

3-Day Church Fast
Tuesday, 21 January to Thursday, 23 January
The goal of fasting is to draw near to God. It hits the reset button of our soul and renews us from the inside out. Our 3-Day Church Fast is the perfect opportunity for us to seek God & His word. We look forward to 3 days of focused prayer as a church family, focusing our attention specifically on what it means to be the righteousness of God.
BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO HUNGER AND THIRST FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS, FOR THEY SHALL BE SATISFIED,
-Matthew 5:6
This verse is so encouraging! It reminds us that God desires for us to be satisfied – to experience spiritual focus, energy, peace, and joy. It’s when we hunger and thirst for righteousness that we will be satisfied.
What is righteousness?
Righteousness is right standing before God. It’s a free gift, just like our salvation, and it’s what we are made to be when we accept Christ. The Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians, saying that God “made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).
Being righteous is standing before God blameless. When God looks at us, he sees us as righteous because he sees us through the finished work of what Jesus did for us on the cross. Jesus became our sin so that we could become his righteousness. What an incredible exchange!
This idea of righteousness being so freely given can be hard to grasp, particularly because we’re so conditioned to earn most things that we receive – grades, awards, privileges, promotions, salaries, opportunities, approval, and on the list could go on. Virtually everything surrounding our lives is awarded to us based on our behaviour, on our working for it to prove our worthiness. But God made us righteous and it is one of the greatest gifts He has given to us, because it’s based on what Jesus did, not on anything that we have done or ever could do.
When we know who we are in Christ, we will want the things that a righteous person wants, and act like a righteous person would. But when we forget that we are the righteousness of God we we tend to think, speak, and act like the person we used to be before we become Christians.
To remind yourself that you are the righteousness of Christ, say out loud and declare, “I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus” as often as possible. Write it in the margin of your Bible. Place it on sticky notes. Let’s do what we can to get this pivotal truth into our hearts during our 3-Day Church Fast.
How do we hunger and thirst for righteousness?
Hunger starts with longing for more of God. So often we get complacent in our pursuit of God because we may think we already have all of God that there is to have. But there is always more of God to be had. Always! For all of us. Do you realise that no matter how long or how far we run after God, we will never exhaust him? We will never get to his end. He is inexhaustible! We can know Him and still have so much to know about the depth of His riches (Rom 11:33). We can know His love and still have so much to know of the width, length, height, and depth of His love (Eph 3:18). We can know His mercy and still experience His mercy new every day (Lam 3:22-23). We can hear from Him and still have so much more to hear from Him.
If you realise that you lack hunger, then ask God to grow it. He will. He is faithful. He loves to answer a prayer for more of Him.
We start hungering by asking, but don’t stop there. Follow asking with feasting on the Word of God. Take time to be with God, in His Word and in prayer every day. Time with God is essential for growing in His righteousness. As we spend time with God, He changes us. He grows us. He grows our desire for more of Him.
Pursuing righteousness requires feasting on God’s Word & His presence, but it also requires fasting. Like our stomachs, our hearts have only so much space.
Our minds have only so much space. Our souls have only so much space. In order to feast we have to fast. We have to make space for more. This is what our 3-Day Church Fast is all about, choosing to fast from things to stay close to Jesus. It may be food or TV, perhaps even certain friends. When deciding on what to fast, we encourage you to seek God in prayer and follow what the Holy Spirit leads you to do. He rewards those who sincerely seek Him (Heb 11:6).
We are excited to see what God does in your life and in the life of our church.