unto God by sacrificing food is:

The Lord said to Moses,
​“Go to the people and consecrate
them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes.
And let them be ready for the third day. For on the third day
the Lord will come down upon Mount Sinai in the sight of
all the people.” (Exodus 19:10– 11, NKJV)

“Consecrate yourselves so you can hear when I come near.” That was the mandate. Humbled souls, clean and yielded hearts, still and attentive minds to God and His will — those should be at the heart of fasting.

Consecration speaks to a state of being set apart, not just from something but for something. Preparation and purpose are central to the process. Every mention of the Sabbath tells us that we are to sanctify it as holy unto the Lord. It’s His day!

Our observance of it, though beneficial to us, should ultimately bring Him glory because God is most glorified by us when we are obedient to Him. That is why fasting is more than mere abstinence from food. God’s command for hearts of consecration is why we are to refrain from seeking our pleasure on the Sabbath. And the New English Translation really brings it home:

You must observe the Sabbath
rather than doing anything you please on my holy day.
You must look forward to the Sabbath
and treat the Lord’s holy day with respect.
You must treat it with respect by refraining from your
normal activities, and by refraining from your selfish pursuits and from
making business deals. (Isaiah 58:13, NKJV)

That passage really moves the idea of consecration into clear view. Our fasted lives should refrain from these things:

• normal activities
• selfish pursuits
• making business deals

I believe that the principle is what is being highlighted here and not necessarily the law. When the Bible speaks to abstaining from normal activities, I don’t think it is banning us from such everyday activities as picking up kids from school or the things that need to be done for furthering life as we know it; it speaks to a consecrated disposition, a clear break from being controlled by those activities and chores. I believe a good, God- honoring fast is one in which we bring into submission and offer unto God as a pleasing sacrifice the following:

• normal activities— ourselves
• selfish pursuits — our senses
• making business deals — our sustenance

An offering of ourselves, our senses, and our substance. That is the true heart of worship, the ultimate posture of dependence upon the Lord. That is the epitome of subservience. Can you think of a worthier offering for us, as priests created to live and minister before the Lord (see 1 Peter 2:9), to bring before God, who honors obedience more than sacrifice?

Fasting is not a stand-alone practice but more like an approach protocol the children of Israel were given when going into the temple, according to the books of the biblical law. Fasting prepares us for worship, prayer, and drawing near to the presence of God. We bring ourselves before Him. We engage our senses in worshipping Him, and we offer our substance to honor Him, all as acts of worship, sacrifices pleasing to the Lord.

We feel the process of consecration acutely during the first few days of fasting. In those early days, I often refer to this simple prayer, which I’ve come to call the Prayer of Lordship, as my fasting examen of sorts, especially during the turbulent early days of the fast, when everything in and around me is telling me to quit:

Father, You are Lord of myself and all my self loves.
You own all my senses.
You, Lord, are my sustenance.
You alone satisfy.

I always slowly, deliberately, and reverently posture myself to pray, pausing between each statement to search God and allow Him to search me in turn. I will sometimes go through all the sensations that feel pressing, surrendering each one to Him as I pray. For example, I’ll say, ​“Father, I thank You that my sight is consecrated unto You. I make a covenant with my eyes, as Job did, to watch, read, and gaze upon only what pleases You.” At another time, I may pray simply, ​“Father, I thank You that my appetites are consecrated unto You.” Another beautiful prayer would be Philippians 4:8 – 9, which I use to focus, meditate, and whisper back to God reverent thoughts of all things noble, just, pure, lovely, virtuous, and praiseworthy.

That simple, contextualized examen has been a tremendous grounding practice for me because fasting is painful at times and a deeply introspective undertaking. When I carry a yielded heart in fasting, things the Holy Spirit is dealing with come to my attention and can be dealt with only by turning them over to the Refiner. When I feel hunger (or greed) come up, I humbly give Him lordship over it and thank Him that the Cross of Jesus and the sanctification of His Spirit covers me. Sometimes the habits, behaviors, and passions I thought were dead are dredged up by the fast so the Holy Spirit can deal with them.

The temptation of these hard days (and the natural response) is either fight or flight, but we should never wrestle our way toward an escape, because the entire disposition of a fasted soul is yieldedness. When we say yes to fasting, we say one giant yes to God and His sovereign cleansing work in our life and He always responds, lovingly showing up with a smile and a mop and bucket full of His cleaning supplies. One decisive yes in fasting is a definitive no to anything in our thoughts, attitudes, and appetites misaligned with Him, for the duration of our fast and hopefully our lives.

If I feel boredom during the day, I meditate on thoughts of His lordship over my pleasure and feast on those. We don’t consecrate a fast and then wake up and throw ourselves to the will and whims of our scorned flesh. The fasted life is a conscious, curated one — a literal, living sacrifice.