Matthew 4 and Luke 4 share the account of Jesus fasting and praying before going into ministry. Jesus endured great hunger and faced intense temptation. He showed us a powerful example of what it looks like to triumph over the enemy and die to our flesh. In Matthew 26, when Jesus was about to be arrested, he warned Peter to pray so he would not fall into temptation because the “spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Jesus fully understood our humanity and what we need to live a victorious life. We must continually die to our flesh and give the Holy Spirit every part of us. Our bodies are the temple of God. Just like Nehemiah needed to clean out unclean things from rooms in the Temple in Nehemiah 13:4-8, so too, during the fast, let’s take inventory of the “rooms in our temple” and see if there is anything that needs to be cleaned out and restored. This starts with identity. Before we can know who we are, we need to have a correct view of who God is. We need to ask God to help us identify any lies we have believed about him and allow him to minister to us and exchange those lies for the truth. This may include confessing our false beliefs, repent of blaming or resenting God for any ways we feel like he let us down, and asking him to help us as we choose to believe the truth of who He is.
When we are secure in who our Heavenly Father is, we can embrace and walk in the identity he has given us. We can confess the lies we have believed about ourselves that were told to us by our own flesh, by others, or by the enemy. We can forgive ourselves and others for those lies and exchange them for God’s truth about ourselves. As we embrace our identities in Christ, we can begin to take inventory of the “rooms in our temple” and clean out any areas that are not in line with God and the identity he has given us. Part of fasting is allowing God to deal with our flesh. We take on a heart posture like King David when he prayed “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!” (Psalm 129:-23-24)“ and “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” (Psalm 51:10). We take full advantage of what Jesus did for us on the cross when we repent from all unrighteousness and allow the blood of Jesus to cover us and make us pure, holy, and righteous. Jesus, in his deep love for us, never leaves us as we are, but through his power and strength, helps us to overcome our flesh. During a fast, we often find the very thing God wants to root out of us is brought to the surface so he can remove it from our lives. Today we will begin the process of taking inventory and then throughout the week, you will have the opportunity to ask the Holy Spirit to show you what else he wants to remove from you so that you get to look more like him.