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How to use this website for fasting and prayer The Heavenly Father created us to have a personal relationship with Him and He sent His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, to be crucified on the cross as a sacrifice for our sins so that we could experience and know the full abundant and abiding life He has purposed and planned for us. As in any relationship, however, we must nurture and care for our relationship with the Lord so that it will grow and flourish. Our Lord is always pursuing us, even when we are not actively pursuing Him. He reveals Himself to us in many ways - big and small, in difficulty as well as in blessing - in order to capture our attention and to grow us into His likeness.
When we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior He deposited His life within us in the form of His Holy Spirit. "I will ask the Father and He will give you another Counselor to be with you forever - the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you" (John 14:16-17). "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you" (v.26). "When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, He will testify about Me" (15:26). It is vital that we feed this new life of Christ within us with the Word of God so we can be nourished, strengthened and equipped to walk this journey of faith.
Utilizing a unique and divinely-inspired process of "feasting" on the Word of God three times a day, Trumpet and Torch Ministries provides 1-, 3-, 8-, 10-, 12-, and 40-day "meal-by-meal" devotional prayer and fasting journeys to guide believers through their own personal period of consecration into a disciplined lifestyle of dependence upon the Lord. It seems difficult to believe that we must be "taught" to spend time with the Lord. However, many of us live completely unaware of the numerous minutes and hours that are lost to activities we have prioritized over spending intimate time with the Lord, or have been swept away by mindless, idle distractions. The enemy cleverly intends to keep us so busy that we have little time to spend with the One Who created us and loves us above all else. Corrie ten Boom has said, "the enemy finds great humor when we are up to our ears in work, but trembles in fear when we are on our knees in prayer."
In the Scriptures, the Lord often used mealtime as a time of teaching and ministering. Today, through the discipline of fasting, the Lord is able to remove our old fleshly appetites and instead develop within us a spiritual appetite for His truth and righteousness. "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" (Matthew 5:6). When the Israelites wandered the desert for 40 years, the Lord caused them to hunger and thirst; this purposeful correction disciplined them to seek Him and to put their trust in Him. Today, He still longs for His children to trust Him and to obey His commands. "Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep His commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD" (Deuteronomy 8:2-3).
Jesus said, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind.' This is the first and the greatest commandment" (Matthew 22:37-38). Our entire lives should revolve around Him, and yet, most of us spend more time planning our lives around when we will eat next and what we will eat. How different life would be - spiritually, physically, emotionally, and otherwise - if we desired Him more than we desire our food? "...give me only my daily bread" (Proverbs 30:8). It is our prayer that these devotional journeys will encourage you to suspend your usual schedule in order to meet the Lord for breakfast, lunch, and dinner - every meal, every day. Do not skip any meals. Just like missing a physical meal may cause your body to become weak, missing a meal with the Lord weakens you spiritually. Sacrificing physical food is not really the emphasis of this fast. Rather, the priority is holding fast to the Lord and clinging to Him throughout the day. We lay the sacrifice of precious time on the altar so that He may fill us with His Daily Bread. You may find it difficult to surrender your food to the Lord, and, especially in the beginning, you may first need to fast (surrender) your time. As you grow in the discipline of spending time with the Lord, He will build a desire and a strength that will allow you to set aside your natural food for His completely fulfilling supernatural food. Take each day as it comes, one meal at a time - one tasty morsel of His Word at a time, and follow God's leading in your life. Do not compare your experience to others. God's purposes for you are unique and specially designed to achieve what He wants to accomplish in your life. Do not succumb to the discouraging voice of the enemy; he wants to captivate every moment of your day and hold your mind hostage with dispiriting and unholy thoughts. Stand firm on the Word that is nourishing you, and be filled with the encouraging voice of your Savior. He is so pleased with your desire to spend time with Him! As you walk and dine with the Lord, He will reveal Scripture to you; follow His leading and journey there. Linger over them, meditate upon them, and savor them. The devotions in this journal are only a starting point. Consider them to be appetizers - little letters of encouragement offering a taste of what your faithfulness will produce. Please take time to record any words, Scriptures, or names that the Lord impresses upon your heart. Keeping a journal of your journey is an important part of this process as God is building a discipline of dependence upon Him. You will be grateful for your personal journal at the end of your journey, and it will stand as a written testament of the Lord's transforming work in your life. Forty days seems like a lot, but - considering the length of a lifetime and in comparison to eternity - it is only a moment in time. The Scriptures record many stories that exemplify how God changed a people and a nation in 40 days. There is something Divinely supernatural and redemptive about the 40-day time frame, and the Lord can accomplish a lifetime's work through you in that relatively short period of time. The forty days are meant to be a starting point to a transformed life of dependence upon the Lord and passion for His Presence in your life. We pray that you do not enter into this journey because of what you hope to achieve or experience, but because you have an earnest desire to know your Savior more fully and to experience the abundant life He has purposed for you. We pray that in 40 days, you will have found all that you have been lacking and experience the fullness that Christ alone is enough. We pray that you will be forever spoiled with a hunger and thirst for His righteousness, overflowing with the glory of God and overcome with the desire to lead others to Him. May you be filled with a total contentment in Christ alone and an overflow of thanksgiving and praise to the One who is your all and all! Blessings for the journey! When you seek Him you will find Him...if you seek Him with all your heart! "One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek Him in His temple." -Psalm 27:4 |