Why Fasting Unlocks Breakthrough: The Biblical Power of Humbling Yourself

So if you go into any situation and say, well, God absolutely owes me this because of this, this, and I deserve it. I've merited it. That's where the spiritual problem comes in. Welcome to the Bennett Broadcast. I'm Matt Bennett. Thanks for joining me as we explore what it means to seek the Lord wholeheartedly, to grow strong in faith, and to be fully devoted to God in today's world. When we do, he will pour out his spirit and bring revival like never before. If I told you there was something you could do to radically change your life and change the power of your standing with God and what you see happen in your spiritual life, I imagine that you would be interested in doing it. I certainly have been. And that's the subject of fasting and the practice of fasting. It can really change your life. This is Matt Bennett. And by the grace of God, I've done a lot of fasting over the decades, longer fast, short fast, and the power is very noticeable and very different. It's part of the Christian life. And understanding and practicing it can make enormous change in your life. I've studied all the passages in the Bible on it, studied the practice in Christian history. And it's extraordinary. And what we're looking at, we have a fast that's coming up in August. It's June now, but it's coming up. And I want to give a few words on how important it is and how you will benefit in extraordinary ways. If you fast, if you fast a little bit, maybe pushing yourself and fasting a little bit more in terms of length or strength of the fast. So we'll have some examples and teaching from the scriptures on it. And I think you'll be blessed and changed because of it. Now, fasting, first of all, we'll look briefly at what it is and why we do it, and then we'll go even more into what it is so that we can get our hearts and minds around it in case the Lord would have you participate. And so in terms of what it is, it's going without food for a period of time for spiritual purposes, and especially the purpose of self-humbling. And Deuteronomy 8, 2 to 3 says this. It says, And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these 40 years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you. and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. So it says here that he humbled you and let you hunger for this purpose. It does humble. When we don't have food, it increases our dependency before the of our dependence on him, on everything. It makes our prayers more urgent and impudent and powerful and our acknowledgement of our need before him. And this is very, very powerful. And this is why we do it. So that's briefly what it is. But why we do it is because it is the best tool to humble yourself. So many times in the Bible, the Lord says, humble yourself, humble yourself, humble yourself. He never, there's no example of us praying to God and say, Lord, humble me. And we'll do that sometimes, but we're trying to tell God to do the things that he told us to do. He tells us, commands us many times to humble ourself. And this is the primary way, not the only way, but a primary way in which we humble ourself. Now, of course, if you go into it with a hard heart and no desire to be responsive to the Lord, then you can be like a Pharisee and it has no benefit. So it's important that you know why you're going into it and ask the Lord to tell him you're going into it so that you can humble yourself before him. And when we're humble before the Lord in an increased way, then we get grace, we get benefits, we get open doors. It says in James 4, 6-10, Well, I won't read that long of it, but I'll read part of it. It says, but God gives more grace. Therefore, it says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. So we get great grace when we come to faith in Christ, but there are ways in which we can get more grace, more favor from God. And this is called conditional grace. This is in addition to unconditional grace. And when we fast or we humble ourselves, this is a way we can get more favor or blessing and we can please the Lord all the more. The scriptures tell us to find out and figure out what it means to please the Lord. And this is a way in which we please him. So right on a couple more verses later, it says, draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. So that is a promise from the scriptures. We see the same thing in first Peter, the same call and encouragement, command to humble ourselves so that we will be humbled and then we will get favor and blessing from God. Another passage that shows how much God loves to be with the humble is Isaiah 57, 15. It says, For thus says the one who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite. So when we have a lowly spirit, a humble spirit, We're dependent on him, more acknowledging our need for him in all matters. He loves to come in and intervene. He loves to lift us up and give us strength because we're acknowledging what's true about the spiritual realm. So that's what it does. It helps humble us. And then as we're humbled, great things happen. We usually get more revelation from God and direction and what he would have us do, more ability to overcome and persevere. We get breakthroughs and things we've been really wanting and longing for in our hearts. And you see these examples all throughout the Bible. Here's an example from the book of Acts 13 It says, while they're worshiping the Lord and fasting The Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them And then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off So they're in a context coming together, wanting to know what they should do next For the purpose and expansion of the church And so they are fasting and the Lord spoke to them and they're able to take action So We see example in Matthew 17, 20. You may remember this where there's, Jesus says, because of your little faith, there's having some spiritual trouble. For truly I say to you, if you have the faith of a grain of a mustard seed and go and say, move from here, it will move. But, um, nothing will be impossible for you. And this is, they're having difficulty ejecting from demons. But it says this kind comes out, this kind comes out through prayer and fasting. So if you're looking to minister and exercise and do deliverance ministry, then you get more power when you are fasting. And a great example from the Old Testament, and this makes it very broad. This shows that in all sorts of situations, when we fast and humble ourselves, the Lord takes notice and brings power and breakthrough that otherwise we may not have. So when Jehoshaphat is facing an enemy in 2 Chronicles 20, he is scared and he knows that if they draw close to the Lord, the Lord will protect them. So it says... In chapter 20, Jehoshaphat was afraid and set his face to seek the Lord and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. And Judah assembled to seek help from the Lord. And he said, don't be afraid of all these people coming against you. The battle is God's, not yours. and stand firm, hold your position, and see the salvation on your behalf. And that's exactly what happened. A national fast led to God's dramatic intervention in history. In this case, Judah not even having to fight. This happens all over in the Old Testament. You see all these examples. You've got Nehemiah fasting 120 days so that he'd have the faith to get resources to go and rebuild the wall. You have Ezra fasting. There is Esther and Mordecai calling a fast, not just in Susa, but for all Jews throughout Persia when they're being threatened with sin. death because trouble and conflict that was happening in Persia at the time. So again and again in the Bible, this is what's going on. The people are in need. They need God. They need God. For God to come and the level of power they want, they need to really humble themselves. And sometimes that means how you conduct yourself in terms of people put on sackcloth or sometimes get on their face before the Lord. Fasting isn't the only thing, but fasting does humble a person. And then the Lord notices and comes and brings deliverance that otherwise may not have been there. So I've seen this happen in my own life. I remember the first long fast I did, 40 days, was back in the 90s, and it was at the inspiration of Bill Bright, head of Campus Crusade for Christ, now Crew. He's gone on to be with the Lord, but he wrote a book, and many people were encouraged to fast for long people. period of time. And I saw a great breakthrough. I was ministering on a college campus and I did a 40-day fast. And then I sensed from the Lord, he'd had me do another one in just a few months, which I did again. And then it began a radical increase in power and breakthrough and salvations on campus. A lot of students fasted as well for longer periods of time. And I You need to take into mind some health concerns and issues. If there are health concerns or even eating disorders, you'd probably want to see a doctor or talk about that. Most people, it's not an issue, but in case it is, you want to be mindful of your health. But you can fast for longer periods of time. The early church, they fasted every Wednesday and Friday for hundreds of years up until about dinnertime. And in many parts of the world, they do that. That's my regular practice here. And I live in New York City. And the U.S. is not common, but it helps in the spiritual life. Fasting doesn't take care of everything. It's just part of the spiritual weapons we have to be strong in the Lord. And if you find your walk with the Lord is lacking, you don't have the strength that you wish to resist temptation or the power, you don't sense the Lord's presence. One of the things that could be missing is a pattern of fasting in your life. But he also causes to longer fast for special situations when we're in tremendous need. I think of some of the revivals that have been happening around the world and amazing breakthroughs are happening. And some of the countries or people, Christians leading, have a powerful life of fasting. It's very rare to see breakthroughs without it. And even as you consider America's revival history, Without the leaders and a large number of people fasting sometimes for longer periods of time, you just don't get the breakthrough that we want. And we need the power of God. We need His holiness to go throughout society. We need a radical increase in salvations. We need lives to radically change. So let's look at it again, what it is. Psalm 35, 13, the psalmist says, I afflicted myself with fasting. It's another way of saying, I humbled myself with fasting. And I mentioned a minute ago, Ezra, when Ezra was leading a group of people from Babylonian captivity back to the land and Judah, Judah. He says that he proclaimed a fast there so that they would have a safe journey. Of course, this would be a dangerous trip over hundreds of miles. And so he proclaimed a fast and it says the Lord answered their fast. He gave them supernatural protection and he blessed them. And all throughout the scriptures, this is the case. Now, today, you don't see people fasting as much, and especially in the West. You do in the international church, but not in the West, because there's some misunderstandings. Some thinks it's legalism to fast. It is not legalism. Legalism is when you think you can merit salvation. And this isn't that. We're talking among believers who already have salvation and not trying to merit in any way. We could never merit anything before God. However, we can meet conditions that please him and he responds. And that's conditional grace. So if you go into any situation and say, well, God absolutely owes me this because of this, this, and I deserve it. I've merited it. That's where the spiritual problem comes in. Yeah. But if he says and promises you, I'll do this, if you do this, well, that's not meriting, that's not legalism, that's believing his promise. And just as he says, if you repent and believe, then you'll become a Christian, you believe his promise and you act on it. Same thing with fasting. He says he'll draw close to you. He says he'll bless you with that increased humbling and bring more of his presence. That's believing as promised. So it's not legalism. It's part of the Christian life. And if you want to be at your maximum, fasting is part of that. Another distinction is... which is needed, is that it's not the same as a privation. Now today, now this is a little confusing, but it's worth understanding, is that the word fasting in English comes from the Anglo-Saxon word family, and it means to refrain. But biblical fasting is different. Biblical fasting, both the Greek word and the Hebrew word means to be hungry. So you have to be going without food to do a true biblical fast. But because the word fasting in English has the connotation of just a refrain, people will say things like, well, I'm going to fast from Facebook or something like that. Now, maybe you need to fast with Facebook and probably be good for your spiritual health, but it's not biblical fasting. That's more accurately called a privation. And there are privations in the Bible. It's when you give up things you could normally have for the sake of spiritual purposes. And privations have spiritual power, and they are helpful, but it's still not the same as fasting. And sometimes today people will do what they call a Daniel fast. That's really not a fast either. What you're doing in a Daniel, so-called Daniel fast, is that you're giving up certain foods and limiting to certain foods. And that is a type of privation, and there is spiritual power there, but it's not a fast. And in Daniel 1 and Daniel 10, the places where people point and say, okay, this is the Daniel fast. In those contexts, he's eating vegetables mostly, but it doesn't use the word fast in those contexts. In other contexts, in Daniel, he uses the word fast because they are going without food. But privations can be spiritually helpful. So if the Lord would have you give up something for a period of time, you see this also in the New Testament. In 1 Corinthians 7, husbands and wives are encouraged to not be together for a little while. For the purpose of prayer, it says, a privation of something that's normally allowed can strengthen your spiritual life. But the difficulty is that what we call privations, fasting. then a lot of times we never get around to actually fasting, and we really need to. It's a very powerful, almost type of privation, and that means we have to go without food. So as you consider fasting, I encourage you to go beyond the privation and do an actual fast where you have periods without food. So it looks different in different contexts. You can do a water-only fast. You can do a liquid-only fast. You can have one meal a day, maybe just have dinner each day. There are different types. A lot of times when I fast, longer period of times, people ask and say, well, okay, what kind are you doing? And I seek the Lord. It depends. If it's short or fast, I might do water only. If it's a longer fast, I might do one meal a day or liquids only. And in liquids only, you can do just clear liquids or you can do liquids that aren't clear. I'll never go and do like a shake. I think it's too filling. I think that kind of crosses over to a... considering food, I think, but maybe a fruit juice or milk or something like that in a liquid fast. And it's very powerful. It doesn't have to be water only for it to be a very powerful, very meaningful fast. A lot of the longer fasts in the Old Testament, scholars believe that there was one meal a day. And the long fasts that say the Nehemiah did in Nehemiah chapter 1, where he went 120 days was probably one meal per day. So it's very powerful, very helpful to do that. And as people have been recognizing too these days, has a lot of health benefits too. And that's not why we're doing it, but it doesn't mean that you can't and won't be benefiting from it. So it's very powerful that way. Now, a problem in the West is we've been not fasting at all and even sort of dumbing down the fast that we do do. Like the Lenten fast, for instance, These days, leading up to Easter, people will eat selective foods, but they won't limit the number of meals. Back when it started 2,000 years ago, the Lenten fast, they could only have one meal a day. But now people have two or three meals a day, and all they'll do is have selective eating. They also, with that one meal a day, had selective eating of only certain vegetables and not this or that. But... They also went without food and only had one meal a day. But that changed maybe 100 years ago. And so now today, we don't even know. We call it a fast. And today, it's not really a fast if you're having two or three meals a day. So if you do the Lenten fast in the future, let it be a true one, or at maximum, you only have one meal a day. And if within that, that also means limiting the types of food, that's great too. That adds to the power of the fast in many ways. So may the Lord give us grace that way. Now, there are a number of books that can really help with this. Derek Prince has written a few books. I encourage you to look up his. John Piper's written, Hunger for God. If you're more on the Pentecostal side, there's Jenison Franklin's book, Fasting. There's a lot of good books out there. And by the grace of God, if we study them and learn it in practice, you will get breakthroughs. And absolutely, in my ministry, in many ways, situations were dire and difficult. And as we fasted and sought the Lord, the Lord answered in really dramatic and powerful ways. I've been blessed to see what I believe part of two revivals in my ministry over the years. And both of them were fueled by, in many ways, begun with long fasts. And not just me, but a bunch of my leaders around me. And we saw a lot of life change because of that. So if we want to see God change your community or change your family or change your nation, a longer fast has to be part of it. It just is. So if it's new for you, then do what you can. Go a couple of days, three days, five days, and do one meal per day. If going without food or doing liquid only is too much, that's all right. Just push yourself more than maybe what you've done in the past. and the lord will reward the lord will bless you and now this august in a couple of months uh christian union the ministry i'm with we do two fasts a year where we recruit people from across the country last january we had about seven to ten thousand people i forget how many from across the country i think we did a 14 day fast and this august maybe we'll do a 21 day sometimes i'll go further and one in august i did 40 days And maybe you will as well. So look for some notifications for that. We're going to start signing people up here. This is so that the nation will return to the Lord, so that we'll have blessings in our own cities and communities, that we'll have breakthroughs in our families, that we'll personally be strengthened, and our love and devotion for the Lord. This is why we want to fast. And it pleases God. He wants His people to be humble. And this is an important tool. This is an obedience to his command when he says, humble yourself. He wants us to do that. He doesn't want us just to tell him to do what's our job. And he wants us to be strong in him. So may it be a great, great blessing to you. So the Lord bless you. And I'm going to say a prayer here. So, Father, we thank you. Lord, we love you and worship and honor you. Lord, you are the great God, the blessed God. Father, may every person hearing this brief teaching on fasting be encouraged, be changed, be full of life, and have the strength to fast longer than they've done before and up to a long period of time so that Christ is glorified. We thank you, Lord. Bring healing to this nation. Bring revival to this nation. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you. God bless. Thank you for joining me for this episode of the Bennett Broadcast. To learn more and find additional resources to help you grow in your walk with God, visit BennettBroadcast.com. To accelerate this movement of helping America return to God, visit ChristianUnion.org slash Cornerstone. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. And I hope you'll join me again as we seek the Lord together for our lives, for our communities, and for the future of the nation.