Benefits of Prayer and Fasting!

Benefits of Prayer and Fasting ~ Isaiah 58: 6-12 ~ 6 "Is this not the fast that I have chosen: to loose the bonds of wickedness, To undo the heavy burdens, To let the oppressed go free, And that you break every yoke? 7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, And that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out; When you see the naked, that you cover him, And not hide yourself from your own flesh? 8 Then your light shall break forth like the morning, your healing shall spring forth speedily, and your righteousness shall go before you; The glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. 9 Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and He will say, 'Here I am.' "If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, 10 If you extend your soul to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul, Then your light shall dawn in the darkness, and your darkness shall be as the noonday. 11 The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your soul in drought,
And strengthen your bones; You shall be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail. 12 Those from among you shall build the old waste places; you shall rise up the foundations of many generations; and you shall be called the Repairer of the Breach, the Restorer of Streets to dwell in." NKJV

12 specific benefits:
1. Revelation
2. Healing and wholeness
3. Righteousness
4. The presence of Shekinah Glory
5. Answered prayers
6. Continual Guidance
7. Contentment
8. Refreshing
9. Strength
10. Work that endures
11. Raising up of future generations
12. Restoration

*Fasting and prayer is a powerful spiritual weapon that will effectively defeat sinful habitation is your life. It is the spiritual equivalent to the work out of an athlete in a gym. As you fast and seek Gods face he will begin to implant His authority in your spirit born out of intimacy with him. The spiritual evil will know you have the relationship with God to defeat them by sensing the power of God in your life. If you are seeking a physical healing from the Lord you need to fast and pray before believers seek God for your healing with you. If your marriage is having difficult times your need to fast and pray for a season before your expect your marriage to change. If your or someone you love has any form of chemical addiction they need to fast and pray so deliverance can actually happen in their life. Continual habits and temptations can be defeated if people will fast and pray.

Many of the chronic behavioral problems, mental problems, addictions, are explained in scripture as being caused by demonic forces. Listen church we are at war and one of our most effective weapon is fasting with prayer. Fasting develops a holy atmosphere around you that pushes the evil away and beckons the holy into your soul. I want you to see people who are in bondage all around you. People are broken, hurting, desperate, under he attack of Satan. FASTING breaks these cycles. Fasting stirs up our hunger for more of God.

"Now, therefore," says the Lord, "Turn to Me with all your heart, With fasting, with weeping, and with mourning" (Joel 2:12).

"The weakness of our hunger for God is not because he is unsavory, but because we keep ourselves stuffed with "other things." Perhaps, then, the denial of our stomach's appetite for food might express, or even increase, our soul's appetite for God… If you don't feel strong desires for the manifestation of the glory of God, it is not because you have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because you have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Your soul is stuffed with small things, and there is no room for the great." (John Piper, Hunger for God).

Fasting helps us more clearly hear God's voice.

"As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." (Acts 13:2).

"It is not necessarily a food fast, and most likely it is not a total refraining from food. It is a fast of what keeps you from seeking the Lord. It may be television, videos, computer games, newspapers, excessive shopping and phone conversations… This is a true fast. Too often we go on hunger strikes to hear from God, and continue in our busy, distracted lives. That is not a fast; therefore, we get very little benefit. A true fast occurs when we abstain for the purpose of seeking God in a more focused manner." (John Bevere, A Heart Ablaze).

Fasting expresses a need for God's help.

"Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from Him the right way (or a safe journey) for us and our little ones." (Ezra 8:21).

"Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai: "Go, gather all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me; neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day." (Esther 4:15-16).

Fasting prepares us for greater effectiveness in ministry.

When the disciples couldn't deliver a demon-possessed boy: "So Jesus said to them, "Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting." (Matthew 17:20-21).

Fasting stirs up a hunger for revival and awakening.