Week 4 Fasting Guide

Week 4

Give us this day our daily bread…

When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, this is a line some of us can truly understand.  You know what it is like to hunger, to wonder what if anything will find it’s way onto the table.  For many of the rest of us, that is something we may never experience. 

The hunger and poverty rates in our country are something to be lamented, especially as the numbers seem to only be increasing.  But, even at a 16% poverty rate in our country (as of the last census), we will still struggle to understand just how important this line of Jesus’s prayer was for those to whom he ministered.  Well over 90% of the world in Jesus’s day lived below the poverty line.  That means over 90% of the world knew what it was to wonder what if anything they might eat on any given day. 

When Jesus says to pray for daily bread, what he is really saying is that we need to pray for that most basic need in our lives.  For some of us it is bread, food.  But, without exception, the most basic need for all of us is the presence of God manifesting itself in our lives.  That is what we are going to seek together this week, lives that are marked and ordered by a basic need for God.

Week 4 Fast: Food.  Well, the food week is finally here!  What we are going to challenge you to do this week is to do one of two things.  First, if your family eats out quite often, challenge your family to fast from eating out this week.  Second, if you are one who eats at home regularly or even if you are one who eats out regularly, pick a food item that is something you can’t think about going a day without (pick one that isn’t a necessity for your survival or for a particular diet you are on, especially for medical purposes!).  Give up that food or drink this week. 

Fast Challenge:  If we are giving up food, what is it that we are seeking?  Think about it like this.  Most of us order our days around something.  If you’re like me, it’s probably meal times or work.  But for centuries Jews, and later on Christians, ordered their days not around food or work but around prayer.  They would pray regularly throughout the day at set times so as to know that as a community they were praying the same prayers to God together.  This week, order your day around prayer.  Choose three times a day, something close to breakfast/lunch/dinner and pray the Lord’s Prayer knowing that your fellow believers are lifting up the same prayer with you.

Prayer Focus: Each day of our fast you will be challenged to pray the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13).  Each week there will be a different emphasis of prayer.  This week isn’t about praying for something specific.  This week is about ordering our days around prayer.  Focus on what it means for you to know that as you pray, your fellow believers are praying the same prayer with you.