Worshiping God Through Activity - Fasting From Laziness

As we walk through this series of Fasting, by now we may be developing a clearer understanding of fasting according to the Bible. But writing this before we enter that season, I need to start from the beginning. A few questions I wanted to answer together are: What is worship? What is fasting? And what does the Bible say about laziness? 

Worship: Worship is acknowledging and believing God’s worth, majesty, authority, value, and glory. Worship comes from the Olde English word “weorþscipe” (worth, worth, woerth) - all meaning utmost worthiness or worth-ship. Worship of God is taking our actions and saying, “God, I’m doing this for you.” Worship of God is taking our thoughts captive and declaring, “God, I’m thinking of you and how you think.” Worship of God is taking our intentions and aligning them with God’s intentions found in his Word. Worship is always active. We don’t worship God by accident. Throughout the Christian life, believers develop rhythms, habits, and a nature of worshipping God. All this takes intentional activity. 

Fasting: Fasting is intentionally abstaining from something for a certain period of time. As a child growing up in church, I heard of fasting in Bible stories,  but I didn’t have any personal experience with it. As I’ve grown and matured, I’ve come to learn that Biblical fasting is about a positive action more than it is about removing something we enjoy for the sake of experiencing discomfort or pain. Biblical fasting is about intentionally stepping toward God by stepping away from something else. Fasting is typically connected with food because food is something we rely on for life and sustenance, for health and well-being. By fasting from food for a time, we are stepping toward God in a way that says, “God, I acknowledge that I really need YOU for sustenance and health.” Our bodies even have a reset phase after a certain amount of fasting. Throughout scripture, fasting and repentance are also often deeply connected. Repentance can be defined as turning away from something evil and specifically turning to God. Fasting is a way of resetting our minds and perspective on God. A byproduct of fasting is a reset and the outcome of the reset is recalibrating our lives with God. 

Laziness: Laziness is interesting. As I sit here and think about it, on one hand, it’s actively doing nothing when you know there are things that need doing. And on another hand, it’s passively doing nothing because we haven’t put our minds into action. In both of these perspectives laziness is connected to an absent-mindedness. What does the Bible say about laziness? In the book of Proverbs it prefers the word “sluggard” when referring to laziness, and there are many references. As Christ followers, Scripture tells us to “take every thought captive to obey Christ” (1 Corinthians 10:5). Laziness is not a godly trait for human beings made in God’s image; and that’s super convicting.

When we look at turning our affections to worshipping God through activity we quickly see that intentionality is key. It matters what we do. It can be observed that individual people are made up of at least four foundational parts: we are emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual beings. And we have the propensity to become lazy in all of these areas: 

● We can be physically present in church (the gathering of the saints) yet be physically and spiritually lazy with what is happening around us in the gathering. The Church is intended to be a passionate, unified body that encourages and builds up one another in Christ. In other words, the Church should fuel active unity, not passive disconnect. 

● We can be physically present at home (providing meals and shelter and routines) yet be emotionally lazy with our spouses, our kids, and even ourselves. It’s all too easy to mentally “check out” when the day has been long. 

● We can be parents of children yet be lazy with our nurturing/mental 

engagement with their hearts and minds. The call of parenting isn’t just to keep our offspring alive. It’s to bring up our children to know and honor the God of creation through Christ. It’s active and intentional. 

● We can claim to be Christians (a term that means “little christs” or “followers of Christ”) yet be spiritually lazy in how we interact with God and his Spirit when we are alone or have time to ourselves. 

In order to intentionally fast from laziness, we must first confess to God and to ourselves our favorite forms of laziness. Next, we must relinquish to God the specific heart condition that drives our laziness, apathy, selfishness, self-righteousness, insecurity, and brokenness. Finally, fasting looks like revealing our belief in God through actions, turning intently to our Savior. God alone deserves our affections and our utmost worth-ship. 

God, help us to confront our laziness that prevents us from experiencing the joy your Word speaks of and that fills your kingdom. Help us to be disciplined, to confess and repent continuously as we pursue Christ. Amen.