I made the decision...

to stick with the Daniel fast. After praying about the decision last and sleeping on it I have decided to finish with the Daniel fast for perseverance sake. The whole time I was praying, that word perseverance kept popping up in my head. I still am not sure if I will do this particular fast again, but I will see it through to the end.

The Daniel Fast...

Our church is winding down from a period of 21 days of fasting. I had chosen to do the Daniel fast. This fast comes from the passage in Daniel 10 where he obtains from all food but fruits and vegetables. Restricting my food to items containing only fruit and vegetables seemed more attainable than going more than a day or two without food entirely. During previous times of fasting I only made it through 2 days and had become quite sick.

I have now been on the Daniel fast since January 3 and it has been a struggle. Not physically speaking, which has been fine aside from caffeine withdrawal and the worst smelling gas, but spiritually speaking. I have found the Daniel fast to actually be somewhat distracting. I'm still eating every meal, and its been time consuming mentally to figure out what I can and can't eat.

The problem with this is that a fast is meant to be a time of spiritual growth and devotion to God, not merely going without certain foods. During the fast, I have been reading my bible more than any time in recent memory but I haven't been praying much more than I normally would. Last time I did a fast I would pray during the times I would normally be eating. This brings me to my current dilemma. Should I stick out the Daniel fast for the last 5 days for perseverance sake, or should switch to a new fasting mode where I abstain from lunch each day and devote that time to prayer? Spiritually speaking, I feel abstaining from a meal a day will help spend more time in prayer and focus on God. On the flip side, I don't want to quit because of my frustration with the Daniel fast, even though I know its not about the food.

I'm curious as to how the experience has been for any one else who is doing, or has done, the Daniel fast. I don't know that I'll do it again and I'm leaning towards switching to abstaining from my lunch the remainder of the week. Time to pray about it.

Love thy neighbor as thyself...

Obviously this is much harder in practice than it is to talk about. I read this blog yesterday and it brought conviction to my heart. The idea that in christianity we are always comparing our best to the worst of those outside of the faith. Unfortunately there was a time in my life where I fell into this. As the quote at the beginning of the blog says,

Christianity was not intended to create a chosen people, fostering exclusive claims for themselves, while looking down upon the rest of humanity like a sea of untouchables or regarding the animate and inanimate worlds around them as fields readied for wanton exploitation. Wherever Christians find themselves, they are called upon to be actively and positively engaged as vanguards of mercy, welfare, and well-being.

Its not about us versus them. But then I kept reading and realized this is a quote by a muslim scholar. Christianity had just been placed in all the places where Islam was previously used. Just reading that made me aware of how often I stereotype Muslims and there beliefs. I wouldn't want to be known by the actions of the worst of the Christian faith, neither then should I look at Muslims through the lens of the extremists. I'm called to love them as myself. Personally I would like to be treated as I am, not as the worst of my group of people. Maybe if we change our attitude towards this subject Jesus will move in our relationships with Muslim people? I know I want to be an agent of Jesus' love and the gospel message. Though I'm realizing how constantly I fall short of that. I'm a work in progress and thankfully God sees it through to the end.

Hello internet.

I have started a blog. My goal is to update it fairly often.