Focus On The External Glory Of God

“Eloy do not focus on the internal struggles and pain; but instead focus on the external Glory of Me”
Elohim (God)

Today I am going through my experience through a 20 day water only fast as part of the lead up to Pentecost 2020. I want to start by stating is that this should only be done if you are clearly instructed by God to do this. One should always test the spirit and get confirmation through your Church family before acting.

For those of you that don’t know, it was during the first Pentecost¹ after Jesus died that the Holy Spirit came onto the disciples and from here the world was changed. To those who believed and accepted Jesus as Lord² and saviour, God came down and what was impossible in man was now possible with God³. On the run up to the Passover, God had me complete a 10 day water only fast, so when He asked me to do 20 I was eager to obey, after getting confirmation through my wife and another household member I told God, Yes and Amen. I was eager to see what I was going to see or experience through this fast. For the first time we had no idea as to the reason behind the fast, only that God had told me to do it, this was a journey of pure faith and trust.

Now straight out of the door as a performance nutritionist I was very well aware of the health risks associated with such a prolonged fast with water only. However, we serve an infinite almighty, all powerful, living God. Through Him there is nothing that can not be achieved, so from the beginning I did not have the smallest notion that this would effect my health or that God would allow for me to end up in a position of illness, for it is sin that makes us sick⁴, not God. In previous fasts I would tend to struggle with sleep after day 2 or 3 and I would tend to be lucky to get 1-2 hours of quality sleep, the majority of the night would be spent tossing and turning trying to get comfortable. I would be notoriously grumpy, moody, snappy and generally not the best person to be around, but there would be revelation or break through in issues that had been facing us, so it would create “balance” and I would always have the reason “why” which made this discomfort worthwhile.  This fast however, I was faced with a whole new set of challenges. I did not know the why, I only had one thought in my mind obedience. There is a lot of theology around delayed obedience but one thing that is clear is that when Jesus says follow me we should get up and follow⁵, so this was my thought, my focus, my reason. The lack of clear why certainly made the suffering harder to bear, for on top of not eating, due to the lockdown we were also living without AC (to limit our expenditure) which isn’t a pleasant experience in Dubai during May. We faced soaring temperatures with only a fan to keep us cool, but God called me to it, so I knew He would carry me through it⁶. 

The first revelation from God came through on the morning of day 7, the afternoon before I had been wondering how I was going to complete this fast. I had two weeks left, I was feeling flat, I was feeling defeated, I did not know how we would pay rent, I did not see any work coming in, I was not feeling God during the extra time spent in prayer, I was not getting any new revelations when reading his Word and of course I was hungry! People in the house were eating around me and God had placed it on my heart that I was to be the one cooking the food. Now I love to cook and I love to serve food to others, so it was an absolute pleasure to be able to do this, but when you are not eaten it was a challenge to say the least. I am just thankful that the food came out satisfying to those eating as I was cooking without being able to taste or check the food. Upon reflection I saw that God helped work into my heart a deep rooted foundation that it is an absolute pleasure to serve others. For just like Jesus we are to serve others and not be served ourself⁷. This was a prime example of how sometimes we only see the lesson or the reason behind why we were doing some time only after the task has been accomplished. But back to the morning of the 7th day (I had not realised this revelation yet), in my morning prayers I was sharing to God how much I was struggling and he then said the thing that changed everything. He told me to stop focusing on what is happening inside of me, instead I should keep my eyes on the external Glory of Him:

“Now when Solomon had finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the house. The priests could not enter into the house of the Lord because the glory of the Lord filled the Lord’s house. All the sons of Israel, seeing the fire come down and the glory of the Lord upon the house, bowed down on the pavement with their faces to the ground, and they worshiped and gave praise to the Lord, saying, “Truly He is good, truly His lovingkindness is everlasting.”⁸

From here He then told me that He sees my struggles, that He acknowledges them, that He is proud of me, that I am doing great and that I should keep on going because it is for the greater good.

From the moment I shifted my focus away from the thoughts of, “I am hungry” or “It is so long until I can eat” or “This is so hard” or “Why does fasting matter anyway” and I changed to, “Wow God is so good, his love is everlasting” or “He will never stop loving me” or “Through Him, what I can not do in my flesh He can do through me”; I was filled with a new energy. My life was restored, I could live again. Yes I was still hungry, but it no longer consumed me, it no longer occupied my mind. When you shift your focus onto the goodness of God it is interesting to observe what does start to occupy your mind. I started to notice my flaws, my short comings, the parts of my life that I had not put to death⁹. When you focus on perfection you start to realise some things. I noticed that I did still have a short temper, that my grace, compassion and mercy was not close to where God wanted it to be. I noticed that I still needed to be “right”, so that ego I thought I buried was still there, it had just shifted to religion…. But wait Jesus came to destroy religion, so this should not be here¹⁰. Through this shift in focus God had started to highlight to me areas that I needed to work out in order to achieve my salvation. The Light of God was now shining onto the areas of darkness that was hiding in the shadows. So what do you do when you realise you are still living in ways that are not right to God? Thats right you get on your knees and you repent, ask for deliverance from this and then let the Holy Spirit do what only He can do and work on your heart. So that is what I did. I got on my knees and cried out to God and said sorry for the times that I was short tempered, the times I pushed an argument to be “right”, the times I didn’t show grace, compassion or mercy. I will tell you, He broke me, when I realised how far from Jesus those traits I had where; I could not stop crying, my heart was broken that I had behaved in a way that did not represent Christ, who I declare as my Lord. But our Lord always grants us forgiveness¹¹, after He forgave me I asked him to remove that old heart from me and to give me more love, compassion, mercy and grace. I wanted a heart that resembled Him, I never wanted to misrepresent Jesus again. I then felt a burning in my heart, I felt the Holy Spirit come to work and do what only God can do. From that moment on I knew everything within my heart had changed. I had stopped arguing to be right, instead when faced with a situation I listened to God and smiled in love and understanding. It was no longer about being right, but about communicating and listening, if the other person was not receptive to a loving conversation I just smiled and moved on to the only topic worth talking about, how great Jesus is.

The last 10 days of the fast went by in what was a relatively comfortable manner. My focus had changed and I kept my eyes on the only thing worth focusing on, the goodness of God. Instead of internalising on pain and suffering, I internalised on building my relationship with the Holy Spirit. I spent those 10 days cementing the changes God had made in me, because the focus of what will eat was gone I could focus on the new heart God had given me and I could focus on my new deeper relationship with God.

I broke my fast 3 days ago, when I broke my fast by taking Communion, believe me I broke down and cried. I had truly learnt that it is only by the word of God that we live¹². He fuelled me, He sustained me, He encouraged me, He guided me and He comforted me. I had received a deeper understanding that He truly is a Loving and Good Good Father and He is with me. How do I know that so surely? Well I lost more than 10Kgs of weight in 20 days, in my industry that is hospitalisation territory, but I was 100% fit and healthy. I was active, I was cleaning the house, I was doing manual labour, I was doing 12’000 steps plus a day. If you speak to people who fast they always say after fasts you need to ease back into normal food otherwise your body explodes with pain etc…. Within 24 hours I was eating my regular diet, my digestive system was fine, I had no pain, I had no issues…… This in itself is a miracle. But wait, it gets better. Throughout the whole 20 day fast I slept well and I had rest¹³ . Truely from this fast I learnt that God is with me, He is on my life because what was done was truly impossible in the flesh.

¹ Acts 2

² Acts 2:38

³ Luke 18:27

⁴ Psalm 38:3

⁵ Matthew 8:21-22, Psalms 119:60, Deuteronomy 23:21

⁶ 1 Corinthians 10:13

⁷ Mark 10:45

⁸ 2 Chronicles 7:1-3

⁹ Romans 8:13

¹⁰ Ephesians 2:8-9

¹¹ 1 John 1:9

¹² Matthew 4:4

¹³ Matthew 11:28