fast for life

Isaiah 58:1-12

(True Fasting)

"Cry out loudly, don't hold back!
    Raise your voice like a trumpet.
    Tell My people their transgression,
    and the house of Jacob their sins.They seek Me day after day
    and delight to know My ways,
    like a nation that does what is right
    and does not abandon the justice of their God.
    They ask Me for righteous judgments;
    they delight in the nearness of God."
"Why have we fasted, but You have not seen?
    We have denied ourselves, but You haven't noticed!"
    "Look, you do as you please on the day of your fast,
    and oppress all your workers.
You fast [with] contention and strife
    to strike viciously with [your] fist.
    You cannot fast as [you do] today,
    [hoping] to make your voice heard on high.
Will the fast I choose be like this:
    A day for a person to deny himself,
    to bow his head like a reed,
    and to spread out sackcloth and ashes?
    Will you call this a fast
    and a day acceptable to the LORD?
Isn't the fast I choose:
    To break the chains of wickedness,
    to untie the ropes of the yoke,
    to set the oppressed free,
    and to tear off every yoke? 
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
    to bring the poor and homeless into your house,
    to clothe the naked when you see him,
    and to not ignore your own flesh [and blood]?
Then your light will appear like the dawn,
    and your recovery will come quickly.
    Your righteousness will go before you,
    and the LORD's glory will be your rear guard.
At that time, when you call, the LORD will answer;
    when you cry out, He will say: Here I am.
    If you get rid of the yoke from those around you,
    the finger-pointing and malicious speaking, 
and if you offer yourself to the hungry,
    and satisfy the afflicted one,
    then your light will shine in the darkness,
    and your night will be like noonday.
 The LORD will always lead you,
    satisfy you in a parched land,
    and strengthen your bones.
    You will be like a watered garden
    and like a spring whose waters never run dry.
 Some of you will rebuild the ancient ruins;
    you will restore the foundations laid long ago;
    you will be called the repairer of broken walls,
    the restorer of streets where people live."


Wow. What absolutely impacts me about this chapter is that these are not things that can be accomplished in a day, a few days, or even a week. I will not be able to rid those around me of their yoke in one day on a quick-search-for-God-because-I-feel-lost fast. I will not be able to restore the foundations that have existed for generations in a week of a I-feel-guilty-so-I'll-give-up-soda-to-appease-God fast.

Is that depressing? Or is it instead refreshing? If we could accomplish everything God wanted us to in a week of us trying to humanly find him, what would be the point of following him the other 51 weeks of the year? I don't think God expects to accomplish everything in the 'true-fast' list in a certain amount of time. He gives us our lives to do it. I think God wants our lives to be a 'fast'- a period of time where we set aside everything else that is less important to focus solely on our Love and Creator.

Share with the hungry, bring the poor into your house, and feed the naked. For only a determined period of time? No. Share with the hungry, bring the poor into your house, and feed the naked for the rest of your life. Fast for life. Focus on God for life.

I love the last metaphor:
   "Some of you will rebuild the ancient ruins;
    you will restore the foundations laid long ago;
    you will be called the repairer of broken walls,
    the restorer of streets where people live."
God will literally re-build people's hearts through our actions that are empowered by Him.

conclusions

1. God is real
2. God is powerful and strong
3. God loves me
4. God wants me to love him and to love others

So wait. There's a God who possesses everything in the universe and has all power and he loves me? Me? How can he see my heart and still want it? What an amazing, uncomprendable love.

That's my conclusion.

philosophy

I don't know if you've ever read literature from people like David Foster Wallace or Nietzche, or if you've ever ever heard of them. They are both very intellectual people searching for purpose and meaning in a life that otherwise lacks both. Actually, Nietzche believed that meaning was found in man's search to tear the 'Veil of Maya', the only thing keeping him from truth. Yet Nietzche is also a nihilist who believes that humans crave purpose only because Christianity has instilled it in them and not because it is a natural instinct. I don't understand how meaning and no meaning work together, but that's just my limited understanding of Nietzche. David Foster Wallace believes that our entire life's purpose is to see experiences without personal bias and to choose what to think- to put yourself in another's shoes essentially. He believed that we search for the truths that are most obvious around us and at one point gives the analogy of a fish trying to convince himself that the thing surrounding him was water. Wallace wants us to get out of our 'default' setting in order to control our brain and its thoughts.

What I don't understand is why life has to be contemplated so philosophically- why meaning has to be so deep and undiscoverable. Shouldn't meaning be something that is an urge instilled in every person across the globe? A yearning so great that it cannot be stifled? 

Did you know that both Darwin and Nietzche were at one point devout Christians (or at least devout in the secular view)? Both went to church and had a strong passion for God. Then Darwin lost his daughter to an illness and began doubting. Nietzche lost both his dad and brother at a young age. He stopped going to church and stopped believing. God had died. 

It's interesting to me that two men who have so significantly shaped today's culture both experienced deep and painful loss. Why do we humans doubt God's goodness and purpose in pain? How can devout followers reject a God because he seems to spite them? 

The truth is actually simple. We are messed up humans. God is perfect beyond comprehension. And we try to get SO philosophical about meaning and life that we miss the simple truth: God loves us and wants to have a relationship with us. Indeed, God himself is the most philosophical being in existence. He always has been, always will be, has all power, knows all things, is perfect in righteous anger and in righteous mercy, lacks bias toward race, gender, or religion yet can judge righteously. Yet, His consistency is simple. 

"What can be known about God is evident among them, because God has shown it to them. From the creation of the world his invisible attributes, that is, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what he has made. As a result, people are without excuse." 

-Romans 1:18-21

Philosophy is overrated because the truth is simple. God is alive and he lavishes grace and love.