a Prophetic Act.

If you have your Bibles, we're going to be back in Matthew 4, which we touched on a bit last week. We're going to be back there again today, so pull up your Bibles to Matthew chapter 4. And we are, don't get too excited, we are talking about fasting. One more week. If you haven't been here, you're probably thinking, wow, these people love fasting. But if you have, you know we've been talking about it for three weeks now.

Why is that? Well, there are different ways people interpret scripture, read the Bible. I know a lot of pastors in different cultures who preach the same message over and over again until everybody not only hears it, but does it. And I don't know if you know this, but our name New Culture is all about the culture of Christ, which means we're committed to practicing the ways of Jesus, not just being people who hear the word. It's rooted in Matthew 7:24, let us not just be hearers of the word but doers of the word, people who don't just read the text and say, what a nice passage of scripture, but who ask, Lord, what does it look like for us to live this out, to practice this? That's why we're talking about fasting for three weeks, because starting Wednesday, Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, we are inviting everyone to fast.

I'm going to read from Matthew chapter 4 once again as our anchoring text. Nathan taught on fasting last week, which was phenomenal, I do listen when I'm not here. I was taking notes as I listened to the podcast. We're going to read it again, because one of the things I love, even with Jesus, is that he taught in a lot of parables, but most of these parables weren't things Jesus came up with on the spot, they were stories people were already familiar with. The hope is, if I teach it in this setting again, maybe something will click. In the same way, you might see us from time to time reading scripture we've already taught on for a while. Why? Because I don't know that we've all mastered what Jesus is saying yet. So we're going to look again with fresh eyes and ask, Lord, what are you saying through this text, what are you inviting me to do when it comes to fasting and practicing your ways? Because the story we're reading today is that Jesus is fasting, Jesus is in the wilderness. If Jesus Christ himself needed seasons of fasting, seasons of going without, to hear God and see God clearly, then I need it too. Let's read Matthew chapter 4, starting in verse 1.

Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.

He did have hunger pains. He was human. Jesus was hungry.

The tempter came to him and said, if you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread. Jesus answered, it is written, man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God. Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. If you are the Son of God, he said, throw yourself down, for it is written: he will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. Jesus answered him, it is also written, do not put the Lord your God to the test. Again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. All this I will give you, he said, if you will bow down and worship me. Jesus said to him, away from me, Satan, for it is written, worship the Lord your God, serve him only. Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.

Matthew 4:1-11

And then, right after that, it moves into a section where Jesus begins to preach.

When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee. Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali, to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah.

Matthew 4:12-14

And it goes on to say that he calls his first disciples in verse 19: come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

Lord, we come before you again today, and we thank you for your word that is alive and active. We thank you, Lord, that even if we've heard these verses a million times, there is a fresh word you have for us today. I invite all of you right now to take a moment and say, God, I surrender to you, would you speak, Holy Spirit, I welcome you to speak, I give you permission to speak to me through your text today. So God, we do that, we welcome your Spirit in. We know that you're here, that you're present, that you're moving. Would you help us see you clearly, hear you clearly, transform us, so we walk out of this place more in love with you and looking more like you, Jesus. In your name we pray. Amen.

Lent: a season of formation

Following Jesus's example, we are entering a season of Lent, which maybe you grew up in a tradition where you celebrated this, or maybe this is completely new to you. Essentially, Lent is a season of surrender. It's a season of preparing all the way up to Easter, a season of formation. On our website, under resources, you'll find a Lent guide, but it's really a season of repentance, surrender, giving, preparation, and formation. This is an ancient practice, practiced all throughout church history. It's not a new thing. It's a time that starts with Ash Wednesday, a day to remember our fragility, that from dust we came and to dust we will return. For some of you this is a common practice, maybe you grew up going to get ashes on Ash Wednesday. Maybe this is new, but that's essentially what it is, going into this season as we draw near to the cross, remembering our humanity, and remembering that even in death Jesus is coming to bring life.

This season matters because, whether we realize it or not, we are constantly being formed. We talk about this a lot here, that our habits form us, the people around us form us, pain forms us, success forms us. So we want to be intentional, like Jesus, to step into those wilderness seasons, saying, God, I want to intentionally be formed by you.

Fasting wasn't just something Jesus did, it goes all the way back to Moses. In Genesis we see fasting. Esther called the nation to a fast for deliverance. In the book of Daniel, chapter 10, there was a twenty-one-day fast for revelation and strength to endure what Daniel was walking through. In Ezra chapter 8, there's a fast where the people needed protection as they continued their journey with God. In Nehemiah chapter 1, it starts with fasting as a way of grief and intercession for what was happening around him. So there are all sorts of reasons in the Bible that people fasted, as a way to hear from God and grow their heart for him, and compassion to move in the ways he was moving.

As we continue to think about why we fast, why we do these things, it's not to impress God, it's not like you're going to have more crowns or jewels when you get to heaven, but rather to make space for God. It's to make space to see what he's already doing, to grow our awareness of how we hear him, to grow the way we speak to him so he can hear our prayers, so we can grow our hearts and move into the compassion he's inviting us into.

Fasting amplifies our prayers

This is the reason we've created a Lent guide for prayer and fasting, and a scripture reading plan through the book of Isaiah, which we're going to be studying leading up to Easter. In Matthew chapter 4, and I do encourage you to go back the last couple of weeks on the podcast, since Nathan taught on this so well last week, we see that Jesus uses scripture to overcome the temptations of the enemy. He knew the word of God, and not just because he was born knowing it. He studied the word of God, studied the scriptures. If we want to be people who can overcome by the word of God, we have to know the word of God. So we are going to pray, because prayer aligns us with God, and we're going to fast, because fasting, as we see, amplifies our prayers and empties us. When we fast, we're emptying ourselves of everything else that's happening, saying, God, it's only you that I have my attention on. And scripture anchors us. So these are some of the reasons we're going to invite everyone today, not only to pray for forty days, but to fast and spend time in scripture, so that as a church we can be unified in our pursuit of becoming like Jesus.

I want to talk for a moment about how fasting amplifies our prayers. All throughout scripture, Old Testament through Acts, fasting and prayer go together. You can pray without fasting. You can also fast without praying, though I wouldn't recommend it, that's one of those things you just shouldn't do. But fasting helps us hear God, and it helps us be heard by God. In Acts chapter 13, it talks about the people in the church worshiping the Lord and fasting, and that's when the Lord starts to move. We see this over and over, that while people are fasting they start to hear God clearly and respond in significant ways. The same is true of us today. It shifts something deep inside of us. We no longer have the noise of anything else, we're no longer being sustained by anything else. We become more and more aware of our dependence on God every single day, even when we can't always see it or hear it.

So we're going to talk about a few things with fasting. One of the invitations we have for Lent as a church is that, if you're able, on Tuesdays from sunrise to sundown, you go without food. This is always one of the most challenging things, because going without food, you will feel hunger pains. It will shift the way you show up in your workplace or with your family, but it's not going to create pain, it's just going to make you aware of what's already there. It's not going to create anxiety, but it's going to make you aware of the things we may need to surrender to the Lord. If you're able physically, and we know there are a million reasons why maybe you can't, I want to challenge you to try fasting physically, because it's a way we can have a full, bodily experience of emptying ourselves to make room for the Lord. But fasting does not manipulate God. It's not that God isn't going to do this unless you fast, it's more about us, but we do it as an offering to the Lord, something that transforms us more into his likeness. This isn't some manipulation thing, God isn't mean, saying, well, I want you to go hungry before I'll move. But it helps us continue to be people who seek him, people who will sacrificially step into what Jesus did, quite literally emptying and giving his life for us on the cross, for us to have that bodily experience.

Fasting grows our compassion

We talked about this a couple of weeks ago in Isaiah 58.

Is not this the fast that I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice, to set the oppressed free, and to share your food with the hungry?

Isaiah 58:6-7

Because biblical fasting is never just personal, it's always communal and relational. It's a way we honor God. It's a way we are unified together. It's a way we can stand in the gap and stand with the poor. That's what I want to talk about next: fasting is a way we can grow in compassion for the heart of God, and for the people God sent Jesus to come and save, redeem, set free, and restore. When we fast, we don't just deny ourselves, we identify with others. We begin to feel something many people around our world, even in our own city, feel every single day.

When we talk about Jesus, one of the greatest things about his love is that he left heaven, the perfect place, to come down to earth as fully human and fully divine, in a human body where he experienced pain, where, as we read in Matthew 4, he was hungry, not because he had to, but because he loved us so much and wanted to, so that now, when we come before him, he knows all of our weakness, all of our pain. He felt the loneliness, the longings, all of that, and can relate to us in a perfect way. So when we fast and grow hungry, physically not eating, withdrawing in that way, it's not that you have to, but it's a way we can have empathy, understanding, and compassion for those going through this every single day. Fasting is more than just going without, it's also a form of intercession, a form of us standing in the gap. That's why, when we fast, we don't just want to go without food, we want to pray for the hungry to be fed, and give so that the hungry are fed. We want to partner with God in seeing heaven come down to earth. So as we fast this season, this is an invitation to stand between heaven and earth, to see, and even at our retreat we'll talk about abundance, saying, God, we believe that your abundance is coming through us, and we want it to flow through our hands, not be something we hang onto, but something we give so freely to the people around us. Part of that is continuing to empty ourselves as his vessels, so things can flow through us freely. It's about standing between injustice and mercy, and trusting God in the process.

Fasting is a prophetic act

I don't know if you all know this, but yesterday was Valentine's Day, a great holiday to celebrate. But there's also something else happening this month called Black History Month. Black History Month is this month, and what I love about some of the things we can learn about Black history, specifically in our country, and more specifically about the church leaders and people who came before us, is how many of them were known for prayer and fasting, for standing in the gap and prophetically leading, living into the reality of heaven, of freedom for all people, before they saw that freedom themselves. I think of people like Frederick Douglass, who did all this incredible work in American history, and who also, when you read about him, regularly prayed and fasted. I think of Harriet Tubman, who, yes, through the Underground Railroad was leading people step by step, but through prayer and prophetically walking toward a freedom she had yet to physically see, believing this is heaven coming down to earth, where all people are free. They prophetically put themselves in places that might be uncomfortable, continuing to live into that prophetic reality. They prayed like they were free. They worshiped like they were free. They resisted injustice like they were free. Their fasting was not an escape, it was resistance, and it was hope, continuing to empty themselves and say, God, here we are, a living sacrifice, until we see heaven come down to earth, and all people free, and all injustice gone, and mercy and grace and peace upon the world.

There are so many people throughout history, Old Testament to New, even in the history of our country, who walked prophetically in prayer and fasting, trusting this is a way we're going to hear God, that God is going to hear us, and we're going to be moved with compassion to walk in his ways. Fasting is not passive, it is incredibly prophetic. It is us believing that we are created in the image of God to bear his image, that although there is still so much pain and injustice, even as we celebrate Black History Month, we realize there is so much more work to be done, even in our own country, and so many other things happening around the world where people are being oppressed, where people are walking in slavery, we have the opportunity to fast and intercede and pray. You can only say something is a coincidence for so long, until you experience God intervening when his people come humbly before him and fast and pray.

In Esther chapter 4, Mordecai sends word to Esther, and Esther sends this reply back to him.

Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.

Esther 4:15-16

The story of Esther is about courage, about faith, about walking in this hidden providence, knowing there was more for the people in that moment. Prophetically she said, okay, before I start to move, before I put my life at risk, before I give up my body in this way, I am going to pray, and I'm going to call the people to fast. This was a communal thing. In this story she's risking her life to save people, risking her life to stand in the gap, when she could have just chosen comfort, could have chosen to step down, but instead she steps right into the middle of pain and brokenness and injustice, believing God's healing hand was going to move through her. So she calls for this fast before she goes, and we see that God works in a way where there's deliverance from destruction, and he saves the people from a genocide at that time. Now, again, we can ask, is this just coincidence? I believe something happens when people come and fast and pray, and come in unity, saying, God, here is our life, here is our body, we will empty ourselves so we can hear you, we will empty ourselves so you hear us clearly, with no noise surrounding us, because we believe fasting is a prophetic act, and your kingdom wants to come into these spaces. So we're calling on the name of Jesus to do that.

Fasting forms us to be compassionate people like Jesus. When we are willing to experience hunger and pain by choice, even for just a brief moment, we start to see people differently. We begin to love differently. We begin to care in a more honest, authentic, intentional way, because we are growing our muscle of not being self-sufficient, growing our muscle of not being in control, not just giving into every craving we have. We are growing our muscle to be sacrificial people. Fasting is forming us, far beyond just, I'm going to skip a meal, it is forming us into people of Jesus who know what it looks like to sacrifice. So when the moment comes, and moments will come, where we can stand in the gap and say, this is unjust, but our God of justice is coming through, and I'm willing to put my life at risk for this, my reputation at risk for this, we will be ready, because we're formed into sacrificial people who know what it looks like to go without, to fast, to pray, and to intercede prophetically. The goal of fasting is so much more than discipline, it's union with God, union with his heart, his purposes. It clears the space for us to step back and say, God, I want to hear your voice, I want to know your will, so I can step in and be like Jesus into these places.

An invitation for the next forty days

So here is the invitation for us at Lent: come into this not like it's another religious obligation, not like it's just another to-do list, but as an invitation for us to slow down, to repent, to say, God, will you show me any ways I am not living like you, that I am not looking like you? God, would you realign my heart with your heart, would you help me to see people like you see people, to not fear the dark things of this world and feel like I have to look away toward comfort, but to be someone who knows that I am a vessel that the power of the living God wants to flow through, so I can step into these spaces with power and authority, so I can stand in the gap for those who cannot stand on their own. It's about returning, about realigning ourselves with God, being formed into his likeness. This is not something that happens fast. This is our third or fourth season of fasting together as a church, and I know for some of you, you tried it and it was okay. That's the whole idea of practice, we are practicing the ways of Jesus. Sometimes you're going to show up to practice and nail it, that was awesome. Other times you're going to think, can someone please coach me here, somehow I missed it and I need a little more help. We are practicing, which means sometimes it's going to be incredible, and sometimes you're going to wonder what you just did. But trust that the Lord is perfecting you as you continue to show up. You don't have to be perfect, you just have to practice, and trust that he's perfecting you in that process. That's what the Lord does.

So, our so-what: fasting helps us to hear God, God to hear us, and aligns our hearts with his mission. And now what: follow Jesus into a season of fasting, prayer, and repentance. I'm going to invite the worship team up to get ready to close today, and I want to invite us all into, and challenge us with, a season of fasting and prayer. I don't have to list all the things going on in our country, in our world today. We know there are people who are going hungry. We know there is oppression. We know there are people living captive, in slavery. We know this is not how God intended us to live, but that his kingdom is coming. What I love about the story of Esther is that she had to make a conscious choice, similar to Harriet Tubman, and even Martin Luther King Jr., all these people who had to choose at some point whether to sit back and watch these things happen and say, God, deliver us, or to believe what Jesus said when he calls his disciples: follow me, I will make you fishers of men. Some of his last words to his disciples were, now you go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and surely I will be with you always.

Jesus was God's strategy for bringing salvation to the world. Then Jesus called people to follow him, to continue that process of seeing his kingdom come. He left with us his Holy Spirit, so we are not alone. He said, surely I am with you always. His Holy Spirit comes, and so we are now empowered to be the people who let that deliverance flow through us. We can be people who look at the things happening and just say, that's really hard, that's painful. Or we can be people who choose to say, God, I don't know why you are not bringing deliverance right now for this, or for that, I don't know why the healing isn't coming, so Holy Spirit, will you give me a strategy, will you give me a plan, will you give me endurance, will you give me strength, will you give me the boldness to keep going, one step at a time, trying to free and bring justice to as many people as I possibly can on this side of eternity, trying to be a person who willingly says, your kingdom will flow through us.

God delivers his people, but more times than not, he does it through his people. Esther was brave enough to say, okay, I'm calling you to fast, to pray, and to stand in the gap. Some of us might be put in situations where we're going before the king, and it's either going to cost us everything, or God is going to use this conversation to deliver us. But for many of us, our role might just be, I'm going to fast, and I'm going to pray, and I'm going to stand in the gap, believing this is prophetic. When I go without, and I'm saying, God, grow my heart for yours, for your people, for your justice, for your kingdom, that is what this season is about.

So here are some things I want to invite you into for the next forty days. You have cards here, and we're going to give you time to sit down and just pray and ask, God, how are you inviting me to participate this year, to pray and fast? Every week in our fasting guide there's a scripture reading plan, and it's a little different, running Wednesday to the following Tuesday, so if you're in a community group you can talk about it then. If you're not, you can just follow along on that cycle. Every week starting this Wednesday, we're going to have a theme we're leaning into together, scriptures to read, and a specific additional practice of withdrawing from something, in addition to fasting. Every single day, we're going to invite you to lean into the daily rhythms we practice at our church. In the morning, we pray and read scripture, so there's a reading plan set up. Midday, we invite you to pray and intercede for a specific area. And in the evening, we invite you to pray the examen, which includes daily repentance, sitting before the Lord long enough to say, God, would you show me anything in my life that doesn't look like you, and listening until he does, and then turning back to his heart. All of this is on our website too, along with our daily rhythms journals, but this is what we're inviting you into.

Weekly, we're inviting our entire church on Tuesdays, sunup to sundown, to go without food, and as you do, continue to lean into those rhythms, continue to pray with boldness for the things you're believing God for. And here's the additional thing: we have a fund on our website specifically for feeding our neighbors. Part of Lent is also a season of giving, so we don't want to just go without food, but to challenge you to use the money you would spend on a meal on Tuesday, and give it to this fund, so we can literally feed the poor in our community and those going without around the world. Imagine if everyone in this room did this for one week, two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, seven weeks, that's all of Lent, about seventy dollars if you did it every week.

So this is what we're inviting us into, saying, God, we are just one church here in this city, one church in this world, but what does it look like for us to be a church that comes together and says, yes, God, we believe you want your kingdom to come here in Madison, we believe you want your kingdom to come around this world, and there are still things happening you are not satisfied with, so we want to see that deliverance, we want to see that freedom, we want to see repentance in our city, repentance in our country, from religiosity, from worshiping false idols, and sometimes that false idol is the church and the religion we've created. We want to see Jesus, the purity of the gospel, we want to see Jesus lifted high above any other, so we're going to remove all other distractions, we are going to offer our bodies to God, we are going to grow in that likeness and holiness to Jesus for this season, and say, Lord, have your way in us.

So this is what I'm inviting you to join us in. Start somewhere. If this is completely new for you, just do it one week and see what happens. If you've done this before, do all seven. And with this card, I want to explain what it is, because we want to join in prayer together. I'm going to step aside and give us time to pray, and then invite you to come and lay the cards here at this table as you're ready. You don't have to put your name on it, but we do want to put these somewhere we can all be praying together during Lent. If it's something private and personal, you can also write don't share, and we won't share it, or just make it vague if you're okay with other people praying into it. But we want to join each other in prayer. If you need healing in your body, if you have a family member who's sick, if there's something happening around the world that God has clearly given you a heart for, we want to join in prayer as a church. So we're going to invite you to write what you're believing God for as we pray and fast, and your commitment to pray for someone else's. You don't have to put your name there either, that stays private too, but I want to invite you to ask the Holy Spirit how to participate in this season, what it looks like for you to fast and pray like Jesus.

Holy Spirit, we thank you for your presence here. God, I thank you for the example of Jesus, who stepped into that wilderness season, fully human, fully divine, but felt the hunger pains and overcame. He went through this season of withdrawal to draw closer to you. So God, as we lean into this Lent season, whether it's our first time or we've done it many times before, we pray, would you challenge us, would you give us the boldness to step in and stand in the gap for those who cannot stand for themselves. Holy Spirit, would you challenge our hearts right now, show us the things you want us to pray for and believe you for. God, would you help us be bold in asking for miraculous things, because we have seen you deliver people, deliver nations, heal nations, and we believe you are still that same God, wanting to do it again. Holy Spirit, we welcome you in this place. Thank you, Jesus.

I'm going to give you a few minutes now to fill these out, and whenever you're ready, come and lay them at the front.