Fasting in the Bible #8 The John the Baptist Fast
John the Baptist’s Daniel style fast was a little weird – locusts and honey. As we discovered in a recent family they have an aftertaste!
Yet Jesus said this about John in Matthew 11:11
Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.
How can we be greater than John the Baptist? It’s the indwelling Holy Spirit how gives us the anointing! A lifestyle of fasting helps in this.
2 Corinthians 5:17-21 (NIV)
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:[a] The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin[b] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
We are new creations – the old us is dead abdburied
We are ministers – of reconciliation, helping others be reconciled to God.
We are ambassadors – entrusted to represent God to the nations.
Be filled with the Spirit and perhaps the Lord is calling you to regular lifestyle of fasting as we have finished our New Year week of prayer and fasting.