.png)
21-Day Fast
Join Our Corporate Fast
January 19th - February 9th
We're joining together as a church for a 21-day fast as we step into 2025. We'll end the fast together with our annual chili cook-off on February 9th!
Date
January 24 - 25, 2025
Culture of Prayer Conference
Public Registration Open
Engage in this 21-day fast by growing in prayer at the Culture of Prayer Conference hosted at Great Oaks Fellowship. We’d like to invite you to join us for a weekend together to hear what God is doing across the nations in our generation and here in our own city. This prayer conference will be a sweet time of dialogue together as we hear how God is forming a culture of prayer in His Church across the Earth.
This life-changing event is for our whole church and city!
Location
Time
Fri 6:30 - 9 PM
Sat 1 - 8:30 PM
Cost
Free
Prayer Room Calendar
What Fasting IS:
Fasting is the voluntary abstention from food (or some other desired object or activity). The purposes of fasting include:
-
To subdue the flesh.
-
"So put to death the sinful, earthly things lurking within you. Have nothing to do with sexual immorality, impurity, lust, and evil desires. Don’t be greedy, for a greedy person is an idolater, worshiping the things of this world." Colossians 3:5 NLT
-
-
To better prepare us for prayer and holy meditation
-
Paul and Barnabas also appointed elders in every church. With prayer and fasting, they turned the elders over to the care of the Lord, in whom they had put their trust. "Acts 14:23"
-
-
To give evidence of humbling ourselves before God, when we would confess our guilt before him and seek his face.
-
"On the day Jonah entered the city, he shouted to the crowds: “Forty days from now Nineveh will be destroyed!” The people of Nineveh believed God’s message, and from the greatest to the least, they declared a fast and put on burlap to show their sorrow." Jonah 3:4–5 NLT
-
What Fasting is NOT:
-
The purpose of fasting does not include earning bonus points with God. In Isaiah 58 (which is very well worth reading in its entirety) we read:
-
‘We have fasted before you!’ they say. ‘Why aren’t you impressed? We have been very hard on ourselves, and you don’t even notice it!’ Isaiah 58:3
-
-
Fasting, in this context, is also not for health or weight control purposes. Any health or weight-control benefit you experience is purely incidental to the purposes of fasting as a spiritual discipline.
-
Fasting isn’t necessarily abstention from food. It can be from other things that are hindering your fellowship with God. Things like: social media, the internet generally, entertainment media, shopping, news/politics, sports, overwork, etc. You might also want to consider limiting or even eliminating your consumption of these things.
Types of Fasts
Fasting isn’t necessarily or exclusively abstention from food. It can be from other things
that are not necessarily sinful (except to the extent they end up displacing God as the
center of our affections) but that are hindering your fellowship with God. Things like:
social media, the internet generally, entertainment media, recreational shopping,
news/politics, sportsball, overwork, etc. You might also want to consider limiting or even
eliminating your consumption of some of these things.
Daniel Fast
A Daniel Fast is patterned after what we read in the Bible in the Book of Daniel (Daniel 1:8-16). Broadly speaking, if it comes from a plant you can eat it. While not an exhaustive list (the dividing line is plant-based) here are general guidelines for foods included on a Daniel Fast.
Foods to Include
-
Fresh, Frozen, Dried, or Canned Vegetables
-
Fresh, Frozen, Dried, or Canned Fruits
-
Whole Grains & Legumes
-
Liquid Plant-derived Oils
-
Nuts and Seeds
Foods to Avoid:
-
Any meat and animal products including beef, lamb, pork, poultry, and fish.
-
Any dairy products including milk, cheese, cream, butter, and eggs.
-
Processed fats with vegetable origins like: margarine, cooking fats made using hydrogenated vegetable oil
-
Any refined sweeteners including white sugar, brown sugar, raw sugar, date sugar, honey, syrups, molasses, cane juice, stevia, agave nectar and artificial sweeteners.
-
Any leavening agents (principally yeast and baking powder) and any leavened bread and baked goods.
-
Any refined or excessively processed food products including artificial flavorings, and artificial sweeteners, white rice, or white flour.
-
Any animal fats like butter and lard, and fats which include artificial ingredients like margarine.
-
Beverages other than water. This includes coffee or tea (whether caffeinated or decaffeinated), carbonated beverages, energy drinks, and alcohol. Treat fruit juice like a serving of food, not a beverage.
-
Recreational drugs.