by Eric Anderson

After Jesus was baptized he went into the wilderness and fasted for 40 days.  This was the kind of fasting where he ate no food at all the whole time.  He only drank water.  If a human body has water, it can live for weeks on its fat reserves, but eventually these also run out and starvation hunger begins.  This happened to Jesus as he fasted for forty days, and while he was fasting, the devil came to tempt him.  Each test was like the temptations that we face—and that Eve faced—but each temptation was made much worse.  Something very significant happened while Jesus was fasting.  But to understand why it is so significant, we need to go back to something that happened with Adam and Eve.

Part a) by Scott Cherry

by John Frazier and Marty Smithhart

When we think of fasting, we think of religion, sacrifice and self-denial. When we do a religious act, the most important thing is truth, followed by sincerity. Are we acting for ourselves, for others, or truly for God? This is the problem when fasting is performed to fulfill an institutional requirement. It takes deep soul-searching to make sure that obedience is deep, honest devotion, not surface, hypocritical piety. There is no benefit for anybody in hypocritical religion. And it is not necessary for others to know if the fasting is truly just between us and God.    

by Abdul-Muslimeen

Understanding the idea of human beings giving up something in order to obey our Creator’s will and to please Him with our lives comes naturally for us.  It makes sense to our minds that somehow our self-sacrifice would make us closer to God.  The Almighty is high above us, and we feel we must stretch up to meet His requirements by whatever means He has commanded. It is not so easy to grasp the idea that God would sacrifice anything for us. To some it is contrary to the very definition of God.