The Power of Fasting

The examples in scripture show that fasting almost never takes place on its own.

Not only do God’s people fast as a disciplined expression of mourning, but we watch godly men and women fast in order to pray, or they fast and engage with scripture, or fast to establish justice, or to worship.

Perhaps the most extraordinary example of fasting and prayer in all scripture is the double forty day fast Moses undertook in order to intercede for God’s people after their extreme disobedience in making and worshipping the golden calf (Deuteronomy 9:7-29).

Just as Moses was receiving the Old Covenant law from God himself on Mount Sinai, the people were in the valley making a golden calf and worshipping it. Moses fasts for forty days before receiving the law, and then for another forty days to intercede for the people’s idolatry to be forgiven.

God forgave them.

Similarly, Esther and her maids fasted for three days when the Jews faced annihilation at the hands of Haman.

The annihilation was subverted.

And when King Jehoshaphat of Judah heard that a great army was coming against him from Edom (current day Jordan), he proclaimed a national fast. They prayed and the Lord intervened powerfully and delivered his people without any of them having to lift a sword!

Stories from more recent times

John Wesley called the people of England to a day of national fasting and prayer on Friday 6th February 1756 when the country faced invasion by Napoleon’s army. Wesley recorded in his journal that, ‘the fast day was a glorious day, such as London has scarce seen since the restoration’.

The invasion did not take place.

More recently, in World War 2, on 23rd May 1940, King George 6th requested that the following Sunday be a day of national prayer for the British forces to be saved from surrender and capture in France. Then followed ‘the miracle of Dunkirk’ (a phrase encouraged by Churchill himself), and Sunday 9th June was declared a National Day of Thanksgiving.

There is a time and place for all God’s people to join together in fasting and prayer.