Originally published Thursday, 21 June 2018.
Author: Kayla Anderson
Being an adult in this current world can feel burdensome at times. No longer are we graced with the carefree days of running amuck with the neighborhood kids, or squealing with delight as games of tag or backyard baseball are played. Those days are often replaced with big daunting tasks that come at us, crippling us, creating fear or anxiety, panic, or a depressed feeling. Big things like job losses, tax troubles, parenting heartache or uncertainty, friendship woes, marital relationships in the trenches or failing, and when these trials come, we can often be left feeling helpless, inadequate, unsure of the next step or unwilling to take that next step because it just feels too easy to fall.
Often my first solution can be to talk. I’m a verbal processor so I just want to talk with anyone and everyone about what situation is going on in my life. Talk to my best friends – they’ll comfort me, hug me, let me cry, and give me encouragement. Talk to my husband – he’ll try to offer a solution because solutions and resolution come so naturally to him. Talk to my dad – he’ll offer me wisdom and advice because so much has happened in his life that is mirrored in my own so he’s likely been there.
Sometimes my first solution is to just put my head down, pull up my boot straps and start at it to just get through the daunting, overwhelming life task at hand because I’m a hardworker and just like to get things done. I’m a bandaid ripper; just do it and get it over with. So often, that’s my mindset.
Not often enough is my first solution to pause and pray. Yet when I read the Bible, so frequently I am shown that prayer and even fasting (voluntarily abstaining from eating while devoting time to prayer or reading the Bible) is the first and best solution for many of those men and women. As Jesus himself was entering into ministry, he fasted.
“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone.’” – Luke 4:1-4
Jesus was referring to fasting, relying less on himself and his solutions but relying more on God. I remember spending a few days as a youth group attendee doing some preset fasting as a group but never in my adult life have I devoted a day to fasting. Not because I don’t know the Biblical principle of fasting or because I don’t want to – that just honestly isn’t something my mind is trained to think about.
David Mathis wrote, “Jesus assumes his followers will fast, and even promises it will happen. He doesn’t say ‘if’ but ‘when you fast’ (Matthew 6:16). And he doesn’t say his followers might fast, but “they will” (Matthew 9:15). We fast in this life because we believe in the life to come. We don’t have to get it all here and now, because we have a promise that we will have it all in the coming age. We fast from what we can see and taste, because we have tasted and seen the goodness of the invisible and infinite God – and we are desperately hungry for more of him.”
Do you know what Esther’s first solution to this huge life task was? It wasn’t to immediately talk it out with friends, her husband (the king), or even Mordecai, her family. It wasn’t to just pull up her bootstraps or attempt to just jump in and try to save the Jews with her own wisdom and judgment. Esther’s first solution was to pray and fast.
“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 maids 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 4:16
I am challenged and encouraged to make my next “first solution” to a big life task to spend time in prayer via fasting. To take the Esther approach. The Moses approach (Exodus 34:28). The Jesus approach. To make my life one that is not relying on bread alone but fully relying on God.
Kayla Anderson is married (for better or for worse) to the one who she knows without a doubt that God created her to be companions with. Together they have four young children, Ezekiel, Asher, Ellery and Alder, and run a hand-crafted soap shop. She is a stay-at-home, homeschooling mom and is in a season of learning how to gracefully be the central point and glue of their family. Thank the Lord that she has Him to look to for wisdom, guidance and strength! She loves reading in the quiet, early morning hours, decorating their sweet little home, writing has been part of her soul since she learned how to write letters, and her love of coffee runs deeper than her coffee pot. You can find more from Kayla on her blog or Instagram.
Photos supplied by Pixabay
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