“Isn’t this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to break the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Isn’t it to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them?” (Isaiah 58:6-7)
Lord Jesus, one of the benefits of being an aging “Baby Boomer” is remembering when some words that are now “radioactive” with alarm used to be redemptively sweet. Tears of joy streamed down my face the first time I sang Charles Wesley’s hymn, “And Can It Be?” “Amazing love! How can it be, that Thou, my God, should die for me (even me, Scotty Ward Smith)!” But now when I sing that hymn, I get a little triggered, when I worship with this string of Gospel-soaked phrases … “I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; my chains fell off, my heart was free; I rose, went forth and followed Thee.”
Jesus, my first experience of the now “four-letter word”—“woke” was all about waking up to every good thing we have in you. This includes (hallelujah) freedom from sin, death, and judgment; and, also, freedom for a life of knowing, loving, and following you.
Where does following you take us? Into a life of sharing the Gospel of your saving grace, breaking chains of injustice, sharing our food with the hungry, sheltering and clothing the roofless and shirtless. This kind of “awake-ness,” love, and “fasting” (Isa. 58:6-7) is happening in abundance in Ukraine, Russia, and bordering countries right now (hallelujah). Multiply it, Jesus, and help us fast our own selfishness and political correctness. So Very Amen.