If you asked me for a glass of lemonade and I went to my kitchen and poured you a glass of water, what would your response be? Likely something like, “Uhhh Carly, I asked for lemonade.” What if I then told you, “I really wanted that to be lemonade, therefore it must be lemonade.” That would be a ridiculous conversation. I cannot expect to pour lemonade out of a pitcher that I filled up with water. In that same way, we can be moved with the desire for Jesus to work in us and flow out of us, yet spend our time filling ourselves with something completely different than Him.

What are you filling yourself with? What fills you more often than Jesus, His Word, His truth?

Whatever your answer to the above questions is likely the thing that would be most impactful to fast from. We are taking the next 21 days to devote to fasting and prayer, but I think sometimes I have missed the point, so I want to share with you what I am learning. This 21 day period is not about seeing how long we can go without something; it is about realizing how often we are consumed with something other than Jesus.

You might be entering this fast looking for clarity, expecting God to speak, or maybe you are entering this fast without even knowing what to expect.

Sometimes life circumstances can leave us so numb, it is too hard to expect much from God. That can be hard to admit, but I’ve been there, too. Let me encourage you today; God is with you. He wants to speak to you. Can you lean in?

In the book of Daniel, the Israelites are in exile under Babylonian reign. Daniel is an Israelite who has been taken in as a student in the Babylonian king’s royal service training. The beginning of Daniel explains much of his story and how he ended up being promoted through the ranks even as a foreigner because of God’s favor on him. He had continual visions from the Lord of future events that would affect the king and his kingdom. However, there were a number of men he worked with who did not like Daniel (which got him thrown in a lion’s den). Daniel still served God while the Babylonians did not. You can imagine the struggles Daniel faced.

In Daniel 10, we see Daniel receive a vision from the Lord that was troubling and hard for him to understand, so he went into a time of fasting and prayer. We see in verse 12 that Daniel did three things. He set his heart to understand. He humbled himself. He positioned himself before God. Because he did these things, he received clarity from God. This passage can be a wonderful guide for us as we position our hearts and minds during this fast.

We can also look at Jesus’s life. In Luke 4, Jesus had just been baptized, which marked the beginning of His ministry on Earth. His first thought was not to step up on a platform to preach; his first action was to enter the desert and fast for 40 days and 40 nights. He knew what was coming and knew how hard His task would be. He knew He needed this time with the Father to seek His Father’s heart and prepare Himself for the call God had on His life. Who else knew the significance of what was coming? Satan did. Satan took this time in the desert to tempt Jesus. We can learn from this passage the significance of time away in prayer and fasting, but we can also learn that our fasting does not go unnoticed by our enemy. We can expect to be tempted during this fast.

What do these passages mean for us? I am confident that each one of us can make a significant impact on the Kingdom of God. Do you believe that you matter in God’s rescue mission for the world? If so, let’s lean in. Let’s prepare ourselves like we believe it. Let’s fill ourselves more with Jesus. After all, we cannot expect to pour out anything other than what we fill ourselves with.