Day 19: Wanted
Reading for Today
Ruth 4:4-6 NLT
4 I thought I should speak to you about it so that you can redeem it if you wish. If you want the land, then buy it here in the presence of these witnesses. But if you don’t want it, let me know right away, because I am next in line to redeem it after you.”
The man replied, “All right, I’ll redeem it.”
5 Then Boaz told him, “Of course, your purchase of the land from Naomi also requires that you marry Ruth, the Moabite widow. That way she can have children who will carry on her husband’s name and keep the land in the family.”
6 “Then I can’t redeem it,” the family redeemer replied, “because this might endanger my own estate. You redeem the land; I cannot do it.”
Ephesians 3:14-21 NLT
14 When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, 15 the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. 16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
20 Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. 21 Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen.
As a kid, I remember feeling the fear of not being picked. As the class lined up to be chosen by the two captains, everyone wanted to be picked for a team. I believe this represents a larger principle that exists even in our adult life.
We all want to be wanted.
We want to know that someone sees us for who we really are and believes in who we can be. We want to experience of someone picking us out of the crowd because the captain recognizes something unique in us.
Too often instead of feeling the joy of being picked, we feel the disappointment of being passed over. Ruth knew this feeling all too well. As God led her on a journey towards the right one for her, she had to first be rejected by the wrong one. While it may have been painful, this rejection pushed right into the arms of her destiny. She would soon discover that Boaz not only wanted her, but he was willing to pay the required price to have her. In this way, Boaz points us to Jesus who was willing to pay a high price for us.
As you draw closer to the end of this fast, be reminded that you are WANTED. You are loved. You are valued. When God looks at you, He sees a wonderful masterpiece.
Fasting Tip: Meditate on Ephesians 3:14-21 and pray that God’s love would overflow in your heart so that you can grasp how wanted you are.
Day 18: In the Waiting
Reading for Today
Lamentations 3:21-26
21 But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: 22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; 23 they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” 25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. 26 It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.
Most if not all bible readers are familiar with this passage for verse 23, “great is thy (your) faithfulness and it’s accompanying hymn.
However, as with most verses, people have no idea of the context of the passage unless you are biblically nosey.
When I read this today, I got excited about what comes after His new mercies. Verse 24 says, “the Lord is my portion.” This reminded me of a verse in Psalms 16:5, “The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.” We must make a perpetual decision to follow hard after God no matter what we are experiencing! We must make the choice to go His way, even when ours would seem easier.
The text goes on to say in verse 25 that, “The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.” Now this is a novel concept. We live in a society that preaches you have to go for what you want. No one but you can make it happen instead here, we see where God is teaching us quite the opposite. He says to us to wait on me. I will do it in my time. When you seek me, you will find me and I am faithful!
In the past few weeks, we have been giving our all going hard after God expecting him to move, and expecting him to show up. Which he really has but there are some answers we are still waiting on and those are the hard things. We have to remember that fasting is not a show pony trick. We don’t fast and automatically get all the things we want. Instead in our fast we experience something much greater, we experience the process of waiting on God.
In so many situations, we find it difficult to wait. I can be a very patient person in many ways, but in probably double the ways I can be impatient. This verse challenged me to take a step back and really think about what it means to wait. Wait is not a fixed verb, it's present, active, and continuing. When one is called by God to wait, it is not wait in the sense of idle action, but wait in the sense of doing something. More than anything in your wait you are expected to seek God in all His righteousness and understanding that by finding Him, you will inevitably find everything it is that you need.
In this season of waiting, I encourage you to seek God. Whatever "it" is that you need or are waiting on can only be truly fulfilling when it is gained through Christ. Remember that His will for you above all is what's best. What you're asking for, may not be for you in this season, and that's ok! That's the beauty of trusting God even his no or not yet is a blessing. A no right now, may in years become a resounding yes. No matter what it is, we must learn to trust His voice and heart above our own. We must know that His will for us is what's best for us even if it doesn't match what we think we want.
If you're waiting, you are not alone! Anybody who has ever desired anything from God has had to experience a waiting season! Trust Him and believe that He has your best interest at heart and it's working together in your favor!
Fasting Tip: Write down what you’re waiting on from God. Commit that list to Him, ask Him what you should be doing in the meantime. Spend some time waiting on His reply and write it down.
Day 17: A Helping Heart
Reading for Today
I have done the Lord’s work humbly with many tears. I have endured the trials that came to me from the plots of the Jews…Butmy life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus…
Acts 20:19, 24
One of the things I dislike most is moving. Packing, unpacking, ugh. I get agitated just thinking about it. I remember watching college students unpack for college. The most interesting thing I remember is seeing the faces of those who found out that their dorm room assignments were on the top floor. Many of them struggled to unpack their cars and gather their things. Thankfully, help was available. Churches, Greek organizations and other groups offered to help parents and students move their things. You see prior to student’s arrival, they did not know how high that they would have to climb to reach their destination, all they knew was that there were some things that they would have to carry and some things they would have to leave behind in order to get there. But what they did not know was that once they reached a certain point in their journey, there would be someone there waiting to help them to get to their destination.
Like these men, there are some people in life who carry the unique assignment of suffering for others. Their lives are filled with the constant victories and defeats of helping others succeed. Paul was such a person. He embraced suffering for the sake of others. You could even argue that it was a part of his DNA. It can be so easy to be frustrated by the unique call to serve you may have received. But today I encourage you to embrace the heart that God has given you for others. It doesn’t make you weak, it makes you worthy to of the call of God on your life.
Fasting Tip: Pray for the people God has called you to serve. As you pray, ask God to give you insight into the importance of your role in their lives.
Day 15: Outlive the Lie
Reading for Today
Genesis 37: 29-35
Then the brothers killed a young goat and dipped Joseph’s robe in its blood. They sent the beautiful robe to their father with this message: “Look at what we found. Doesn’t this robe belong to your son?” Their father recognized it immediately. “Yes,” he said, “it is my son’s robe. A wild animal must have eaten him. Joseph has clearly been torn to pieces!”
No one enjoys a good, intellectual debate like me, but wisdom has taught me that debates and/or conversations work best only when both parties are willing to be open enough to receive and send information. There have been times in the past where I would waste time and energy trying to convince others to feel the way that I did, but the other party would be so convinced of the evidence that they were presenting, either for me or against me, that they almost convinced me to be skeptical of the very things that I knew for a fact to be true or not true. You see, it was not that I was uncertain of what I believed, but the stubbornness of their heart to receive from me almost acted as a sifter to reveal the parts of me that were not as convinced of what I believed as I should have been. So let me free you just a little bit. When you know the truth, don’t buy into the lies that others are selling. Don’t feel pressured to be who people said you are. Joseph comes to a place in his life where he is attacked by his brothers, not only do they sell him into slavery, but they go back to his father Jacob and convince the father that Joseph is dead.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve had a few times in my life where people have tried to convince me that I was something other than what God said. They looked at me in my situation and they thought their attack on me had worked and so they were convinced that I was dead. Joseph’s brothers tried to convince Jacob that his son Joseph was dead, but I’m here to tell you today that just because people call you dead, doesn’t mean you really are. Even when they produce their false evidence, when they produce the stuff that you used to have and the stuff that you used to do, don’t feel like you have to attend the fake funeral that people have set for you. When God has chosen you, He will guide and protect you. I believe with all my heart that greatness slammed down to the ground will one day rise again.
Fasting Tip: Create a list of scripture- based declarations to speak over yourself daily. Let them remind you to see yourself the way God sees you.
Day 14: B!G Steps
Check out this WKND’s message from Pastor Mike, Jr.! Are you ready to take B!G Steps???
Day 13: Because of Him
Reading for Today
Philippians 3:7–11 (NLT)
I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith. I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead!
Friend, we serve such an awesome God! I don’t know about you, but I am feeling stronger and more connected and empowered than ever! Today’s reading takes us to the book of Philippians hands down, one of the coldest books in the bible! This was Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi and is considered one of the prison epistles, in other words these words were written while Paul was imprisoned. He spends this book sharing with this church the glorious mystery of salvation being not only for the Jews but also for the Gentiles.
In times previous Jews were taught that their salvation was through good works and following rules such as specific sacrifices, fasting perfectly and often, and doing other ritualistic acts. However, the new church taught that it was no longer one’s acts that saved, but rather faith in the sacrifice of Christ. Paul was teaching the church at Philippi that now it was no longer needed to do all of these things but now we prefer it to experience Christ’s power.
This fast for many has brought about a renewed strength and sense of the presence of God. There are things that I am still believing God to resurrect in the last few days of the fast. The specific wording Paul used here means to know God through experience. Paul shares with the church that he would rather suffer with Christ and experience death in his flesh so that his spirit can know God’s resurrecting power. By living a lifestyle of fasting, we are submitting our flesh to continually be challenged and changed to be more like Christ.
As we mount this final week of the fast, remember the uncomfort is only temporary compared to the things God is working out in our future. Tap into the glory of the pain knowing that It’s Bigger than You! What we are seeking from God is far greater than our ache for food. Food only brings a temporary comfort that doesn’t change anything. This week dig in and know that what God is doing is going to be the seed for even greater in the future.
Fasting Tip: Make a list of the things you are believing God to resurrect or change for you in this last week of the fast.
Fasting Food Suggestion
Are you looking for a quick easy smoothie idea? One of my favorite smoothies is the strawberry peanut power plus from Smoothie King, but I didn’t to keep buying them, so I found the perfect-ish home recipe (all quantities can be modified to suit your personal flavor preferences). Here’s what you need:
½ cup frozen strawberries
1 sliced and frozen medium banana
3-4 medjool dates
1 cup almond milk or yogurt
2 tablespoons of peanut butter
Protein Powder of Your Choice
You dump everything into the blender and mix on high until well combined. If you want it thicker you can add ice but the frozen fruit normally does the trick. If it comes out too tart,, you can add honey to cut the tartness.
Pour in your favorite cup and enjoy as a nice meal replacement!