Bible Class: A Man of Desire - Fasting
Gospel of Mark • Sermon • Submitted
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Welcome
Welcome
Good morning!
I’m so glad to see all of you here this morning.
This is the part of the class where we have an opportunity to raise questions and share insights you have from your time reading, meditating on, and praying through this week’s text.
Okay, great!
Now let’s look a little closer at today’s text.
18 Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. People came and asked him, “Why do John’s disciples and the Pharisees’ disciples fast, but your disciples do not fast?”
“John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting”: In the law only the fast of the Day of Atonement was required (Lev 16:29, 31; 23:27–32; Num 29:7), but after the Exile four other annual fasts were observed by Jews (Zech 7:5; 8:19). Fasting was also frequently employed as an expression of mourning for the loss of someone or something (1 Sam 31:13; 2 Sam 1:12), and was often viewed as a sign of repentance marked by the symbols of mourning (Matt 6:16). By New Testament times the stricter Pharisees fasted twice a week (Monday and Thursday; cf. Luke 18:12), although we should note that their twice-weekly fasts were from 6 am to 6 pm.
The phrase “the disciples of the Pharisees” is unique and presents some difficulty because the Pharisees were a sect, and, as such, were not always necessarily teachers, which means they did not necessarily have disciples. However, some were numbered among the scribes / teachers of the law (NIV), and would have had disciples. But there’s another possible non-technical meaning here that might refer simply to people who were influenced by the teachings and practice of the sect of the Pharisees. And this latter sense could also apply to “John’s disciples” as well.
We’re not told why these disciples were fasting. John’s disciples could’ve been fasting because he might’ve been in prison by this time, or in anticipation of “the Messianic age”. And those belonging to the Pharisees could’ve been observing one of their twice-weekly fasts.
19 Jesus said to them, “The wedding guests cannot fast while the groom is with them, can they? As long as they have the groom with them, they cannot fast. 20 But the time will come when the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast on that day.
Jesus answers their question with three illustrations:
The Bridegroom
The Unshrunk Cloth
The New Wineskins
Jesus used these vivid pictures to explain why his disciples did not fast. His first picture comes from a Jewish wedding: Jewish couples did not go right away for their honeymoon, instead, they remained at home for a week or so, during which time they kept a sort of open-house with continual feasting and rejoicing. In lives that were hard like theirs, a wedding week was the happiest of times.
The closest friends of the bride and bridegroom were invited to this wedding week of happiness, and called by the name “children of the bridechamber”. So Jesus likened his company to men who were children of the bridechamber, chosen guests at a wedding feast.
What’s significant here is that there was actually a Rabbinic ruling that “All in attendance on the bridegroom are relieved of all religious observances which would lessen their joy.” So Jesus’ answer to them draws on their own religious traditions that actually exempt wedding guests from all fasting.
This first metaphor is theologically taken from Hosea:
14 Therefore, I am going to persuade her, lead her to the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. 15 There I will give her vineyards back to her and make the Valley of Achor into a gateway of hope. There she will respond as she did in the days of her youth, as in the day she came out of the land of Egypt. 16 In that day— this is the Lord’s declaration— you will call me, “My husband,” and no longer call me, “My Baal.”
Here you’ll notice the “wilderness” theme present as a place of hope and renewal. God will take Israel into the wilderness to deal with her, and in those days they will restore their love to God and depart from their idolatry.
17 For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth; they will no longer be remembered by their names. 18 On that day I will make a covenant for them with the wild animals, the birds of the sky, and the creatures that crawl on the ground. I will shatter bow, sword, and weapons of war in the land and will enable the people to rest securely.
19 I will take you to be my wife forever. I will take you to be my wife in righteousness, justice, love, and compassion. 20 I will take you to be my wife in faithfulness, and you will know the Lord.
So the bridegroom metaphor is repeatedly applied to God throughout the Old Testament and was frequently used of the Messiah’s coming. Therefore, Jesus is implicitly saying that he is the messianic bridegroom, and the Messianic Age has dawned.
This language is then carried forward as part of the Christian’s anticipated hope:
7 Let us be glad, rejoice, and give him glory, because the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his bride has prepared herself.
2 I also saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband.
The Messianic age is about the people of God being prepared for the day when they are finally united with their God, who has gone to prepare for them like a groom prepares for his bride. Therefore, in much the same way, we prepare for this day like a bride prepares for the groom!
21 No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. Otherwise, the new patch pulls away from the old cloth, and a worse tear is made.
Jesus knew full-well that he was coming with a message which was startlingly new. He also knew that his way of life was shatteringly different from what the orthodox Rabbinic teacher taught. And he knew how hard it is for human minds to change or accept new truths.
I think the second and third metaphors illustrate how necessary it is to have an adventurous mind that is willing to change and think outside the boxes of our traditions.
The second metaphor draws on similar language to one of Jesus’ parables:
1 Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables: 2 “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3 He sent his servants to summon those invited to the banquet, but they didn’t want to come. 4 Again, he sent out other servants and said, ‘Tell those who are invited: See, I’ve prepared my dinner; my oxen and fattened cattle have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’
In this parable, the King gives a wedding celebration for his son. So take all the wedding customs we’ve talked about so far and amplify them by about 100. Not only was there an extended period of festivities, feastings, and celebrations, but the king would provide wedding garments for his guests, often basing their attire on some theme. He provided the most luxurious of foods. And would send his servants with personal invitations to his guests.
5 “But they paid no attention and went away, one to his own farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his servants, mistreated them, and killed them. 7 The king was enraged, and he sent out his troops, killed those murderers, and burned down their city.
To refuse such an invitation is insult enough, but to mistreat the kings servants is a death-wish!
8 “Then he told his servants, ‘The banquet is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. 9 Go then to where the roads exit the city and invite everyone you find to the banquet.’ 10 So those servants went out on the roads and gathered everyone they found, both evil and good. The wedding banquet was filled with guests. 11 When the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed for a wedding. 12 So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ The man was speechless.
In Jesus’ parable, the king sends out his servants into the cities to invite everyone to the banquet, symbolizing the gospel’s invitation to all peoples.
13 “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him up hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 “For many are invited, but few are chosen.”
Somewhere along the roads and gathering places, the king’s servants invited a man who did not put on the king’s wedding garments. He came in his street clothes. This too was a serious insult! So in the King’s wrath the man is tossed out into the darkness and excluded from the life of the wedding celebration.
Jesus’ answer draws on this kind of language. These disciples, being invited to the King’s wedding feast, are looking at their old, tattered clothes and thinking about how they can patch them up. Maybe their thinking they can put a brand new patch to sort of spruce up their old tattered cloths a little bit. But not only would their new patch not match their clothes, a point Jesus makes in Luke’s account (Luke 5:36-38), but when the new patch shrinks, it will tear and make an even bigger whole, thus ruining the garment altogether!
22 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost as well as the skins. No, new wine is put into fresh wineskins.”
Wine was an integral part of their culture. Wine and alcohol didn’t have much of the moral associations it now has today. Not only was wine a vital part of their industry, but it was also an integral part of their life, being involved in everything from their religious celebrations to their daily consumption. (Read the graphic).
In ancient times wine was kept in goatskins. New skins were soft and pliable, so they could stretch as the wine completed its fermentation. However, old wineskins that had already been stretched would become brittle, so the gas from the fermenting wine would burst them open, destroying both wine and wineskins.
New wine is another important image in both old and new testament symbolism:
1 When the day of Pentecost had arrived, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like that of a violent rushing wind came from heaven, and it filled the whole house where they were staying. 3 They saw tongues like flames of fire that separated and rested on each one of them. 4 Then they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them.
13 But some sneered and said, “They’re drunk on new wine.”
You’ll remember that Peter then defends what the people had just witnessed by citing the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy. And it’s interesting that the imagery of the very thing they accuse Jesus’ disciples of being drunk on actually features in Joel’s prophecy:
24 The threshing floors will be full of grain, and the vats will overflow with new wine and fresh oil.
So Jesus is telling them that before they can be fit for the new wine that God is pouring out in their day, they must be made new. God will not pour this new wine into the old, brittle container of their religious customs and traditions. So those who want what God is doing in their day must be willing to let go of their old traditions and receive what God is doing in new ways!
Importantly, Jesus’ third illustration draws on his first miracle:
1 On the third day a wedding took place in Cana of Galilee. Jesus’s mother was there, 2 and Jesus and his disciples were invited to the wedding as well. 3 When the wine ran out, Jesus’s mother told him, “They don’t have any wine.”
4 “What has this concern of yours to do with me, woman?” Jesus asked. “My hour has not yet come.” 5 “Do whatever he tells you,” his mother told the servants. 6 Now six stone water jars had been set there for Jewish purification. Each contained twenty or thirty gallons.
7 “Fill the jars with water,” Jesus told them. So they filled them to the brim. 8 Then he said to them, “Now draw some out and take it to the headwaiter.” And they did.
9 When the headwaiter tasted the water (after it had become wine), he did not know where it came from—though the servants who had drawn the water knew. He called the groom 10 and told him, “Everyone sets out the fine wine first, then, after people are drunk, the inferior. But you have kept the fine wine until now.”
11 Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee. He revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him. 12 After this, he went down to Capernaum, together with his mother, his brothers, and his disciples, and they stayed there only a few days.
Understanding Fasting
Understanding Fasting
So, because our culture is so unfamiliar with fasting, with the time leftover I wanted to explain what happens to your body during fasting. Just so you know, I’ve primarily drawn my information from a book on fasting written by Dr. Fung. His clinic has done the leading research on fasting, and I really recommend checking it out.
First, during fasting insulin levels drop. Insulin is your body’s hormone responsible for controlling energy use and storage; it tells your body when to burn energy and when to store energy (higher levels tell your body to store energy, and lower levels tell your body to burn energy).
Our body stores energy in different forms: Glycogen, which is the glucose stored in the liver, is your first energy reserve, and your body stores enough glycogen for about 24 – 36/hours of energy. Your liver will produce new glucose from amino acids through a process called “gluconeogenesis”. During this phase, your blood sugar levels will fall but remain within a safe and healthy range.
Your body’s other form of stored energy is fat. After about 36-48 hours of fasting, your body will enter the state of Ketosis, during which low insulin levels stimulates the breakdown of fat into usable energy through a process known as lipolysis. This stage is actually characterized by increased cognitive function because of the ketones released into the blood.
After about five days of fasting, your body enters a phase of protein-conservation and starts producing high levels of growth hormones to maintain muscle mass and lean tissues. Your body’s energy is supplied almost entirely by fatty acids and ketones during this phase, and adrenaline prevents decreased metabolism.
So you can see how during the first phases of fasting you might be tempted to “disfigure your face” and wear a scowl. The initial phases of fasting are most difficult. But fasting is always God-facing, not to impress other people. So we’re meant to let the sacrifices of our fasting be seen by God.
Jesus actually teaches his disciples to take measures to refresh themselves so that they don’t draw inappropriate attention to their fasting that might ruin their fast at the heart-level by causing them to use their fasting to draw people’s admiration.
Most modern day people don’t have the problems first century Jews might face, and so anointing their head with oil might not refresh us in the same way as it would them.
But there are a number of measures you can take if you know what is happening:
Mentally prepare yourself for these various phases
Stay hydrated so your body can flush out toxins (but don’t over hydrate!!!)
Drink bone-broth to supply your body with necessary minerals to avoid intense headaches
I could go on at length about the process of fasting and the steps you can take so that your fasting isn’t obvious to everyone, but my purpose in this lesson isn’t to give you a science lesson in physiology. The lesson that I want to emphasize here is that we can address some of the external side-effects of fasting so that we can live a relatively normal life while fasting and not draw excessive attention to our fasting.
The purpose in this is to practice our fasting towards God alone!
Here’s the last point that I want to make: Jesus’ teaching about the private nature of wasn’t intended to make fasting a matter of top-secret national security. In just the same way that his teaching about the private nature of prayer doesn’t mean that we’re not allowed to pray publicly, I believe we should see our leaders set an example for us in fasting. Considering that “example” is one of the mandates of Christian leadership, our leaders should set an example for us to follow in fasting.