Pastor Ronnie Floyd is urging believers in Christ to rediscover the spiritual practice and discipline of fasting in order to grow in their faith and overcome both physical and spiritual challenges they face in every day life. Fasting, in a nutshell, is a form of volunteer suffering on behalf of the Lord. We give up something we enjoy, usually food, but it can be other things, and replace that time with prayer and Scripture reading. Or just to learn how to gain mastery over our appetites, physical and spiritual.
Floyd, who is the former head pastor of Cross Church located in Northwest, Arkansas, and is the 61st President of the Southern Baptist Convention, just recently released a new book on the topic of fasting called, “The Supernatural Power of Prayer and Fasting.” In the book, Floyd provides biblical and practical guidance for this practice that he says is critical for addressing both personal and communal challenges presented to the Christian in their life.
“Fasting makes you much more sensitive to the Holy Spirit the longer you go,” Floyd said in an interview with The Christian Post. “Do I understand all that? Absolutely not. I think it’s a mystery. I think that’s where the supernatural power of God steps in and begins to speak to you in a way that most often is not done.”
While the practice of fasting is rarely ever mentioned from the pulpit, Floyd stated that the Sacred Scriptures mention it a total of 57 times. He then explained that the word itself means “shut mouth, not eat.”
“I believe that fasting is abstinence from food with a spiritual goal in mind. When God places something on your heart, whether it is a burden, whether it is a decision, whether it is a real problem going on right at your job or your family or finances, or whatever it may be, there may be three or four things God has on your heart, and He may choose to use fasting to call you into addressing those things,” the former pastor said.
Fasting, the pastor stressed, is an oft-overlooked spiritual discipline that has profound relevance today. He challenged churches and pastors to embrace fasting as a response to societal and spiritual crises.
“In this day and time, I’m convinced, personally, that one of the greatest ways the Church can answer this moment in American history is to pray and to fast and to be the salt and light,” he continued in the interview. “We know we should pray for our country, but we also … need to fast in our country. I would urge every church, every pastor, every church leader to consider your involvement personally, but also your involvement, collectively as the Church of Jesus Christ.”
Floyd then described how he has witnessed the power of fasting for himself. He discussed how his commitment to the practice started during his college years and then deepened as he began to face serious challenges in his life, including his wife Jeana’s fight against cancer back in 1990.
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“We had two little boys, and Jeana was diagnosed with cancer, and the initial reports of that were really, really difficult for us to understand and very challenging into what may be lying ahead,” he recounted. “God put on my heart to pray and fast the very week she was diagnosed, for my wife and for her healing. … I would carry an index card with me, and I would write that Scripture on an index card, and that’s what I would look at every time I was very frightful, every time I was pursuing God. I would just go to my knees, and I would ask God to heal my wife. Through God’s grace, through God’s favor, He chose by His sovereign and providential will, to heal Jeana.”
Then, in 1995, Floyd undertook a full 40-day fast for personal revival, revival within his own congregation, and for revival throughout the country. He said the experience made a deep impact on him and produced a lot of fruit in his walk with Christ.
“That day, God moved so profoundly that the church got a new pastor, and the pastor got a new church, and neither one of us changed our geographical location because God can do more in a moment than we can ever do in a lifetime,” Floyd stated.
A very important point he made about fasting, Floyd pointed out, is to start out small. If you are going to do an extended fast, you should consult your physician first.