Dear Brethren and Friends, Over the 36 years I knew him, Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong stated a number of times, “There is no limit to what men or women can accomplish if they turn their lives completely over to God!”
Dear brethren, we are right now facing a number of severe trials involving extremely serious illnesses among dozens of our brethren and loved ones. In addition, it certainly appears that this may be a pivotal year—one in which prophetic events speed up, the impact of the Work increases and Satan the Devil is therefore stirred and attacks God’s people and His Work more than ever. We need to soberly realize this, and to do all we can to prepare ourselves physically, mentally and spiritually. As the end of this age draws near, we need God’s power in our lives more than ever. And, remembering the lessons of the Pentecost season that has just gone by, we need to continue focusing on the power of God’s Spirit in our lives.
Throughout the Bible, God’s leading servants were led to “seek” Him with all their hearts at special times of need. Describing how His own people would turn away and finally be taken into slavery at the end of the age, God tells us, “But from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul. When you are in distress, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, when you turn to the Lord your God and obey His voice” (Deuteronomy 4:29–30).
So we are told to “seek” God with all our heart and with all our soul! In all honesty, how many of us really do this?
Again, describing what our Father in heaven knows we ought to do in times of trial, He told the people of Judah that they would finally “seek” Him at the end of their 70 years of captivity: “Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:12–13).
It is not very complicated! If you and I—and all of us in the Living Church of God—are going to be used powerfully in the months and years ahead, we need to go “all out” in seeking the Eternal God through earnest Bible study, meditation, fervent prayer and fasting. These are all vital “tools” for drawing closer to the Creator. We often take them for granted. But we should not! For they are absolutely vital for any human being who really wants to get close to His Creator and have the awesome power of God’s Spirit flowing through Him and intervening, when necessary, even in the events around him.
Even Jesus Christ—who had existed with the Father from eternity—knew what to do when He was called upon to confront Satan directly in the temptation at the beginning of His ministry. For Jesus knew that since He was in the human flesh it would not be “easy,” humanly speaking, for Him to overcome the extremely intelligent, charismatic, persuasive and powerfully dominant personality of Satan the Devil in a personal encounter. The Bible tells us clearly what Jesus did to prepare for this battle: “And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry” (Matthew 4:2). As we all know, during this temptation, Satan twisted God’s word and tried to “use” scripture to convince Christ to do selfish things. For Satan is very clever at misguiding us and perverting the genuine meaning of God’s word for those who are spiritually weak and still want to “hang on” to their vain human reasonings, the desire for self-exaltation, their desire for illicit sex, illegal drugs, and other such vices. In such circumstances, we all need a powerful force to help us overcome the master deceiver, Satan the Devil, and his demons.
When the man who became the Apostle Paul was struck down and completely blinded by the living Jesus Christ, he did the right thing! For he had, in fact, studied what we call the Old Testament and the laws and ways of God under Gamaliel, the great rabbinical teacher of that age. So Paul knew what to do: “He was three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank” (Acts 9:9). Paul completely devoted himself to fasting, and obviously to “seeking God” through meditation and prayer.
One of the great Bible heroes of all time, Moses, was also guided by God to fast when he was going to appear directly in the presence of Christ to receive the Ten Commandments. “When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water” (Deuteronomy 9:9). Then—after he found Israel in a sexual orgy when he came down from the mountain the first time and broke the tablets of stone, Moses once again went to see God and again receive the Ten Commandments. How did he approach God? “And I fell down before the Lord, as at the first, forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all your sin which you committed in doing wickedly in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him to anger. For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the Lord was angry with you, to destroy you. But the Lord listened to me at that time also” (vv. 18–19). Moses describes his attitude and approach before the great Creator of heaven and earth: “Thus I prostrated myself before the Lord; forty days and forty nights I kept prostrating myself, because the Lord had said He would destroy you. Therefore I prayed to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord God, do not destroy Your people and Your inheritance whom You have redeemed through Your greatness, whom You have brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand’” (vv. 25–26).
When Jehoshaphat, the righteous king of Judah, was faced with absolutely overwhelming military forces arrayed against him, notice what he did: “And Jehoshaphat feared, and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. So Judah gathered together to ask help from the Lord; and from all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord” (2 Chronicles 20:3–4).
In answer to the earnest prayers and fasting of Jehoshaphat and the entire nation of Judah, the Eternal God nearly wiped out a whole group of armies that had been arrayed against them. It was remarkable! God turned these soldiers against each other until they were totally destroyed. “So when Judah came to a place overlooking the wilderness, they looked toward the multitude; and there were their dead bodies, fallen on the earth. No one had escaped” (v. 24). Brethren, the Bible’s record is very consistent in showing us that when we turn to God and seek Him with earnest prayer and fasting, the answer is sometimes awesome.
As we all know, the Bible tells us that God is always the same in the basic ways He approaches us and answers our prayers. He reveals to us, “Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). There are some occasions in our lives when we may deeply need God to directly show us what to do and how to handle particular situations. Or we may need and deeply crave real understanding of His will or His purpose in key events in our nations or in our personal lives. The prophet Daniel faced such a time when his people had been in captivity for 70 years and began to wonder, “Is it ever going to end?”
Daniel’s response? “Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. And I prayed to the Lord my God, and made confession, and said, ‘O Lord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments, we have sinned and committed iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments’” (Daniel 9:3–5).
Notice Daniel’s heartfelt attitude, and what happened as a result of it: “Now while I was speaking, praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the Lord my God for the holy mountain of my God, yes, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, reached me about the time of the evening offering. And he informed me, and talked with me, and said, ‘O Daniel, I have now come forth to give you skill to understand. At the beginning of your supplications the command went out, and I have come to tell you, for you are greatly beloved; therefore consider the matter, and understand the vision’” (Daniel 9:20–23).
Here, as most of you know, God began to reveal to Daniel one of the most inspiring and encouraging prophecies anywhere in the Bible! He gave Daniel understanding of the actual number of years that would pass before the Messiah was to come to this earth. He let Daniel know that, afterward, Jerusalem would be destroyed, and he showed Daniel many other things as well. Also, most encouragingly, God told Daniel, “For you are greatly beloved; therefore consider the matter and understand the vision.”
What an inspiring and encouraging statement from Almighty God to Daniel!
We might not receive such hearty commendation every time we pray and fast. But Daniel was an unusual man—profoundly seeking God and walking with God even under difficult circumstances at the headquarters of the entire pagan empire of Babylon. He must have had hundreds of trials and tests there that we do not know about. Yet, God knew his heart, and He knew that Daniel needed powerful encouragement at that time. So, God indeed gave that encouragement and wonderful revelation about the coming of Jesus Christ to this earth to be our Savior.
All of this came in response to Daniel’s heartfelt prayers and fasting!
Dear brethren, we are at a time when dozens and probably scores of our own brethren are facing extremely serious or even terminal illnesses! Some have already died. We are at a time when the most horrifying, world-shaking “tribulation” in human history is beginning to come upon us. As Jesus said, “For in those days there will be tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the creation which God created until this time, nor ever shall be. And unless the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake, whom He chose, He shortened the days” (Mark 13:19–20).
We are also at a time when the most powerful Work of the true Church of God ought to begin to take place soon! For our peoples really need to be warned specifically about their national identity, about who we are as peoples, and about what is sure to happen within the lifetimes of many of us! So, it is absolutely vital—as the true Church of God—that we begin to cry out to God with all our hearts and “seek” the Eternal God in fervent prayer and fasting! And we should not wait to fast just once a year, on the Day of Atonement! As I have said so often, we certainly need to “go all out” in genuinely seeking God—even with tears in our eyes and with earnest prayer, meditation, and fasting. Our attitude during a fast is to be one of deep humility. The Bible tells us over and over how important it is that we realize our own “nothingness,” and cry out to God for the extra help we need. Jesus Christ stated, “And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Matthew 23:12). Any of us who begin to think that we are very “important,” or that we are more “righteous” than others, is in deep spiritual trouble! Each of us must realize how very weak we are in times of stress and trouble, and how vitally important it is that we humble ourselves before God and get strength from Him and Him alone!
When you fast, you ought to be sure you are entering into your time of fasting with an attitude of deep humility and the awareness of how much you need to seek God. During your fast, as Mr. Herbert Armstrong explained in his Autobiography, it is good to devote yourself to extra hours of Bible study, of meditation and seeking God. Just “starving yourself” is not the kind of fast that will help you spiritually.
It is vital that you also prepare yourself physically for your fast. Learn to ease up on what you eat before your fast begins. Eat smaller portions. Have more bland food that will not upset you or give you water cravings during the fast, so use less salt and fewer spices. Get plenty of rest during your fast—taking naps or periods of rest if necessary. Do not do all of your normal work, but rather “cut back” on the number of hours you spend at work—even taking the entire day off, if that is convenient.
If you have any questions about your physical fitness before a fast, or if you have any unusual health problems or issues, it is a good idea to seek the advice of a competent health professional before you embark on a complete fast. In a complete spiritual fast, as we have seen in all the Bible examples, nothing should be taken in the way of food or water—only fresh air and sunshine! This is the definite and consistent example of a complete spiritual fast. Of course, there are “juice fasts” and other partial measures that are certainly helpful in cleansing your system and even in seeking God—as long as they are not used as a substitute for the occasional complete spiritual fast. From time to time, you may wish to take only water—or perhaps fruit juices or warm chicken broth—and to use your time to seek God by drinking in of His mind through urgent, fervent Bible study and prayer and meditation. But God does not want us to neglect complete fasting as we are able!
If we—as a Church—begin to zealously seek God more than ever, in study, meditation, prayer and fasting, we will receive answers! God will begin to intervene powerfully and heal more of His people. He will empower us much more in His Work of reaching this confused world while there is still opportunity. He will intervene to stay the hand of Satan from hurting or destroying His Church and His Work.
We must never give up and quit! And we must always have the outflowing concern to want to reach out to our nations and to the whole world with the Truth of God—since we have both the opportunity and the responsibility. God has specifically called us to this very task! Our Father in heaven tells us in His inspired word, “Deliver those who are drawn toward death, and hold back those stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, ‘Surely we did not know this,’ does not He who weighs the hearts consider it? He who keeps your soul, does He not know it? And will He not render to each man according to his deeds?” (Proverbs 24:11–12).
So, let us all surrender our lives more fully to God and use the powerful tool of fasting—along with study, meditation and prayer. Fasting should not be a “once a year” event for true Christians. We need God’s help and His intervention to supernaturally “heal” our brethren and loved ones. We need Him to deliver us from Satan and his terrible, divisive tactics meant to ruin us and destroy His Work. We need God’s power to do this great Work, so that when the terrible events of the near future begin to happen in earnest, the people of our world will know that God has warned them ahead of time! This is our opportunity and our responsibility!
With Christian love,
