Appearance and Substance

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Preacher: Ross Macdonald Scripture: Matthew 6:16-18

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Well, it's certainly good to be back in our home court as it were I You could probably tell in my voice.
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I'm working through a head cold somehow for the past half a year I've been like Daniel in the lion's den dodging all the sicknesses, but I'm going around and of course came back from a nadnok
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With more than used towels and bedsheets, so please bear with me this morning I'm hoping my voice will will sustain and be in good shape for events on Thursday night and Friday This morning we finally get back to the
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Sermon on the Mount. It's been some while since we've had a detour We've been with with our brother
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Greg who's who's away this week we've been in Jonah and Jonah 1 & 2 and then of course we looked at 2nd
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Corinthians and Considered restoration and what a what a glorious opportunity enjoy that was and then last week
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We're in Colossians 3 for several days And so it's been quite some time since we've been back in Matthew chapter 6 back in the
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Sermon on the Mount now we finished the Lord's Prayer and if you'll remember when we began chapter 6 there were
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Three major units that chapter 6 begins with and each one of the units is structured in a very similar way
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Although in the Lord's Prayer, there's this huge elaboration pray in this manner And we spent a while unpacking that but the three major units began with when you give alms
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Or when you give charity don't be like the hypocrites, right? Don't be those who only want to appear a certain way before men
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But inwardly you have no desire no seeking after God rather when you give don't even let your your hands know between them
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What you're giving let it be done toward God in secret and God who sees in secret will reward you openly
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And so that's the structure we've seen both with charity and prayer and now this morning with fasting
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Each of these units drives home the point that we are not to be like hypocrites And this is really flowing out of Matthew chapter 5
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Remember where we left off in Matthew chapter 5 toward the very end It was you must be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect and prior to that Jesus clarified that there is a exceeding righteousness that his followers must exhibit a
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Righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees And so Jesus here as we come into chapter 6 is helping us understand what the succeeding righteousness looks like It is not a righteousness that merely performs before others
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Is a righteousness that is sincerely offered unto God And that's what we have in our verses this morning verses 16 through 18
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Moreover when you fast do not be like the hypocrites with a sad countenance
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For they disfigure their faces that they may appear to men to be fasting Assuredly I say to you they have their reward
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But you and you fast anoint your head wash your face so that you do not appear to men to be fasting
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But to your father who is in the secret place and your father who sees in secret will reward you openly
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So this is an opportunity to talk a little bit about fasting Really? I just have two parts to the sermon this morning
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The first is to really focus on fasting and the first three words of this verse
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But then I also want to drive home the point that Jesus has been driving home all along this warning against hypocrisy
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About the appearance this a this fixation on how we appear before others without any consideration of how we appear before God And so that's that the two -pronged approach will have two verses 16 through 18
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And to my recollection we it's been some time since we've actually spoke about fasting
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This is not a topic. We've turned to very often I Wonder and I'd love to hear
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Some other afternoon what some of your personal experiences of fasting are For me it was a bit of a journey.
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I don't know that I properly understood fasting for quite some time. I think I had Views that maybe even here in Matthew 6 ought to have been corrected earlier
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But as I've come in here with you saints at grbc I've had many occasions to think through fasting many occasions to fast along with you
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Many times we've gathered in a circle in this very room and we've been praying with fasting for very specific things praying for Sometimes for things to come to pass for God's will to be made clear and we recognize that though those times feel somewhat far and few between that Nevertheless, we are standing in a rich part of our
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Reformed heritage indeed Christian heritage Fasting has always had a place in practice among the people of God You you go out to a
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Pilgrim Hall Museum in Plymouth. I've been there a few times over the past couple years They have paintings and facsimiles and all sorts of memorabilia
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Connected to Thanksgiving Day back in the Plymouth colony. They don't have any facsimiles or paintings of the fasting days
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That would have been on the other side of those feasting days the the Puritans practiced both fasting and feasting
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In fact the fasting days were just as common if not more common in the days of old
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Nowadays when it comes to fasting you only hear people talk about it if they're about to undergo a medical procedure
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They need to fast sometimes. That's the only time they take it. Seriously, you know they won't put their hand in the cookie jar because things might go wrong and under the
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Surgeon's knife the next day or you hear people that they've tapped into intermittent fasting.
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Oh, I fast twice a week Wow, that's amazing. That's like the Pharisees. Oh, it's intermittent fasting.
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I've never lost so much weight It's all a fad to to burn calories. It's nothing spiritual for the
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Puritans for for Spirituality fasting is always a religious observance
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Not a dietary observance Religious observance and the focus is entirely on God We're gonna unpack that a little bit together this morning
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Archibald Alexander from from old Princeton back in the glory days in 19th century He wrote fasting is made a part of all religions true and false
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And it's practiced among the heathen the Jews the Mohammedans in other words the Muslims the
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Romanists in other words the Catholics even Oriental Christians and Because of this the practice has been turned so much to superstition
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Protestants have too much neglected this duty. So even in his own day. He recognized there's such an emphasis on Containing the flesh and doing sort of ritualistic fasting that Protestants have just absconded with the practice altogether
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He was seeking to correct that Let's talk about Matthew 6 16 through 18.
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I'm just gonna focus on these first three words when you fast When you fast notice as with alms and prayer
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Jesus does not say if you fast He says when you fast There's an expectation
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Fasting is going to take place in a Christians life What is the purpose of fasting
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It's not just the refusal of food. What is the religious purpose the religious practice of fasting?
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Well, John Calvin the great reformer. He described it with three purposes. He said first it's to subdue our flesh
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And secondly, it's to prepare us in prayer And thirdly, it's to demonstrate humility before God self -abasement before God So it's about reigning in or subduing the flesh
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It's about clarifying and perhaps drawing us into a spirit of prayer and it's to demonstrate both outwardly to some degree but especially inwardly a certain humility a certain self -abasement before God Now these can be found throughout the scripture both
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Old and New Testament. We have examples of these very things Calvin himself was aware that in his day and throughout much of church history
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Fasting was a regulate regulated part of Christian experience He himself held that it ought to be occasional and not habitual in other words
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There ought to be an occasion for a fast. It shouldn't be something that is scheduled on the calendar Now's our fasting day.
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There ought to be an occasion that that is a way of protecting that God were devotion But this is not to devolve into something that is almost
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Ritualistic and empty in that very way more to talk about that in a moment our own confession
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Our second London Baptist confession it addresses fasting as a part of how
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God is to be rightly worshipped How not not just in a particular setting or place but in all of the ways that we are to worship
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God Our confession says chapter 22 paragraph 5 God has to be worshipped with the reading of scriptures preaching hearing the
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Word of God Teaching admonishing one another and Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing with grace in our hearts to the
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Lord. Does that sound familiar? It ought to Also the administration of baptism and the
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Lord's Supper all of this is Aspects of religious worship of God and it's to be performed in obedience to him with understanding and faith with reverence and godly fear moreover solemn humiliations with fastings and Thanksgivings upon special occasions ought to be used in a holy and religious manner.
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So you see what our confession is putting forth There's a regulative way that God is to be worshipped There's always to be preaching and hearing of God's Word Things that are spoken things that are received things that are sung psalms hymns spiritual songs the word in all these forms
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Saturating the lives of the people of God Upon the needs upon the opportunities.
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There's to be baptism the regularity of the Lord's Supper and then on special occasions times of fasting times of Thanksgiving the only other place in our confession that addresses fasting is when elders are
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Chosen by common suffrage in the church and there to be set apart by prayer and fasting I believe that's the only other direct reference to fasting in our confession
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What they're recognizing in terms of a religious worship of God is fasting as a way of seeking
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God But notice what it was connected to and we'll see this as a pattern. It was always connected to humiliation self abasement a certain humbling of the soul
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That is what fasting is meant to bring about and if fasting is about seeking God we can recognize it is impossible to see
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God without humbling oneself And God resists the proud He draws near to the humble if you're seeking
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God to draw near to you. You have to humble yourself That's the only way he can be found Fasting is a way of getting your body into a humbled position so that your soul can follow train can follow suit
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So fasting and if you look throughout church history fasting was always connected to humility it's essentially a physical display of humility a physical means or form of self humiliation and Fasting is a means of seeking
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God because fasting is a means of humbling oneself. I was reading a lot Over the past week on this very topic
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I came across a notebook of an old reverend from when him in the 17th century named John Fisk Just pull out a couple of passages
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From his notebook to give you a little window into how fasting was viewed in the colonial days of our country right here on the
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North Shore October 19th 1644 a solemn day of humiliation
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Kept regarding the dominance of the Presbyterians in England. I love that's a personal one. I love that one
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January 2nd 1645 a solemn day of humiliation Kept because of the extremity of the season and concern for the church in the town
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February 20th 1648 a colony wide fast ordered by the general court and the governor
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For this for the state of England the West Indies and Massachusetts Bay Colony April 15th 1648 a day of humiliation for a church member who had resisted discipline
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February 28 1661 a day of humiliation before the scriptures to seek reconciliation with all in the church
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These are just random Scattered moments from the notebook of this reverend and he's are counting both in the church and in the colony at large days set apart for fasting
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Even not just in the early days of the colonies, but even later even during the Civil War Abraham Lincoln proclaimed three fasts during the
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Civil War two in the fall of 1863 one in the fall of 1864 and Specifically the word went out.
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This is a day for public humiliation fasting in prayer You see in all of this the common word
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Humiliation, that's the key The old Dutch reformer Will Helmuth saw Brockle I don't think most of the babies have been born if you're looking for a name
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Will Helmuth is up for grabs. That's a good one to bring back. Oh, Willie I'm Brockle writes fasting in and of itself is not a religious practice merely depriving oneself of refreshment is
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Not observing a day of fasting For fasting is a humbling of oneself and fasting and humbling are not two separate duties.
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You see what he's saying You can skip food. That means absolutely nothing. You're just denying yourself food if there's no humility.
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You haven't even begun to fast Fasting is humility That's the point.
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He says this Fasting serves but one purpose to facilitate the humbling of the soul.
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It has no significance beyond that Now he has a lot more in his four -volume
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Christian reasonable service To address fasting but notice what he says is the most significant thing humility
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Fasting serves one purpose to facilitate the humbling of the soul Beyond this it serves.
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No other purpose. I Mentioned it took me a while to work out Certain misunderstandings of what fasting is and how it ought to be done
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One of my fonder memories that's that's very much an embarrassment is Convincing Alicia that we needed a day of fasting.
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This was early on long before we were married It's like we're gonna fast. I'm gonna show her how spiritual
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I am. I'm zealous for the Lord It's like alright, we're gonna have a day of fasting. How am
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I gonna do this? Alright, I'm gonna have several readings from Scripture appointed times throughout the day We'll make sure we get some of that in make sure we spend some time in prayer
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And then what so I'm over at her parents house. We're sitting in the living room floor I bring a Jansport backpack full of Capri Suns and in between moments of reading
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Scripture We spent half the day playing a video game together We're just playing like Crash Bandicoot drinking
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Capri Suns and it's like, oh time to read Scripture Isn't this a great fast?
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That was no fast at all. That was just a very bizarre day. It certainly had nothing to commend spiritually to the
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Lord There was no humility in that It was actually more of a fun day than a fast day in a lot of respects it's not fasting if there's not humility
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And Ezra 8 one of my favorite passages just to speak about this matter of fasting
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Ezra chapter 8 Ezra is on the verge of leading the people finally out of Babylon The very thing that God had promised is now on the very cusp of fulfillment
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There's a lot of moving parts just because it's going to happen All of God's Providence has lined up doesn't mean it's going to happen easily there's a sort of frenzied search to get the
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Levites in order and make sure that everyone's ready to go and all of this happens within the space of two weeks and As they're all trying to collect all of these things
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Ezra gathers the people we read in verse 21 and I proclaimed a fast there at the river
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That we might humble ourselves before God To seek him in the right way for us and for all of our little ones and all of our possessions
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So we're if we're coming off of Ezra chapter 7 We have generations that have been thirsting longing drooling for this day of return
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It is a long journey three four month journey To get back to the motherland to get back to the land of promise
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Most of the people have never even been there And now they have to gather everything that they have established generationally with their lives in Babylon This is the seventh year of our desert sees rule
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It's the Persians have kind of swept in and you recognize they're basically packing up their whole lives in a matter of two weeks
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So they can fulfill this great promise of God that they would be restored to the land and Ezra Who's trying to navigate and administrate all of the moving parts of this great this great journey?
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Stops catches himself and says we're gonna fast for three days He doesn't do what most of us in the room would do is like we're losing time.
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We got to go people will catch up We just got to hit the road. He says, all right, we got to make it and let's fast for three days
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Because we want to go the right way And we want God to show us the right way. We want his blessing.
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So let's humble ourselves. He doesn't get ahead of himself Notice that it's not just getting there that matters to him.
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It's how they get there that matters to him Sometimes the reason that fasting is neglected as a spiritual practice in our lives is because it's just about getting
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It's not about how we get it's just getting and if you're obsessed with getting there's no place for self humiliation
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I don't need to humble myself before myself before God This is just a leverage.
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This is just a tactic for me to get what I'm seeking It's not about humbling myself for God's will to be revealed
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For God to show me the right way to show me things about him show me things about myself It's no wonder that fasting is so wrought widely neglected among us
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Ezra doesn't lose sight of the purpose even in the midst of the busyness even in the midst of all of the turmoil
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It's how the people get there He wants to seek the right way and he seems to be aware of if not directly employing the very prophecies that were connected to how the people would be restored to the land when you come to Jeremiah 51 of the great prophecies of God Being able to restore on a set day his people to the land and God says to the
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Prophet in those days and in that Time the children of Israel will come they and the children of Judah together with continual weeping
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They will come they will seek the Lord their God. They will ask their way to Zion with their faces toward it
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Ezra seems to be fulfilling that taking that in and saying, okay, this is not some triumphant March We need to remember why we were dragged out of our land in the first place.
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So let's fast and think about that We don't want to get there just to be dragged out again a few years later
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Notice that Ezra seeks the Lord Because he wants to know the right way. This is a reason that we humble ourselves
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We often find the right way because we've been tripping over ourselves in all of the wrong ways So finally, there's a place for humility
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Everything that I thought was right. Everything I sought to do has made a royal mess So it's time now instead to seek the right way that you have
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Lord I'm just gonna humble myself and stop trying to dart forward The problem is we often ask the
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Lord to follow us in the decisions we make We usually have to fast after the fact
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I love that Ezra fasts before We're about to go I'm gonna fast as we go
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He doesn't presume to know the right way. He seeks and waits upon the
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Lord That's very instructive Ezra seeks the
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Lord and he seeks the Lord in a certain way. He proclaims a fast in order to be humbled before God Again we often begin to fast or humble ourselves after a stumble after a trial
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Ezra does this beforehand? He recognizes the truth of James 4 10 if you humble yourself
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God himself will exalt you in due time And so fasting is a means of humbling the flesh
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It's a way of reigning in control over our bodily appetite a way as it were of constraining our our impulses
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That ability to just give in to things as soon as they flash in front of our attention Fasting is a way of tempering and depriving the flesh to be that impulsive
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To not just do automatically as we please to to pursue at great length the things that will gratify or suit us
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Fasting is a way of demonstrating that however vital our earthly needs may be There is still a narrow and temporary way
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That those earthly needs must be met. What is a true need an everlastingly vital need doesn't come from the earth it comes from heaven and man doesn't live
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By bread but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God fasting is a way of declaring that You're essentially preaching to your stomach and your soul all that's within you
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What does Paul describe of the the Judaizers and in the church at Philippi says their
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God is their belly When their God gives a command they obey
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They have no higher principle no higher form of obedience than their flesh Fasting is a way of saying my belly is not my
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God the impulses of my flesh that that natural Adamic thirst for gratification does not have control over me
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The condition of the body affects the soul we can fall into Unfortunate ways of describing the relationship of body and soul in distinguishing them we forget how closely
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Interwoven they are and truly they are Distinguishable at death the body goes into the ground the soul goes to be with the
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Lord and awaits to be further clothed But that further clothing is the state of the body is intended to be
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The soul is not meant to be apart from the body The body is not meant to be apart from the soul.
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This is the condition that sin that death has brought about human beings image bearers are bodies and souls
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Because we're schizophrenic about that separation and have more of a platonic view of the relationship of the body to the soul
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We sometimes discount the import that our bodies have on our spirituality on the soulish aspects of human experience
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We almost Marginalize or neglect how in fact impactful our bodies are and you know what?
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It's like when you're very sick when you're feeling very weak. It's hard to be spiritually minded, isn't it?
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All of a sudden it's like a burden or a lodestone on your soul when you're very healthy when everything is
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Functioning like a well -oiled engine Your spirituality is almost taken up to the next level
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You come into the church and the doors fly open and bluebirds start to fly and you're just kind of singing all these hymns as You bolt around And then we're all kind of cracker to the corners coughing and hacking and saying
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Oh Lord how much longer? The condition of the body affects the soul
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That's why Paul says he uses all these metaphors of an athlete of a fighter a prizefighter a runner
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He says I beat my body into submission Unfortunately, this has a whole legacy in early
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Christianity of sort of self -torture as a means of spiritual improvement And certainly scripture does not condemn that the point that Paul is getting at is no athlete.
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That's actually about winning Lives this life of splendor and luxury
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The one that wins the gold medal the one that makes it to the finish line is not the one who had ostrich
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Feather fans and was just plucking grapes all day And that's not picking on, you know, whatever your waist size is, right?
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I'm that would be a pot calling a kettle black listen, even sumo wrestlers are
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Very well disciplined not to say they get a bad rap But I mean,
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I don't think any of us could hang with those guys. I don't know. I have weird algorithms I've watched sumo wrestling from time to time.
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I know a lot more about it than I should it's a pretty impressive sport I have to say This is just a way of saying if you want to win if you want to make it
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You have to get control of your body. This requires self -denial self -discipline
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Paul tells Timothy in first Timothy for Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness
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Discipline yourself. I do that Paul says you need to do that Timothy. Do you want to be godly?
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Deny yourself discipline yourself get some control over your flesh learn how to deny your appetites
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That's how you'll be godly It's not all of it, but it's a big part of it Christian does does your flesh have more control over your life and your walk than it should
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Often it is the case that you have no place to seek God And that's why you need to deny your flesh in the first place
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This is what it's costing you You're not having a sight or a hunger for God because you haven't been denying your flesh because you haven't been disciplined in your walk
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It's interesting among, you know Gen Z errs and so on. I have to speak down It's like when you're an upperclassman, you have to speak down to the freshman.
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Well, I'm a millennial speak down to the Gen Z errs There's perhaps more health consciousness than ever among Gen Z errs
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But I think a lot of that is just chaff. It's so fickle. It's so fickle There's more concern about bodily health in really good ways is the body and the soul is intertwined
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But at the same time there's not the kind of concern that the godly of all the Saints of old have had About the body the bodily denial bodily discipline as a means of spiritual
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Discipline as a means of spiritual formation. I want to be godly not I want to be fit
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I want to be godly not I want to be healthy to be godly doesn't mean you're gonna be unhealthy
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But you understand what I'm saying? It's a lot more Than the bodily parameters and achievements of health.
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It's about godliness otherwise, it's just it's not fasting at all because there's no humility and It's no humility if it's not humility before God You might as well just get a backpack full of juice boxes and play video games right it's not real fasting
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Fasting can help sharpen and direct our hunger for God or reliance upon God that humbling that sense of a need for Relying and finding
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God comes when we haven't been able to find him when we haven't been relying on him And so there's a need for a humbling
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That's where fasting comes in if you look at it There's an old fifth century document called the opus imperfectum and in in dealing with the early part of Matthew 6
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The writer says, you know, basically Matthew's lifting The Lord's Prayer is the very center of these things all these things are acts of piety and faith right almsgiving the
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Lord's Prayer, you know praying and Fasting, but he recognized prayer is the central thing behind it all and in fact the only way to combat vanity is if you on the one hand deny the vanity and pride of your flesh by showing mercy to others by giving to others
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And then that is a way of actually being led into prayer but then also Fasting and denying your own flesh.
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That's the other way of of aiding and supporting prayers all about prayer In other words was all about your relationship in pursuit of God Fasting can help sharpen and direct that hunger
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That's the point You think of Jesus in the wilderness fasting.
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He was about to embark on his ministry one of three That in there in the midst of their ministry as they embarked upon their ministry in significant ways
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They had a 40 -day fast Moses Elijah the Lord Jesus the law the Prophet the priests
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Jesus in the wilderness fasting And you think again he's the last
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Adam starving denying his flesh Looking for the will in the way of God Not turning stones into bread
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But simply eating and being supported and nourished by all that came from the Lord his
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God And that's in high contrast to the first Adam not in the desert not in the wilderness, but in paradise feasting and giving in It's gonna eat.
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Hey, you should eat this God's holding out on you. Sounds great. Pass it over He just gives in there's absolutely no self -denial and the early church
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They put a lot into that about the practice of fasting tertullian wrote a whole tractate on fasting he was connecting the fact that fasting is a
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Christian practice because Adam was commanded by God do not eat and he ate and So Christians need to learn unlike Adam how to deny food in their pursuit of God There's a way of saying we won't be like the first Adam who always gave into the flesh
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We'll be like the last Adam who denied himself to seek out God There's that measure of devotion and Faith in all true fasting
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Jesus says when you fast, this is what it has to look like If you're just fasting out of a tradition if you're fasting because it's on your calendar
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If you're fasting because you're trying to impress your girlfriend That's not that's not going to work
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It's hard to really humble yourself out of a tradition out of a ritual. There's nothing Godward about that.
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It's just going through the motions That's why Calvin says it ought to be occasional That's why as Alexander said the
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Protestants have largely neglected it became superstitious Ritualistic didn't have anything about God anything about sincere humility
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That's only false humility. And if there's only false humility why fast in the first place in the gospel of Mark chapter 2 this seems to be the issue and There's a lot going on in Mark chapter 2 that that goes far beyond the issue of fasting
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But fasting seems to be one of the issues that is of concern not only for the Pharisees and the scribes
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But even for the followers of John the Baptist we read beginning in verse 18 the disciples of John and of the
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Pharisees were fasting and they came to him and said Why are the disciples of John and of the
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Pharisees fast and your disciples don't fast? Jesus said to them can the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them
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As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them and then they will fast in those days
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Notice we have this unlikely pairing the disciples of John and the Pharisees. How did these guys become friends?
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Didn't John say of the Pharisees you brood of vipers who warns you to flee the wrath to come?
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And now they're walking together. They've both got issues with Jesus Now they're in the midst of fasting right the disciples of John and of the
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Pharisees were fasting And we have an automatic tendency to think disciples of John good
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Pharisees bad But here we see even the followers of John the Baptist are put off by how
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Jesus and his disciples are operating They're a little too loose. They're getting a little too comfortable with sinners.
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They're a little too celebratory Where's that humility the kind of humility we have look at our sackcloth.
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Look at our fasting They're fasting as we as we know The Jews fasted twice a week
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In fact it did a K an early Christian document in chapter 8 verse 1 Says we ought to fast on two days a week, but the opposite days that the
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Jews do they do you know? I forget what it was Wednesday, you know Wednesday and Friday then we ought to do
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Tuesday and Thursday something like that We ought to be be distinct but the practice was the same Fast two days a week
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But here's the disciples of Jesus and they're not fasting at all What's going on? Well, these followers were fasting that's no big surprise they were fasting with this humility
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That's good. At least those of John would have understood his whole ministry was a call to repentance This whole ministry was a call to humble
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Humble the the people of Israel the children of Israel and prepare the way for the Lord Fasting was primarily a symbolic expression of repentance of self -denial of waiting for the way of the
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Lord to appear They have many examples throughout scripture of voluntary fasts There's really only one positive command that comes through And that's
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Leviticus 16 the command to fast on the Day of Atonement The language there is to afflict oneself and the idea again is self abasement self humiliation very appropriate as we
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Embark toward the Day of Atonement that the reception of God's forgiveness ought to come with a certain humiliation a certain repentance
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Fasting was meant to depict that and aid the souls of the people toward that now later on Of course, it's described as more of a common practice.
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That's the only positive command in scripture But you read Zechariah 7 Joel 1 Isaiah 58 fasting was very commonly practiced by the people of God It had become so customary as we said it was practiced twice a week
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So they get all that we're supposed to be mourning. We're supposed to be humble. We're supposed to be a repentant What's Highlighted is fasting had become an empty display of personal holiness
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Why aren't your disciples holy like we are? That was the attitude You'd be a lot more holy if you would put some sackcloth on and just starve yourself for a day
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We do this twice a week every week. It's just how we live. It's how we operate And that had withered down into this fleshly display of personal holiness
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I'm holy because I ritually mourn my sins It's the same withered meaningless display that happens every
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Ash Wednesday When people who live absolutely debauched lives get a little smudge on their forehead and they think somehow now
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I can display to the world that I'm holy Look how I've humbled myself before God the furthest thing from that truth
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Now in Matthew 6 our passage Jesus is targeting this kind of attitude this kind of display
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He says don't be like the hypocrites. They try to make a big show out of it, but it's empty There's nothing
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Godward about it. It's all directed toward the eyes of men We get the same air of superiority in Luke 18 the parable of the
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Pharisee and the tax collector All right, the parable of the allegedly righteous one and the sinner
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The Pharisee stood and prayed with himself God. I thank you that I'm not like other men Extortioners unjust adulterers or even like this tax collector.
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What's the first thing? He says because I fast twice a week That's what he says
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You want proof? That I'm holy Let me tell you about my humility.
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I I fast twice a week how humble I am how holy I am The tax collector standing far off would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven
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He beat his breast saying God be merciful to me a sinner You see the difference between fasting twice a week that is supposed to be expressing repentance and humility and The actual humility and repentance that is shown by the tax collector
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And I think the whole condemnation there in Luke 18 like If there's not humility why fast at all you've missed the whole point
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You've missed at all It doesn't add anything to you doesn't commend you to God if anything it attracts
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God's vengeance upon you to these Pharisees the vital issue was the outward form the ritual the appearance of Humility and holiness not the reality.
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And so when the disciples of John the Pharisees come to Jesus and his disciples They say essentially why don't you look the part?
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Where's your forehead smudge? Where's your sackcloth? Why don't you do this ritual that we've adopted now and we've done it for for generations
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And Jesus is condemning that whole practice. It's all hypocrisy You love the appearance you love the boast, but you don't have the substance
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Now, maybe you're going through the motions Sometimes in the Christian life, it feels like we're just going through the motions going through the outward forms
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It feels like a smudge on the forehead. Just I keep showing up. I feel God is very distant.
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I Feel very spiritually cold. I feel very spiritually weak and vulnerable and I'm just going through the motions going through the motions well, if that If that experience leads you to humility
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It's attractive to God if that experience on the other hand leads you to the sort of critical spirit
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We find here in the Pharisees then you'll only get further and further from God Maybe you've been going through the motions and it's just become so hollow
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And the fact is you're a lot more like the Pharisees in the passage than the disciples of Jesus Duties are dull outward.
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There's a critical spirit of others. We find that in the Pharisees and The farthest thing from your experience is the joy of Jesus presence.
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That's what the disciples have Why don't your disciples make themselves look miserable like us as we contort our faces?
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Jesus says because they're with me If you're close to me, you can't contort your face like that My abode is at the right hand of the
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Father where there's fullness of joy evermore There's no contorting of faces there
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If you're around me if you're with the bridegroom, how could you fast? It's absurd
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That's Jesus response Alexander McLaren makes this point. So well, he says why does so many
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Christians have so little joy in their lives? It's because they have the religion of John's disciples or of the
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Pharisees Religion where the main features are a restriction prohibition and they actually pride themselves on that and so there can be no joy
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For there's a great many people who call themselves Christians and have just enough religion to take the edge off of worldly pleasures
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But not enough to make fellowship with Christ That's very very insightful
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Just enough for religion to take the edge off of worldly pleasures, but not enough to actually commune with Christ That's where the joy is
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John's disciples get repentance. They get humility. They're not like the Pharisees But they miss as much as the
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Pharisees miss. They don't understand where the joy is They don't understand what it means to actually commune with Jesus If that's you
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You should see this as an invitation to humble yourself fast and seek God in the right way when you fast
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Jesus would say to you When you're in that wilderness and you're denying your flesh because you're seeking
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God Just do it in a way that you're not tempted to put it on display before others. Don't contort your faces rather anoint them
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Don't don't have this miserable countenance rather be normal as best as you can be cheerful Hey Alexander, I mentioned him in the same place where he wrote that He says yesterday a pious young man called upon me
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He said he wished I would write an article on the duty of fasting because he observed there was much neglected in our day.
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I Told him this is a wise minister He's like, you know, I want to be zealous. You should write a thing on fast
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We really need to recover this practice. Here's this wise minister and he says here's what I told him I told him
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I'm not in favor of periodic fasts Not once a week not once a month and there were times indeed when we ought not to fast
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That's it. That's a response. You want me to write on fasting? Here's what I do. Don't make it regular In fact, there's a lot of times where you shouldn't fast at all.
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That's what Archibald Alexander says. Why he's detecting something in this young man's heart Sometimes it's just the anxiety of not having enough zeal of not having enough joy that makes legalism so attractive
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This is the shortcut. This is how I can get it This is how I'll find that sense of fulfillment purpose energy power control legalism always offers that And Alexander picking up on this directs this young man away, yeah, there's a place for fasting
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But if you're coming at it in this way, it's no place for you Well, the young man as young men are prone to do thinks what is what is this old guy know?
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He doesn't have the zeal that I have So Alexander writes soon after our conversation this man determined to fast one day every week and After some time he realized that it was degenerating into formality and he abandoned it
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In other words the very thing he wanted to address. He found in his own life. I'm just becoming legalistic
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This has become an empty ritual and a source of pride in my life. It has very little to do with God Another embarrassing story
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I could share in working out issues of fasting was when I was in a band of young guys and we were just cutting our teeth on scripture and One in this circle had found this book it was from some charismatic publisher.
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It's like an awful terrible book But I had a great cover It had this tribal ruler with like this amazing, you know multicolored elaborate sash and He had kind of this glowing light behind him and he had his hands kind of closed and just had this like UFC look on His face and he was praying and the whole book was titled when kings pray and fast
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And here was this tribal King and he's like, let me tell you what happens when I pray and fast to my God So my buddy totes us in our circle.
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He's like we got to read this and it's like yeah Let's start fasting next week and it's like we're gonna tap into this kind of power and holiness
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Just like the young man that Alexander is addressing It doesn't take long for that and it's not just with fasting.
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It's with a lot of spiritual disciplines in the Christian life It doesn't take long for that to degenerate to be the very opposite of the thing
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You thought it would be to accomplish the very opposite of what you wanted it to accomplish
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Jesus is warning you don't be like the hypocrites Make make it so devoted to God that there's not even an opportunity to put it on display before men hide it
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Pretend you're a double agent. No one can know that you're fasting You know that you're at D 'Angelo's and you're kind of you know, like oh,
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I'm eating, you know You know you you go early when you're meeting someone for dinner and you put stuff around your lips that was well
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I'm full I couldn't eat, you know, you're hiding. Don't be deceitful, but you see my point This is about God.
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This is about self -humility Jesus says when you fast do not be like the hypocrites with a sad countenance
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They just figure their faces because they just want to appear to men They want the attention.
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They want the recognition They want the feeling that I had when
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I saw that tribal ruler on the cover of that book And that's the reward Jesus says if that's what you want, that's what you'll get you have your reward in full
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It means nothing to God. It's accomplished nothing with God. It will not only help not not help you.
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It will harm you So don't be like them when you fast wash Don't appear to men to be fasting but appear to your father.
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That's the whole point. I present myself to God I live before his face quorum deo Don't be like the hypocrites
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Jesus says When we live for men we as image bearers disfigure ourselves.
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We weren't made to live by the sight of men the appearance of men It's like when you see a young woman and and especially in the days of social media
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Instagram tick -tock it's like they They manicure their whole lives to cater to a certain taste and appearance to men and they have just figuring themselves
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They have who knows what materials in their lips and plastic surgery and they look like something out of Star Trek They've disfigured themselves because they're so bent on appearing a certain way before men
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We're not meant to appear before men. We were made to appear before God. We weren't meant to we weren't meant primarily
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For men, but primarily for God unto men all is done for pretense in the hypocrites life all is done for show and There's a illusion that comes with that that somehow if it's so effective toward men
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It must be effective toward God if others are so impressed by it God must be impressed by it And this is the thing that the prophets are constantly condemning the
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Israelites with and the Pharisees and the disciples of John They still don't get it in Isaiah 58 when when when
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God is basically addressing his people in this very way. He says He's sort of mimicking what their what their sayings are.
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We're holy. We're humble Why hasn't God fulfilled his promises and look at what God's response is why have we fasted they say
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And you have not seen hey, we're fasting. We're holy. We're humble. Look how spiritual we are.
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Why aren't you responsive to this? Why have we afflicted our souls and you have taken no notice
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This is God's response and the day of your fast you find pleasure. You exploit all your laborers Indeed you fast for strife and debate to strike with the fist of wickedness
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Is this the fast that I've proclaimed? Where in other words God is saying have you fasted at all?
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Where's the humility? Are you actually seeking me? You're complaining about me, but you're not seeking me.
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You haven't humbled yourself at all. You've actually puffed yourself up against me That's what God is saying in Isaiah 58.
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It's the very opposite of what fasting was meant to be not helpful. It's harmful What is the
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Lord seeking in all of these ways in all these places? What is he seeking in Matthew 6? Not mere appearance
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Substance Substance I have this bottle of scotch and on the bottom of it is the
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Klan motto of the Distillery, it's my favorite motto. I Wish it was the
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McDonald's motto, but it's not ours is kind of lame the motto is quam with dairy essay with dairy, which is not to seem
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But to be Not to seem but to be That's essentially what
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Jesus is saying. Don't just seem to be Be don't just have the appearance
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Have the substance This is what happens in in Mark 11 we read that Jesus comes out of Bethany and he's hungry and he goes to a fig tree and the fig tree is full of Leaves and he's hungry.
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So he goes toward it and he's looking to find something on it and he finds nothing but leaves And Mark includes it wasn't a season for figs, which is it's a fast we don't have time to get into that that's fascinating He goes and looks for fruit when it's not in season expecting to find it
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In response Jesus says to the tree let no one eat fruit from you ever again and his disciples heard it.
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I remember Reading commentaries on this where the common commentators were saying essentially this is a display of the humanity of Christ That's a very large concern for Mark and in his humanity.
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He's he's hungry and he's irritated and so he curses this tree and You know, it's almost unfortunate that he doesn't make the tree fruitful he rather just curses it and maybe this is just showing his prophetic denouncement and so on and They're a little bit close toward the end there.
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It's not Jesus being irritable Remember, this is the Jesus who's in the wilderness for 40 days refusing to turn stones into bread
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So this isn't this isn't something new for him It's not like us if if I was in the wilderness for two days,
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I'd be turning stones into Chipotle everywhere. I looked burritos burritos This is the
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Lord He restrains himself from utilizing his power in every place that it is not of the father's will
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And here he comes to this tree and it's full of promise and there's nothing it's it's a it's an enacted parable
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It's a prophetic display Israel was to be fruitful had the appearance of fruitfulness.
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Look at the fastings Look at the temple ceremony Look at the zeal and with all the appearance of leaders.
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There was no fruit to be found And so Jesus says may you never bear fruit again He's condemning the fruitless house of Israel and Judah.
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This is an enacted parable. The whole episode is doing what it's condemning Profession without practice.
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It's condemning the form without fruit. It's condemning appearance without substance. That's the point
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The Lord is not seeking mere appearance. He's seeking substance, you know, Jonathan Edwards.
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I Mean when when you had the fasting days in the colonies these fasting days always had a fasting sermon it would be appointed in all of the towns to have the minister preach on that occasion a
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Message calling for humility and repentance and Jonathan Edwards in 1734.
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I was looking at reading his sermon from Isaiah 58 3 through 5, right? It's just the fast that I've proclaimed and he's addressing his congregation in Northampton.
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I mean the sermon is incredible, but I only have time to read a small portion of it and He's he's recounting how many fast days if we had in the colonies
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It's become something formal. It's become something empty. This is what he says It was a thing that the first settlers of our country looked upon as suitable that every year in the spring
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We ought to keep a day of fasting to humble ourselves for our sins and particularly the sins of the past year and to implore
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God's favor on our land and the concerns of the year ahead and At the latter of the end of the year to keep a day of Thanksgiving for all the blessings of the year, right?
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feasting and fasting and This custom has ever been ever since kept up among us and we've been trained up in it from our childhood
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Everett says this is how we've all grown up. We've all had days of fasting It's not this the main thing that makes the land still zealous for keeping an annual fast
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Much more than any sense we have of any occasion for it by reasons of the sins that we are guilty Or a sense of our need of God's mercy.
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I want you to miss what he's saying. He says why do we keep an annual fast? Because we've always kept an annual fast
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That's essentially what he's saying. Why do we do this every spring? Well, we grew up doing it every spring Why do we get a smudge of ash on our forehead?
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We've always gotten a smudge of ash on our forehead And he says there's not actually been any sincere humility
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It's not because we need God's mercy. That's driving us to have this day of fasting Are we zealous of fast and Thanksgivings any more than papists are zealous of their
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Saints days? We are greatly backslidden We've become a degenerate people
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Now this is just an excerpt but he he draws out many reasons that he would say we are degenerate and I use the opposite of those things to say what would it look like?
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To actually have substance, right? If these are the reasons that there's just an appearance But not substance then the opposite of those things is what the substance would actually be
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It's what fasting ought to be linked to it's what fasting ought to produce So he says this what are our fastings but a mere formality with respect to the body of the people
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It is not a spirit of devotion a spirit to worship God to think and talk of God and of divine things
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That's the first thing This ought to be leading toward devotion a spirit to worship
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God. That's what fasting with substance will lead to Not the appearance of men not the pride of if only
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I could be a tribal ruler. No a Seeking of God a spirit to worship
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God to think of him to enjoy him Secondly he says is it not that there is a spirit greatly prevailing amongst us to find fault with others
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To cry out about their sins while we are insensible to our own Doesn't the spirit appear and that there's so much evil speaking backbiting and contention among us
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So what's another aspect of the appearance without the substance? Other people's sins loom large your own sins are almost impossible to find
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You can acknowledge it with almost a dismissal wave of the hand But you're very critical and you're magnified.
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You're locked in like a heat -seeking missile on the sins of others It shows that you have a show of devotion to God a show of humility, but not the substance of it
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You're a lot more like the Pharisee than the tax collector in Luke 18 so substance means there's going to be a meekness a love of mercy a humility that while it doesn't
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Disacknowledge others sins it's able to view them in light of the mercy that that one has received and it's it's a means of showing mercy to the
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Other of imploring there to be repentance that grace may be found And then lastly he says particularly let it be inquired
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Whether or not notwithstanding all the fast days we have kept has there ever been reformation in our land
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What he's saying is where there's no reformation. There hasn't been a real humbling Isn't that how we talk about repentance repentance is what a turning around?
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Where there hasn't been a turning around there hasn't been repentance And so Edwards is saying yeah, we've had fast days as long as we can remember.
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Has that ever actually changed us? Has that even changed our direction for a year? Have we not gone further and further astray from God's will?
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Now I'm not saying it was all this sermon and I'm not saying it was all this fast day, but he preached a sermon in 1734
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That was the year the Great Awakening broke out Hmm Have we ever changed
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Who big change is coming And maybe this was the fast that did it there ought to be transformation
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There ought to be meek mercy And there has to be devotion born of humility.
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This is what it means Just to focus on God to pursue him when we fast not if when we fast
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This doesn't mean we we need to be smiling sunshines wherever we go
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We keep it secret. It's it's more toward God. It doesn't mean we're you know, we're manipulative or we're deceitful
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So we don't have to be smiling sunshines if we're really going through the times there is a place to be a Jeremiah There is a place to be a weeping prophet prophet.
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In fact, they call those fast day sermons Jeremiah ads means of lamentation But the point is this if if you're seeking
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God if you have a devotion and a hunger for God not for men If you're looking for mercy from God and you're therefore looking at others with mercy and meekness
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And if you're expecting as a result of pursuing God that his spirit will transform you if all these things are true
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Your face will be radiant You might not put olive oil on it. You might not anoint it, but your face will be radiant What we know of the men that have gone off in humility and fasting to commune with God as they come back with their faces shining
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That's what Psalm 34 5 says those who trust in the Lord are radiant. Their faces are never covered with shame
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Their faces shine why because of who they were communing with who they were looking to if you're looking to men
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Your face will never shine you have nothing to reflect but their own darkness When you look to God, even if you can't see the light that the light the luminance that is radiating from you others can
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You come from your fast and you're like Moses, you know putting the floodlight around the people and everyone's like whoa What's going on with him?
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No one wants to sit next to me. It means that even in the best of times you anoint your highest boasts with humility
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But even in the worst of times you anoint your deepest sorrows with hope you're not a hypocrite
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Your sorrows really are sorrows But their sorrows sown in hope You're not a hypocrite your joys really are joys, but you're not lording it over others
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You're humble and realize the one who gives is the one who takes blessed be his name And by the way, even in your darkest hour
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Or the season of great struggle in your life when your eyes are fixed on the Lord your face will be radiant Because the
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Lord's presence can be found even in the darkest valley even in the pit God's presence can be found.
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There's no place where the presence of God can't be found That's just something to amen this morning.
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Listen, wherever you are It's not a place that God's presence cannot be found Remember what we said a couple weeks ago from 2nd
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Corinthians 2 I'm thinking of Psalm 51 It's in the secret place that David found the
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Lord the place where his bones were crushed. He was worshiping a
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Lot of us in this room We're not privy to the dark places the dark passages the dark valleys going on in people's lives, but God is he's attentive to all
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So in light of that seek him turn your face toward him. It will be radiant as you do so Spurgeon wrote on this.
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I absolutely love how he says this he says Sometimes a day of affliction becomes a fast which is turned into a feast
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It comes when you grasp the promise that all things are working together for the good of those that love God it comes to those Who see a covenant
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God in all things? That's what turns a fast into a feast He says I remember how one who had long been afflicted and had gotten well
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Lamented that he had lost some of the brightness of the Lord's presence that he enjoyed when he was sick And he said to me.
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Oh Take me back to my sick bed again. Let me be ill again. I was well when
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I was ill and Now that I'm getting well or now that I'm getting I'm afraid that I am getting ill now that I am.
01:00:04
Well, we say that again. Take me back to my sick bed again Let me be ill again for I was well when
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I was ill I'm afraid that I'm getting ill now that I am. Well, he understood that there was something to be found in God's presence
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That's what the humiliation. That's what the fasting that's what the devotion. That's what the meekness That's what the that's what the heart of one who's hungering and thirsting after righteousness will arrive at transformation
01:00:34
One last point as we come to a close now Back in mark 2 the question is why do your disciples not fast
01:00:42
Jesus responds with a counter question Can the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them?
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And then as he says there is a time the bridegroom will be taken away. They'll fast in those days So we see held together a reason not to fast and a reason to fast
01:00:56
The reason not to fast is the presence of the bridegroom The joy of the feast the reason too fast is the absence of the bridegroom the waiting for his appearing a
01:01:08
Wedding reception, of course in this time was not a line of handshakes. It wasn't cold salmon It wasn't
01:01:13
Kenny Carlson doing the electric slide All the things we hope to see in five days This was a week -long
01:01:22
Celebration it was probably one of the greatest events in The the yearly life of a local village
01:01:29
I don't think there would be any joy or celebration that could top it locally Only when you get to Jerusalem for the big holy days could that maybe compete?
01:01:37
But in the communal life of a village a week of crockpots and dancing and feasting and joy
01:01:43
That's what a wedding meant. That's what the presence of the bridegroom meant To show up that in that with sackcloth and ashes would be not just absurd.
01:01:53
It would be downright offensive And so Jesus is drawing on this very picture to I to identify himself.
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I'm the bridegroom you've been waiting for I'm the one who's come to wed my my distant people
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I'm the one greater than Hosea who's come to marry and bring into my own flesh an adulterous wife
01:02:14
And to the disciples of John this is a very different direction this is not the ministry of John This is not camel -skinned locust eating call for repentance
01:02:27
This is a joyous call so with without the
01:02:34
Lord's nearness We fast When the bridegroom is taken away he says then they'll fast
01:02:41
Without the Lord's nearness we we fast with the Lord's nearness we feast
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When you feel he's distant When you've been going down a wrong way, you're no longer listening to his voice.
01:02:57
It's time to humble yourself. He's distant. It's time to fast When you find his presence
01:03:05
When you're restored to the joy of his salvation, it is time to feast. He is near to you again as Christians we hold these two things together
01:03:15
The Samuel Miller who probably wrote the greatest book on fasting in our reformed tradition 19th century book tremendous book
01:03:23
He used two words to describe a Christian's fast a fast that could only be possible in light of the gospel and he says for a
01:03:30
Christian fasting is evangelical humiliation well -chosen words
01:03:39
For a Christian in light of the gospel fasting is evangelical humiliation It's not humiliation without the gospel but it's also not the gospel without humiliation a
01:03:51
Christian holds both of these things together a Christian knows how to fast and feast As reading a book right now with Peter and one of the points was made in the last chapter.
01:04:02
We read from Ecclesiastes Only those who truly weep are able to truly laugh and I think another way of saying appearance
01:04:16
With substance is this Only those who truly fast are able to truly feast
01:04:27
Maybe you're not feasting on the joys of Christ because you have not been fasting Christian Maybe you are not in the stratosphere of what it's like to commune with the bridegroom where there is inexpressible joy full of glory
01:04:41
Because you've never brought yourself to the depths of self -abasement Fasting is a means of doing that.
01:04:47
It's not the only means but it is a means And so when we fast again, not if but when we fast we do so seeking
01:04:56
God's direction We do so imploring the presence of our bridegroom to be near that we may feast again
01:05:01
We ask for him to comfort us even when we're wayward and in a dark place. We do so with evangelical
01:05:08
Humiliation as Samuel Miller says we deny and humble ourselves To repent and to apply a new that atoning blood by which alone guilt is washed away
01:05:16
To invite the Holy Spirit of promise who alone can destroy the reign of corruption and heal all of our backslidings in short
01:05:25
We display and we confess and we live blessed are those that mourn for they shall be comforted Let's pray father.
01:05:37
Thank you for your word Lord. Help us in these things Lord that as believers here in this room
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Lord, we we would truly know the depths of fasting that we might know the heights of feasting that we would recognize how you
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Displayed yourself as a bridegroom who is always to be met with joy And Lord, we're not meeting you with joy when your voice is not
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Present and ruling in our lives when our flesh is beginning to reign and have control over our members
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Lord. Maybe that Be the turn the call to repent to humble ourselves
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To discipline our bodies into submission that our souls may follow suit Help us
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Lord as your people to discipline ourselves for godliness Help us to be mature in these things Lord as I've shared
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I've been so immature about these things falling right into the traps of John's disciples or of the
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Pharisees falling into the traps of manufactured zeal
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Lord Those in this room that have a heart for you. They don't want to appear they want to have the substance
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They don't want to be nothing but leaves Lord. They want to be fruit -bearing trees Help us then to abide in the vine.
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Give us a measure of your own spirit Lord That may we as a church know what it means to truly fast and to truly feast
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To not do it as something that's just set in our spring and in our fall as it's been for a number of years to Not be some hollow empty ritual like Jonathan Edwards was pointing out
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But to be the very means of awakening as it was in 1734 Help us
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Lord for we cannot do these things apart from you. We pray for your grace and for your power We pray for those in our midst
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Lord who are strangers to that grace Those Lord who have not repented not turned around who don't know what nearness is because they can't recognize how distant they are
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May you show them the depth of their sin give them the grace of repentance and faith
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Bring them to yourself that they might know the joy that ought to characterize all of our lives We ask for all these things in Jesus name.