A Hunger for God: Desiring God Through Fasting and Prayer

As we look out at the church today, there is so much that encourages us and fills us with gratitude. There is renewed zeal among God’s people for the spread of God’s glory across the earth. Like never before we hear brothers and sisters in different circles and different streams of contemporary Christianity talking about the gospel and mission, about transforming cities and reaching unreached people groups. These conversations are essential, and we hope they will continue with even greater intensity and intentionality in the days ahead.

But sometimes what we are not hearing can be as illuminating as what we do hear. It reminds us of an exchange in an old Sherlock Holmes mystery, where Holmes refers to “the curious incident of the dog in the night-time” during a robbery. A fellow detective, confused at Holmes’s comment, responds that “the dog did nothing in the nighttime” — to which Holmes responds: “That was the curious incident.” Despite the proliferation of Christian publishing and Christian conferences, J. I. Packer’s observation of our own curious incident still rings true:

When Christians meet, they talk to each other about their Christian work and Christian interests, their Christian acquaintances, the state of the churches, and the problems of theology — but rarely of their daily experience of God.

Modern Christian books and magazines contain much about Christian doctrine, Christian standards, problems of Christian conduct, techniques of Christian service — but little about the inner realities of fellowship with God.

Our sermons contain much sound doctrine — but little relating to the converse between the soul and the Saviour.

We do not spend much time, alone or together, in dwelling on the wonder of the fact that God and sinners have communion at all; no, we just take that for granted, and give our minds to other matters.

Thus we make it plain that communion with God is a small thing to us.

Think about it. Where are the passionate conversations today about communing with God through fasting and prayer? We seem to find it easier to talk much of plans and principles for proclaiming the gospel and planting churches, and to talk little of the power of God that is necessary for this gospel to be proclaimed and the church to be planted.

If we really want to be a part of seeing disciples made and churches multiplied throughout North America and to the ends of the earth, we would be wise to begin on our knees.

It is for this reason that we gladly commend the new edition of John Piper’s Hunger for God: Desiring God through Fasting and Prayer. If you have read or heard anything from Piper, you know that he is rightly and biblically passionate about the spread of God’s glory. But at the same time, he is acutely and biblically aware of our need for God’s grace. He knows that apart from dependence on and desperation for God, we will not only miss the ultimate point of our mission, but we will also neglect the ultimate need of our souls.

We were made to feast on God. In the words of the psalmist, we were created to cry:

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you;
my flesh faints for you,
as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.
So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
beholding your power and glory.
Because your steadfast love is better than life,
my lips will praise you.
So I will bless you as long as I live;
in your name I will lift up my hands.
My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food. (Psalm 63:1–5)

We have read the sad statistics about the number of young people who turn away from the church once they are out of their parents’ home. We have heard people explain that they have “tried God” when they were young but that it didn’t work for them. But we have to wonder: did they “earnestly” seek him with their whole hearts? Did they cry out to him in fasting and prayer? Sometimes we “earnestly seek” after things from God rather than God himself. It is hard for us to imagine anyone leaving the presence of the living God — the maker and sustainer of heaven and earth — and looking for something better!

There is spiritual delight to be found in God that far supersedes the physical diet of this world, and fasting is the means by which we say to God, “More than our stomachs want food, our souls want you.” Once we “taste and see that the Lord is good” (Psalm 34:8), the things of the world no longer appeal to us in the same way.

As Piper says in the opening pages of this book, “Beware of books on fasting.” This is not a book of legalism. It’s not a book of technique. It does not contain a twelve-step plan. At the end of the day, it’s a book more about our hearts than about our stomachs. Abstaining from food (or other things) for a period of time is not an end in itself but a means to cause us to learn about and increase our love for Christ. As Piper explains in this book, the Bible gives us many reasons to fast:

• We fast because we’re hungry for God’s Word and God’s Spirit in our lives.
• We fast because we long for God’s glory to resound in the church and God’s praise to resound among the nations.
• We fast because we yearn for God’s Son to return and God’s kingdom to come.
• Ultimately we fast simply because we want God more than we want anything this world has to offer us.

Few things are as frustrating as trying to convince our loved ones of the greatness and grandeur of God. We are jealous for our neighbors and our faith family and the nations to find satisfaction in God alone. As we recently reread the book you hold in your hands, we have tried to imagine what it would be like if our churches were filled with believers fasting regularly and biblically. What might God be pleased to do if his church rises up to say, “This much, O God, we want you!”? We encourage you to read this book, asking great things from God, “who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think!” (Ephesians 3:20).

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For a free pdf of the book, as well as options to purchase paperback or Kindle versions, see Desiring God’s updated resource page for a Hunger for God: Desiring God through Fasting and Prayer.

This post is transcribed from DesiringGod.org with permission

Jesus, Risks, and the Hobbit

[[WHILE THIS POST IS A COMPILATION OF IDEAS, IT IS A LITTLE SCATTERED AT TIMES. PERHAPS I WILL COMPILE AND BETTER ORGANIZE MY THOUGHTS IN THE NEAR-FUTURE, BUT FOR THE TIME BEING I JUST NEED TO GET THE CONTENT onto paper AND I PRAY THAT IT IS COHESIVE ENOUGH TO GET MY POINT ACROSS.]]

 

As I was watching The Hobbit tonight, I had a few key things come to mind (don’t worry, I won’t give any spoilers).

I think it’s pretty clear that we all love epic tales. We love stories of mass adventures and journeys into the unknown. Lord of the Rings, Narnia, the Bourne movies, the list goes on and on.

I started to think about why that is, and at the end of the day, I think it’s because we all want to be a part of something bigger than ourselves.

We flock to theatres, buy novels, plaster our walls (both physically and electronically) with posters and visual content, and much more to express our interaction with these themes; but for me, this exposed in me (and surely in others) a dangerous reality.

We long for the interaction and involvement in grander themes, something “bigger” than us, having a greater purpose, and yet we leave it to the movies we watch, the pages we turn, and the stories we read. We long to play a part and yet settle for living vicariously through a character while we are a passive observer.

Why?

I think it’s because we know that it will cost us.

We know that with these sorts of involvement, there is risk. We want the benefits without the costs, we want the enjoyment of being significant without the dangers of being disliked by some.

Allow me to hone in on this a little bit. I do not want this to be some generic, conceptual argument with vague intentions which significant, tangible realities are swirling around this.

There is a higher calling for our lives than observing adventures happen on a television screen. Jesus calls us to follow Him. We are being called upon to be agents of reconciliation and proclaim His Gospel to the world (2 Cor 5:18-19). We are being called to advance His Kingdom and live in such a way that the world will see that we value something more than anything else this world can offer us.

We are being called by God to make much of HIM, not ourselves.

The truth is.. it will cost us, but His promise is sure.

Jesus says we may lose everything (see the book of Job), but He is enough.

The Bible says that you may be rejected by men (John 15:18), but He alone will sustain you and never leave you (Deuteronomy 31:6).

Without fragmenting this too much, I look at how I’m living and look at the scriptures and see a great imbalance. I read stories in the Bible and desire the interactions and communing with God that these men and women had, and yet I often seek to do as little as possible to receive it. Perhaps it’s my Westernized, American mentality or perhaps we’ve just used that as an excuse for far too long. All I know it that there’s an imbalance, and I don’t wish for it to be a defining factor for me any more.

At the end of the day, we must risk. We must venture into the unknown, but in doing so, we can hold firm to the fact that our God will remain with us, and that He is ever-victorious; that either in our life or our death, He will be made much of and magnified.

Joel Houston (lead singer of Hillsong United) says, “all too often we look at injustice and say to ourselves ‘that’s not right; that’s not fair’ and then chance the channel or get on with supper.”

We identify with it, but that’s often times all we do, because for us to ever do something about it will actually cost us something.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be the generation that can hold doctrinally-sound beliefs and do absolutely nothing about it other than debate people.

I desire to be a part of a generation that acts on those beliefs. A generation that lives them out. I want us as Christians to be known for our intentionality and urgency in what we believe–while being characterized by love. I want to live in such a way that even if my friends don’t believe the same things I do, they know I believe it, and it shapes the way I live.

Are we believing in God to move in impossible situations? Are we even asking Him to? Or are we writing Him off before we even give Him the chance to do something?

The Bible says that God is able to do abundantly more than we ask or think (Ephesians 3:20), and so even the most far-fetched, impossible-seeming, most ridiculous aspiration you have in reaching someone or doing something for the sake of the Gospel, God can do even more.

God desires to make His name great and for our lives to be consumed with bringing Him glory. May we stop settling for adventures and epic tales on a movie screen when we have one laying right in front of us.

May we live with a Gospel urgency and intentionality, knowing that not just what we think about Jesus, but how we live for (and proclaim!) Him is necessary in making Him known in our specific contexts.

May we live out this Gospel, depend on Jesus, and love God passionately as we seek for His Kingdom to advance.

Praying for this.

An Anchor For Our Soul

As Christians we can subtly slip into trusting our accomplishments, success, health, bank account, respect that we have garnered, or the fact we have outpaced our competitors. We can feel better about life when things are going well. We can also despair when it’s not going so well.

Hebrews 6:19-20 says, “We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever.” In our lives it’s sometimes not a life-altering event that discourages and demoralizes us, but it’s adversity after little adversity, frustration after little frustration that can throw us to the ground.

The writer of Hebrews is telling us that the world is like water spiritually. It’s always moving, changing, and insecure, so we need an anchor for our soul. We can attempt to anchor our soul in the things of the world, such as human relationships, health, family, and career, but ultimately those are always changing, moving, and insecure. We need an anchor that goes through the water and provides the safety, security, and stability we need in the drifting and storms.

Thank God he sent Jesus to be the anchor we all need that provides what nothing else can. I don’t know what life will bring my way and I don’t know if the ringing in my ear will ever go away, but I do know I have an anchor for my soul, who is Jesus Christ, who is my trust, security, and hope.

(content adapted from a post found on The Resurgence blog here: http://ow.ly/bfV6f)

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This has held very true in my life.

I find myself to naturally placing my worth, identity, and confidence in the shifting things of this world. Deep down I understand that these things will not, and were never meant to, satisfy, yet time and time again I put my hope in the fleeting things of this world that will ultimately pass away (1 John 2:17, 1 Corinthians 7:31).

In a world filled with variation, I soon felt the longing in my heart for consistency. A hope that will never fail me, and a desire that will never be extinguished. All the things on this earth have left me longing for more–nothing was ever truly satisfying.

Enter Jesus.

James 1:17 says that, in Christ, there is no “variation or shadow due to change.” He is unchanging.

Hebrews 13:8 says that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” He is reliably the same.

Hebrews 12:18-29 paints the picture that God is removing the shakeable, inconsistent, and ungratifying things of this earth to establish His Kingdom, an unshakeable Kingdom, in which we can have eternal hope in.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not rejecting the things of this world. The Bible says, after all, that God created all things for the praise of His name and the glorifying of Himself (Colossians 1:16, Romans 11:33-36, 1 Corinthians 10:31). But our ultimate hope cannot lie in created things, where we worship created things over the Creator (Romans 1:21-25), but must be rightly positioned to God (Revelation 4:11).

May we not put our hope into things that will ultimately fail us, because they were never meant to truly satisfy us.

May we echo the longing written about in Psalm 42:1, “[a]s a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God” and in Psalm 27:4, (“[o]ne thing I asked of the Lord, that I will seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord.”

May we reflect, daily, on the account in Ecclesiastes 3:11 which says that “eternity is written into man’s heart” and heed the words of C.S. Lewis when he says, “If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”

May we build our house on the Rock that is Jesus Christ, and not the sand that is worldly things (see Matthew 7:24-27), which cannot and will not satisfy your deepest longings for joy, peace, approval, and acceptance.

We were made to glorify God, and to find our hope in Him–and Him alone. May we trust in Christ as an immovable, unchanging, reliable, trustworthy, sovereign, reigning, powerful, loving, and gracious anchor for our soul as Hebrews 6:19-20 states.

What It Means to Be a Pilgrim

Michael Horton writes,

There is a significant origin and end point to history, within which we ourselves are cast members. It is a courtroom drama in which we are either false or true witnesses, “in Adam” or “in Christ,” justified or condemned, alive or dead.

Neither masters nor tourists, we become pilgrims. 

Unlike masters, pilgrims have not arrived and they do not presume to inaugurate their own kingdoms of glory. They don’t have all the answers and they are not exactly sure what their destination city will be like; they are driven by a promise and by God’s fulfillment of his promise along the way. Yet unlike tourists, they are on their way to a settled place and every point along the way is a landmark toward that destination.

The Gospel-Driven Life, (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2009), 35, paragraphing added.