Prayer & Fasting 2023
Whether you have fasted before or this is your first time, here are some tips to help you out:
✔️ Adhere to all physician assigned dietary restrictions. Please do not hurt yourself.
✔️ Ultimately the strictest form of fasting is water only.
✔️ If you wish to do this, make sure to get plenty of water and sleep.
✔️ Pray! Fasting is not just giving up food.
✔️ Fasting is for prayer, reflection, confession and meditation of the Scriptures. Get alone with God and talk to Him.
Theme for the Fast: Be the Bridge
Schedule
Sunday:
🔹 Dinner Meditation: Preparing Our Hearts
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Psalm 122
Our 2023 focus this year has us looking outward to connect people to Christ. Before we impact people for Christ, we must take time to pray for ourselves, preparing our hearts and minds to share God’s good news. Take time to pray for yourself, confess sins to God, and sit quietly before the Lord. Open the Scriptures to Psalm 122 and begin to read through prayerfully. Ask the Holy Spirit to open your heart to Him. Ask yourself, “Am I still glad when it’s time to gather with the Church?” If not, what may be getting in the way? Ask God to give you a heart for His house – the gathering of His people. Ask God to restore the joy of your salvation and bring you a renewed gladness of heart in knowing Him.
Monday:
🔹 Morning Meditation: Lifting Our Eyes
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Matthew 9:35-10:1
Read the passage above. Consider the heart of Jesus. He loved people and saw their needs. He also saw they needed a shepherd (pastor/teacher/elder) who would guide them through the challenging circumstances of life. Consider that we were once ignorant of God’s promises and purposes. Remind yourself that Jesus called on the disciples to lift their eyes and see the harvest – and that harvest was the spiritual NEEDS of people. Ask God to lift your eyes and see people the way God sees them. Ask for a pure vision to care instead of condemn. Ask what gifts God may have given you to accomplish the purpose to reach others for Him.
Pray that our church will love lost people as Christ chose others to love us when we were lost.
(Don’t GIVE UP. Today will be “temptation” day. You can do this and you’re NOT ALONE. All of the Waters Church Locations will be open Monday from 6-7 pm for those who would like a place for quiet reflection. Press on).
🔹 Lunch Meditation: Who is my Tax Collector?
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Luke 5:27-32
Read through the passage above. Who did Jesus intentionally call to follow Him in this passage? Tax collectors were hated in Jesus’ day. They were considered traitors and worse than pagans because they over-taxed their fellow Jews to pad their own pockets. Take time to think about the kind of person that you would tend to reject for what they believe, how they vote or act. Perhaps that person is your “Levi (also named Matthew)”. Seek God’s heart considering that kind of person. Perhaps one of those kinds of people are in your life for a reason? Take time to pray for one of those kinds of people if you have them in your life. Ask God to help you see them if you don’t currently know one or see one.
🔹 Dinner Meditation: Who is my One?
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Matthew 18:10-14
Read through the passage above. Notice Jesus’ words in verse 10: “see that you do not despise one of these little ones.” While many consider Jesus is talking about children here there is good evidence he’s talking about his rag-tag group of uneducated average disciples (the 12). Jesus asked people not to despise them. Then He shares the story of the shepherd who leaves the 99 in search of the 1.
Consider prayerfully about your place at Waters Church and how (if) you serve. Ask God to help you bring more people along for the work of the Church. Pray for our Weekend experiences and the preaching of God’s Word in 2023. Pray for our Pastors and Teachers to be strengthened with wisdom for delivering God’s Word. Pray that they will have hearts and ears open to what the Holy Spirit would say. Pray for our Elders to give sound and Godly wisdom to those in our church.
Tuesday:
🔹 Breakfast Meditation: Running with, not from God’s call
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Jonah 1
Read through Jonah 1. Ask yourself if you’ve ever been tempted to run from God’s call/command in your life. Ask God to help you obey Him. Remind yourself that the Holy Spirit is God in you leading and guiding you. Ask that God guide you today to live as He wants, to be obedient to His calling on your life.
Without reading ahead in Jonah, ask yourself this question: Why did Jonah run?
🔹 Lunch Meditation: Don’t Make Assumptions
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Jonah 3
Stinking of “great fish” bile, Jonah is called again to preach to Nineveh. This time he doesn’t run and goes to the city to preach. Amazingly, the whole nation responds from the king to the cattle. God sees them repent and relents of disaster. A city is saved, and the reluctant prophet is used.
Consider that Jonah had failed God and yet was used by God. Not only did he fail, but he also refused to follow God. Sometimes we can be just like him. Yet God wants to use us still. Ask yourself, “Have I let my past mistakes/failures/sins disqualify me in my mind?” Remind yourself that if God can use Jonah in spite of his own willful disobedience, He can and will use you. Perhaps 2023 is the year you need to re-engage God’s calling on your life.
🔹 Dinner Meditation: Bridging the Gaps
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗Jonah 4
Read through the chapter. Today we have looked at one of the most famous stories in the Bible. But we aren’t told why Jonah ran from God’s purpose until the end of the story. Why do you think that is? Also, what was his reason? Shocking to think that He was ready to die over that, right?
Have you ever had that kind of attitude toward someone far from God? Have you ever resented God’s mercy in someone else’s life? Is there a lack of forgiveness somewhere in your heart? Is someone coming to mind right now? Perhaps that is the very person God wants you to reach out to. The last few years have really divided our Country. Perhaps we’ve let those divisions turn us into Jonah-type people. Let’s ask God to change us from a Jonah-type person to a Jesus-type person.
Wednesday:
🔹 Breakfast Meditation: Bridging the Gaps
📖 Bible Meditation: 🔗John 6
Key verse for meditation
John 6:44 (ESV) No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day.
John 6:65 (ESV) And He said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to Me unless it is granted him by the Father.”
Read through the entire chapter of John 6. It’s quite a story. Why did the people follow Jesus to the other side of the lake? What were they really after? And when Jesus spoke and told them more about His mission and purpose, why did they reject Him?
When we want to reach people for Christ, we have to learn to embrace the fact that many / most people reject Him. This was true while Jesus was performing great works for people to see. It will be true today.
But there is always hope. God draws people to Jesus. So, pray today for that person you’ve been inviting. (Hopefully more than one). Pray that God the Father will not just draw them to our Church services, but to Jesus. Pray that God opens their hearts, so they receive the Word of the Gospel.
🔹 Have a late Lunch or early Dinner and join us any time after 6pm for First Wednesday, February 1st (see your local Location’s schedule) prayer with Worship at 7p.m.; Word at 7:30p.m. We will be celebrating the Lord’s Supper as well.
Notes Section:
Do you have a testimony to share from the fast? Let us know!
Submit your testimony videos 🔗 https://waterschurch.org/submit
