# Definition of Fasting/ Jesus in the Wilderness



## MarieP (Mar 25, 2011)

I was recently conversing with a sister, and the topic of fasting came up. She said she'd always wanted to hear fasting defined- does it always mean abstaining from food and water in the Scriptures? What light can be shed from the historical records outside the Scriptures (both Old and New Testment fasting?) This is not to get around fasting, but rather to know if there's a Scriptural warrant for saying, as some do, that fasting can be giving up the internet or TV for a time to spend in prayer and repentance. There are also those, like myself, who get hypoglycemic and fasting with food/water seems to counteract what is sought to be accomplished.

Also, she said that she doesn't believe that Jesus fasted with food and water in the wilderness, that it was giving up companionship with men to spend time alone- she says that if He fasted for that long, it would show the power of God and be a miracle, but the point of the wilderness was humiliation and trial, not demonstrating a miracle. Is this a tenable position? I mentioned that one of Satan's temptations was for Jesus to turn stones to bread, She said he was indeed hungry at that point, (as the verse prior says), but that fasting doens't necessarily mean not eating.


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## Contra_Mundum (Mar 25, 2011)

Luke 4:2 "And in those days *he ate nothing.*"

Ask your friend what those words mean. I don't know about water, but he definitely went without food.

Of course it was a miracle. It was a miracle in his time, just as it was a miracle for the Israelites to live in the wilderness for 40 years, and to be sustained by the power of God. The manna (when at last they received it), and before that the water from the rock, were simply manifestations of miraculous sustenance in tangible ways--which is all that sacraments are. Sacraments _aren't_ themselves the miracle, or course, but they are the signs and seals of it, ordinary and earthly things by which God makes himself known in his works of salvation and judgment. It is because of our weakness that God stoops to speak to us by physical means.

What is Jesus meditating on in those days, if not the Pentateuch? Does he not quote Moses consistently against the devil?

It was a miracle when Elijah recapitulates Israel in his own wilderness trek, "And he arose, and did eat and drink, and *went in the strength of that meat* forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God." 1Ki 19:8.

I think your friend should do more listening and meditating on the text, and the whole-cloth of Scripture. As should we all.


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## MarieP (Mar 25, 2011)

Thanks, Luke 4:2 certainly settles it! Will point this out to her...


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## Wayne (Mar 25, 2011)

Someone asked me recently for Reformed sources on fasting. On the hope that you might find something here to answer some of your questions, here's that list.
[and I would welcome any additions to the list that any of you might add]



> Presbyterian & Reformed Resources on the Subject of Fasting
> 
> *Constitutional & Ecclesiastical resources—
> *PCA Book of Church Order, Chapter 62, Days of Fasting and Thanksgiving. [cf. http://www.pcahistory.org/bco/dfw/62/01.html]
> ...


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