PRAYER AND FASTING | cedarbrook

On January 19, we're kicking off 7 days of prayer and fasting. For this one week, we want to disconnect from the world through fasting and spend that time praying, connecting with God.

Prayer is a lifeline. I have tried so hard to make prayer first in every situation. However, I’ve discovered many times that I often act first then want God to rescue me out of a situation, but prayer should be our premier choice, not our last resort.

You see, recognizing the value of prayer as a lifeline is not enough. For prayer to become a part of our life, it needs to become something we look forward to doing, something that doesn’t give us a headache or makes us feel bad doing, but something that rejuvenates us, giving us hope and tangible peace.

That’s the purpose of this week, and my ultimate prayer and hope for each of us, is that by practicing praying will help us experience what Paul the Apostle spoke of in Ephesians 3:18-19, to know how wide, how long, how high, and how deep God’s love is for you – a lifeline for our daily lives.

So whether it’s before the day begins or before you go to bed, whether before you send that text or before you walk into that meeting, whether when bad things happen or before bad things happen, make prayer your lifeline.

If you’re a well seasoned Christ follower or need to supercharge your prayers, then add the spiritual discipline of fasting to this week. And as you do so, I’m sure you’ll experience God and his grace for you.

I can’t wait to hear the testimonies of all that God is doing and accomplishing in you and through you as you pray and fast.

The sections below will guide you through how you can pray or fast, and what we’re praying for each day of this week.

I’m praying God moves mightily in your life this week as you take a step of faith in prayer and fasting!

Pastor Jonathan

P.S. If you want prayer this week, click this link and submit a prayer request so the staff, elders, and other church leaders can pray for you.

How Should We Pray?

How do we make prayer a part of our everyday life? We can learn from two things that Jesus did in Mark 1:35.

And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. (Mark 1:35 ESV)

We should pray at a CERTAIN TIME. Jesus got up very early in the morning to spend time with His Heavenly Father. For prayer to work, we should do the same. It doesn’t matter if it’s in the morning or evening, but make sure it is a time you can be consistent with praying. Make a daily appointment with God and keep it.

We should pray at a CERTAIN PLACE. Jesus had a prayer place. The place Jesus went was desolate on purpose. Your prayer place needs to be an undistracted environment where you can pray aloud and hear from God. Consider finding somewhere distractions can’t find you, or where you can’t access distractions. Maybe have some worship music playing in the background to muffle out the distractions.

What Should You Pray?

To make the most of your CERTAIN TIME and CERTAIN PLACE, you should go into prayer with a CERTAIN PLAN. Go into your prayer time with a plan. If it changes, that’s fine. For example, when Jesus taught His disciples how to pray, He gave His disciples a prayer outline. We call it the Lord’s Prayer. This is our plan this week.

We are going to pray a little bit of the Lord’s prayer each day for 7 days.

The Lord’s prayer can be found in Luke 11:2-4 and in Matthew 6:9-13. Below is the version from the Gospel of Matthew.

9 Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. 10 Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our daily bread, 12 and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: for yours is the kingdom, the power, and glory forever. Amen.* (Matthew 6:9-13 ESV)

What is Fasting?

Fasting is withholding from something we want so we can set our attention on God. Food is an important part of life, but Scripture is full of invitations to go without it for a period of time to connect with God and be more mindful of our reliance on him.

Types of Fasts:

Complete Food Fast

In this type of fast, you drink only liquids. Drink a lot of water, and then add in juice and shakes as needed.

Partial Food Fast

This fast involves abstaining from eating any type of food for a certain period of time each day. For example, you can choose to skip a certain meal or abstain from eating until sunset.

Selective Food Fast

This type of fast involves removing certain elements from your diet. One example of a selective fast is the Daniel Fast, during which you remove meat, sweets, and bread from your diet and consume water and juice for fluids and fruits and vegetables for food.

Soul Fast

If you don’t have much experience fasting food, have health (or other) issues that prevent you from fasting food, or if you wish to refocus certain areas of your life that are out of balance, this is a great option for you. For example, you might choose to fast social media or television for the duration and then carefully bring that element back into your life in healthy doses at the conclusion of the fast.

How to Journal:

Write down your thoughts in following areas using two sentences or more:

Write specifically the things you are grateful to God for.
Write specifically the action steps you are going to take today or the next day to address any insights you received from God while you were praying or clinging to God through fasting.
Write specifically the things you want to see God do for your own personal revival, opportunities to share the gospel in word and deed to the people around you, or through the church in our area.

At the end of the 7 days, you should review your journal entries. In reviewing your journal entries, ask yourself:

Are there any patterns in your gratitude toward God?
Are there specific action steps that should be incorporated into your everyday routines?
Are there any opportunities to minister the gospel in word or in deed that you need to step into?