Fasting for the Reward of the Father — John Piper

Jesus’ Teaching on Fasting in Matthew 6

The text of the morning begins at verse 16 of Matthew 6. If you didn't bring your own Bible, please reach for the one in the pew rack, and you can turn to page 1147, and follow along as I read verses 16 through 18 of Matthew chapter 6.

And whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance in order to be seen fasting by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you may not be seen fasting by men, but by your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will repay you.

Carl Lundquist and the Recovery of Spiritual Disciplines

Carl Lundquist was the president of Bethel College and Seminary for almost 30 years. He died about four years ago of complications with a terrible skin cancer, some of you remember. In the latter years of his life, he devoted a lot of energy to promoting and studying the devotional life and the life of the disciplines of the Christian walk.

He began a little organization called the Evangelical Order of the Burning Heart, based on that passage in Luke 24, where they said, did not our hearts burn within us when we heard the word open to us?

And he began to discover things that he had not practiced much of his life, and he, to his great credit, built them into his life in those latter years and taught them and wrote articles in Our Standard about them.

In issue number 16 of the letter called the Burning Heart letter that he was sending out month after month, and I was getting them and benefiting from them as God was teaching him, because I had a great admiration for Carl Lundquist.

A Forty-Day Fast and Desire for God’s Work

He wrote about his first beginnings of taking fasting seriously. Let me read you a couple of paragraphs, so you'll hear how one man probably, well, it was 1980, I can't remember what age Carl Lundquist would have been in 1980, but you listen.

My own serious consideration of fasting as a spiritual discipline began as a result of a visit with Dr. Joon Gong Kim in Seoul, Korea. Is it true, I asked him, that you spent 40 days in fasting prior to the evangelism crusade in 1980?

Yes, he responded, it is true. Dr. Kim was chairman of the crusade, expected to bring a million people to Yoedo Plaza, but six months before the meeting, police informed him they were revoking their permission for the crusade.

Korea at that time was in political turmoil and Seoul was under martial law. The officers decided they could not take the risk of having so many people together in one place, so Dr. Kim and some associates went to a prayer mountain and there spent 40 days before the Lord in fasting and prayer for the crusade.

Then they returned and made their way to the police station. Oh, said the officer when he saw Dr. Kim, we have changed our mind and you may have your meeting. As I went back to the hotel, I reflected that I had never fasted like that.

Perhaps I have never desired a work of God with the same intensity. His body is marked by many 40-day fasts during his long spiritual leadership of God's work in Asia. Also, however, I haven't seen the miracles Dr. Kim has.

Fasting as a Discipline for Seeking God’s Guidance

And then he told later on in the letter about a burning heart retreat that he and Nancy would lead periodically and at one of them he noticed a seminary senior not eating lunch and he asked him if he was okay and was able to draw out of him with some coercion that he was just drawing to the end of a total 21-day fast for the discerning of God's leading in his life as a seminary graduate.

And Dr. Lundquist said that in his later years on the basis of experiences like these he began to build into his life a regular fast of a weekly nature and he described it like this. Instead of taking one hour for lunch, I used the time to go to a prayer, this is one day a week, to go to a prayer room, usually the flame room in nearby Bethel Theological Seminary and there I spend my lunch break in fellowship with God and in prayer and I have learned a very personal dimension to what Jesus declared, I have had meat to eat ye know not of.

Now that's very similar to what I'm calling the fasting 40 to do one day a week, every week for one month all the cards disappeared last week, you all know who you are, others are joining with you, two meals, a breakfast and a lunch, so a fast for a 24-hour period for the kinds of things mentioned on the prayer card or the fasting 40 card and anything else for awakening and for the extension of the kingdom that God brings you to your mind.

Jesus Assumes His People Will Fast

One of the texts that moved Dr. Lundquist was Matthew 16 to 18 and the verse that arrested him and convicted him, it's one thing to base your life on people's experience, that's not a very reliable basis, it's another thing to base it on the word of God and what he saw are the words and whenever you fast and like so many of us including most of the books you'll read on fasting, he noticed it did not say if you fast, Jesus didn't say if you fast do it like this, he said when you fast or whenever you fast and Dr. Lundquist and I and many commentators conclude Jesus is not teaching us to fast, he's assuming we're fasting and he's teaching us how not to do it and how to do it, it's what Matthew 9 15 said, when the bridegroom is taken away then they will fast, so you don't find a command to fast in the New Testament, you find an assumption of fasting in the New Testament, when the bridegroom is taken away they will fast or Matthew 6 16, when you fast do it like this not like that, Jesus is teaching how to do it and how not to do it, not whether to do it, if fasting is going to be built into our lives as people and as a church for the rest of our lives then we need to know how not to do it and how to do it, what are the perils of fasting?

The Spiritual Dangers of Fasting

I'm going to have John Bloom copy this sheet, this is notes from a physician that we were given down in Orlando at the beginning of December, a doctor who has made a special study and focus during his life on fasting, gave this little talk and some of you have said to me if we are really serious about this and some of us make an attempt at a 21 day or a 40 day fast you better tell us how not to kill ourselves and that's what this paper is for, it gives the kinds of practical warnings and guidelines from a physician's medical physiological perspective and I encourage you to pick one up next week but more important than that, more important than that is the spiritual dangers of fasting, that's what Jesus is talking about in this text, the spiritual dangers of going about it the wrong way or having a wrong mindset about fasting, so that's what we want to look at for a few minutes, first he tells us what not to do and then he tells us what to do, verse 16 he says, don't be like the hypocrites, whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance in order to be seen fasting by men, so the mark of the hypocrites it seems is that they want to be seen fasting by other people and oh everybody in this room knows what that tastes like, it tastes so good, it's built right into the fabric of the fallen human heart that we want people to notice our accomplishments and tell us how good they are, it is better than all the food you could eat and that's why you can fast to get it, it's better than anything, people will just go to any lengths if they can get the applause of people, if they can get the commendation of a very significant person in their life, something in this fallen heart craves to be made much of by other people and Jesus knows that and therefore he talks a good deal about it in his gospels and especially right here in the last part of verse 16 he says here's the warning truly I say to you they have their reward in full.

In other words, if the praise of men, if the applause or the esteem or the commendation of other people is what you're after you'll get it and that's all you'll get. So the danger of fasting like this is that it works it succeeds so horribly.

That's the danger. If you want the reward of other people's recognizing your discipline and your devotion and your piety it will work it will succeed and that's all it will succeed at. It's just a devastating success.

God protect us from the success of fasting the way the hypocrites fast. So Jesus says you want that reward? You want the reward of people's praise? You'll get it, period. Success is a dangerous thing when you're aiming at the wrong thing.

Hypocrisy and the Desire for Human Applause

But now I ask myself this question why is that hypocrisy? They're fasting. They want to fast and they are letting the world know that they want to fast. They're being transparent and candid. It's the hypocrites who wash their hair and their face and walk around like they're not fasting.

When they really are fasting those are the hypocrites, right? Why not? Why is it hypocritical if you're fasting to let people know you're fasting. I mean, tell it like it is I'm fasting, folks that's not hypocrisy, is it?

But Jesus says these are hypocrites. Now, you see, you've got to scratch your head and just go a little deeper here. It's not very deep to figure out what's going on here. What's wrong? Why are these people hypocrites when in fact they look like what they're doing.

They're not covering it up. The problem is this. Here's why they're hypocrites. Fasting means hunger for God not hunger for people's applause. That's the meaning of fasting. Therefore, if you put forward a fasting demeanor it means to the world I want God.

And if that's not what you want you're a hypocrite. And that isn't what they wanted. They put forward a fasting demeanor which says in the religious parlance of Judaism and ought to say in Christianity here's a person who's hungry for God and what they were hungry for was man and his applause and his approval.

And that's why they were hypocrites. It was a lie. They were saying something with their fasting which they did not feel in their heart. If they wanted to be really free from hypocrisy you know what they'd have to do as they left their face all gloomy and walked around fasting, fasting.

They'd have to put a big sign around their neck. And the sign would say the bottom line reward for my fasting is your approval. That's what they'd have to wear. And then they'd be openly and non-hypocritically vain.

But they did not wear that sign because they didn't want people to know that. The bottom line reward was applause. They didn't want people to know that they really did want people to think it was for God and it wasn't for God.

Nobody would applaud them if they wore that sign. So they had to be hypocrites in their motive. Now that's how not to do it. Here's how to do it. Let's go to verses 17 and 18. But you when you fast anoint your head wash your face so that you may not be seen fasting by men but by your father who is in secret.

And your father who sees in secret will repay you. Now there are all kinds of public fasting in the Bible. Public seeable fasting in the Bible including the New Testament Acts 13 a group fasting at Antioch.

Acts 14 they fasted before they appointed elders. Luke knew about it, he wrote about it. There's all kinds of public seeable fasting in the New Testament. Therefore I do not conclude from this teaching of Jesus that if someone notices that you're fasting somehow it's ruined.

It's benefit is ruined. That's not true. Somebody notices that you skip lunch at work and they say, are you sick? And you say no, no, I feel fine. Why didn't you eat? Well you could you could just say some general thing if you wanted to like um I didn't feel like eating today.

Or you could just say um I'm fasting today just seeking the Lord's fullness in my life. That doesn't contaminate your fast. If you say that there's a difference between being seen fasting and fasting to be seen.

Can you all handle that? Being seen fasting is an event out there. It's an event that happens has no moral significance necessarily. To fast to be seen is an inner motive of the heart and has tremendous moral significance.

There's a difference and what Jesus is saying is you're a hypocrite if you fast to be seen fasting. You're not a hypocrite. If when you're fasting somebody happens to see you fasting and know that you're fasting.

Fasting to Be Seen by God

It's the heart issue here that Jesus is talking about. It goes a little bit beyond this though he takes us further. He wants us not only not to try to be seen by men but to want to be seen by God. You see that?

It says. But you when you fast anoint your head wash your face so that you may. Here's the negative side not be seen fasting by men. And here comes a but but that you may be seen by your Father who is in secret.

So it's not wrong to want to be seen by God. In fact fasting means God see my hunger. For you see me behold me let your countenance shine upon me in my fasting. You want to be seen by God. That's the whole point of fasting.

So what Jesus is doing here I think is giving a test to us as to the reality of God in our lives. And whether our lives are oriented on the living reality of God. Or whether our lives are just oriented on how we work with other people.

What effect what we do has on other people and what effect they is that where we live entirely just at this horizontal level of interrelationships. Or is God so real now. Test yourself right now. Is God so real that if he alone knows what's going on in here even if it's very uncomfortable painful thing that's all you need.

That's all you need God knows. And then you know if God's real to you. And the reason for this orientation on God that he's testing us for is that we're so easily deceived in good things. Let me try to explain preaching praying attending church Bible reading acts of kindness.

Religious Practices and the Loss of the Vertical Relationship with God

The tendency the human tendency in doing those wonderful things is that we begin to think not just that people might praise us for doing them. That's one thing but something more subtle namely we begin to think that the primary effectiveness of them is the effect they have on others who see us do them like I'm a father and I contemplate praying at the breakfast table or having devotions.

And I think to myself if I pray at the breakfast table and if I pray for devotions in the evening my sons will watch me pray. And in seeing me pray they might someday grow up to pray. That's dangerous because prayer is to God.

Prayer works like this. Here's my son here's my prayer and here's God prayer goes. And if my mindset begins to think I'll pray so that I'll do this that God can just fall out of the picture I'll have my devotions in my room.

And if my roommate sees me maybe my roommate will be convicted of his not reading the Bible and so on. So the danger is not just that we want the praise of others but even a more subtle more noble mistake namely God gradually vanishing out of the picture of the vertical dimension of life growing dimmer and hazier while this for God's sake we say and for religious reasons is still happening they'll see me pray.

They'll see me read my Bible. And they'll see me give my tithes. And in doing all of that they will be moved to pray. And they will be moved to give their tithes. And they will be moved to read their Bible.

And pretty soon what's the vertical dimension of my life? Is there any reality? Am I communing with the living God in my Bible reading? Am I giving for his sake? Does he enjoy seeing my giving? Don't misunderstand.

The Bible clearly teaches that all that we do in the sight of others has a good effect on them. When it's good it's not a bad thing for my sons to learn to pray by watching me pray. It's not a bad thing for the roommate to feel pricked in his conscience when his roommate reads the Bible and he doesn't.

What I'm pointing out is that we're we're spring loaded to be deceived and corrupted. And we need to be vigilant. Jesus is calling for a radical orientation on God in our fasting. And he tests us by saying comb your hair wash your face and don't even let anybody else know.

And then you will be tested to see whether you can carry this through with only God only God. Knowing when I have done things that Noel doesn't know about my boys don't know about you don't know about that are intended to be good things.

The temptation to want to slip your card out on the table so people know you did that. You know you made that visit or you made that hard call or you didn't eat that meal. The temptation to bring it up in a subsequent conversation is absolutely tremendous which shows how hungry I am for your approval.

So dangerous it is so dangerous. Whom are we hungry for folks. So he tests us and he wants a radical orientation on God. One last question. What's the promise. The reward. Is it the praise of men. You fast towards God.

The Father’s Reward and the Coming Kingdom

And when you're done with your fasting and your hair's all combed and your face is washed and the fast is over people then praise you wrong. Is it money. The very next verse says. Don't lay up for yourselves treasures on earth.

Doesn't matter whether God gave the money or the devil gave the money. Don't let your fasting be a fasting for for the accumulation of earthly riches. I think the reward is the Lord's prayer. Just a few verses earlier.

Hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done. That's what we want to happen if we fast and nobody's watching and we say oh God. What I long for is for your name to be glorified cherished loved by me and my family and my church.

What I long for is your kingdom to manifest itself now and bring itself to consummation in the world. What I long for is for your will to be done in my boys in my church in this city. And when I see people doing your will the way the angels do it in heaven with that much sleepless energy and joy and zeal I will be satisfied.

The Lord will give those kinds of things to us as we seek him without any care about the praise of men. So I invite you to press on this year. Don't want this to be a flash in the pan. You find your own pattern you fasting 40 you be the leaven for us in this church in February.

You know who you are right now. And I call you to be urgent and to pray your heart out for the rest of us and that we might know what it means to be free from this built in craving to be applauded by other people.

And may our relationship to the living God be so sweet so assured so deep so free so non-condemning so accepted that we just revel in him as the audience of one who knows what we're doing when we do it.

And it doesn't matter if anybody else knows in all the world. Get that real with God get that real with God. Oh Lord. I pray now as we close and as the prayer team stand here and as we we want to support one another in prayer and help each other get real with God and get over the obstacles that make us have an undue fear of you or a sense of distance from you.

Lord help us just bring people to the prayer teams now may we pray for one another that there might be an authenticity and a reality and a depth in our personal vertical union with you that gives us a peace when nobody knows our alms our prayers our fasting Lord.

Work this now. I pray and all the people said Amen.