Answer to a Question.

Matthew 17:21
Propounded at some recent meetings. What is fasting, and how does it apply to us today?
WHEN the disciples asked the Lord concerning their inability to cast the demon out of the child, He replied, “This kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting” (Matt. 17:2121Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. (Matthew 17:21)).
We read of the Lord fasting forty days and forty nights in the wilderness (Matt. 4:22And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. (Matthew 4:2)); of the prophets and teachers at Antioch fasting when they chose Barnabas and Saul for the ministry (Acts 13:2, 32As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them. 3And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away. (Acts 13:2‑3))— doubtless actual and literal refraining from food for the time being, so that they might be undistracted in their spiritual exercises.
But there is a practical and constant side to fasting that we ought to have our attention drawn to. We refer to Isaiah 3-8. Fasting is not merely external, as Isaiah asks, “Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him?” If fasting is just a matter of food, attitude, dress, it is pure hypocrisy. Alas! how much there is of this.
Churches filled Sunday morning, a fasting communion, knees bent, eyes closed, lips moving, repeating a form of prayer; at night the theater or the whist drive or the mazes of the dance. Where is reality in all this? It is sickening hypocrisy! But says the Lord, “Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?”
In short, fasting embraces self-denial, so that the needy of all sorts around may be helped and blessed. If Isaiah 58 were faithfully carried out it would mean constant self-denial, and this would prove a most acceptable form of fasting of a very practical nature. If the Christian, young or old, practiced Isaiah 58 they would realize in detail what fasting means.
And yet, in practicing it, what feasting would be the portion of the one so fasting—the feast of joy in seeing the blessing of others―the being watered in the act of watering others. Try it, and it will open out before you a path of fasting as to luxury, ease, self-gratification, but feasting in the recompense of so doing.
[A. J. P.]