Fasting - Week 3 of 3

This is the final recap of my experience during my 21 day fast. My biggest obstacle was praying all day long consistently which was difficult at times due to having a full time job.  I will be better prepared for a 21 day fast next January. 

This fast has led me through many different emotions and levels of God’s presence.  I have experience the reward of the humbling of my flesh that can only take place during a fast.  I have been dying to my own will and desires, and experiencing what desires  God wants for my life.

Keep in mind that my primary objective during the fast was to pray for my granddaughter who suffers so much, my wife, family, friends, and people who come to the Healing Room.  I really was the last person on the priority list.  What I found out was that God had to work a breakthrough in me first before breakthrough could occur in the people that I was praying for.  I hope to share in the future about breakthrough with others that I was praying for as they are revealed. Below are a few things that I want to share with you.

• I have been able to truly receive God’s love at a level that I had never been able to experience.  Because of this, I have been able to express this love to my wife and children.  Understand, all my life I have guarded my emotions, but now I want to show myself and others the love that God has given me.
• I received a word a couple of months ago.  The word is encumbrance which means weighed down.  When we are weighed down with the things of this world and the sin that we have, we don’t see clearly.  The Bible describes this as a veil (2 Corinthians 4:3 But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing).  Fasting has helped me remove a huge part of the veil that was a hindrance to where God wanted me to be. (Ezekiel 13:21 I will also tear off your veils and deliver My people out of your hand, and they shall no longer be as prey in your hand. Then you shall know that I am the Lord).  I need a unveiled mind and spirit to be able to stand in the gap for others.
• During the fast, I took Communion each day on a suggestion from Linda who is a sister in Christ.  During this time, my wife brought to me the importance of Communion and how I must be aware of what Communion really means each and every day (Matthew 26:28 For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins).  Communion has taken on a very special meaning in my life.  I have decided to continue to take Communion each and every day.
• I will continue to fast each Sunday and Monday leading into the Healing Room on Monday night.  I pray that you will come to the Healing Room and experience healing and deliverance in Jesus name from the things that are troubling you.  You won’t leave in the same condition as you came in.

I fully understand that God’s priorities are seldom my priorities.  That is the difference in the nature of man and the nature of God.  The Bible says in Isaiah 55:9  “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. So how do we better positon ourselves to hear from God?  How do we free ourselves from our own desires to know His will?  For me, it has been fasting and it causes me to take the sword of God’s Word and separate what I want from what I need.

When you fast and sanctify yourself unto God, it moves you off the same old beaten track to a realm of unbelievable breakthroughs, including miracles.  There are far too many people on the edge of what God is doing, and not enough of us standing firmly in the middle of His will.  Do you want to change your life, your family, friends, and others?  You are the one that can make these changes – fast, sanctify yourself, and take a firm stand in the middle of God’s will.  When family, friends, and ministry people see you stepping off the edge of mere “Sunday morning religion” and getting right in the middle of what God is doing, they will follow and find God’s direction for their lives as well.

We all desire to be in the will of God and to walk according to His plans.  Sanctification is the key to being in God’s will (Joshua 3:5 And Joshua said to the people, “Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.”).  Fasting is an essential means of sanctifying yourself, pulling yourself away from the world, and getting closer to God.  Fasting allows you to filter your life and to set yourself apart from your fleshly life to see God in all His glory.  Fasting is what prepares you for a new anointing (Mark 2:20  But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days). 

It is my prayer that you make fasting a part of your life, as we are instructed by God.

Joel 1:14 Consecrate a fast, Call a sacred assembly; Gather the elders And all the inhabitants of the land Into the house of the Lord your God, And cry out to the Lord.

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

Joel 2:15 Blow the trumpet in Zion, Consecrate a fast, Call a sacred assembly;

In Jesus name,

Tony Sanchez

Fasting - Week 2 of 3

I want to say thank you for all of the responses during this time of fasting.  It is encouraging to hear that people are being convicted.  I want to share two such responses below:

Thank you Tony.

1. Fasting has been on my mind for about the past year and I am looking forward to reading more. I have been weak regarding food and believe He is nudging me to fast. I do not know anything about how to go about it and look forward to hearing more from you on this.
2. Glad you're doing this fasting Brother, it has been on my heart to set aside a day to fast for the Lord. I believe that fasting is just us humans being desperate for Him. I tried to fast I think almost the same day you started but failed. Instead I gave up something I really, really like. Now that I read your email about fasting for our own desires and not God's, I may need to reevaluate what I gave up and the reasons behind it.

I just completed week two of the 21 day fast.  Before I get started, I want to share with you all one of the reasons for my fast that I put in my fasting journal dated January 4^th.  In my words I prayed for a “Double portion of Elijah (2 Kings 2:9) for power and authority in Jesus name for healing and deliverance for me and my family and those I pray for in the Healing Room and others.”  Last Sunday I sent out a recap of my first week of fasting and proceeded to attend service soon after and was surprised to hear Pastor George’s  message included a “Double portion of Elijah.”  What a blessing to have confirmation in what I was asking.

The Holy Spirit is using this fast to reveal my true spiritual condition, resulting in brokenness, repentance, and a transformed life.  God looks for those faithful few upon whom He can pour out His blessings in extraordinary ways.  When we fast, you attracts God’s attention as one willing to venture beyond the norms of religion and go to a higher, more meaningful relationship with him.  When we fast, we have no other choice than to deny self and depend on Him.  When we do this, we are telling God our desire to be in His will and to walk according to His plans which He will gladly reveal to us.

Fasting is an essential means of sanctifying ourselves, pulling ourselves away from the world, and getting closer to God.  Fasting allows us to filter your life and to set yourself apart to seek the Lord.  Jesus prayed this for us:

John 17:16-19 They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.  Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.  As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.  And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.

Fasting will help us identify areas of hidden sin and things that are displeasing to God in our lives.  Fasting helps us discern between serving the flesh and serving the spirit.  Hebrews 9:13-14 For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh,  how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

Fasting helps us to distinguish between what you want and what you really need.  When you choose not to worry (Matthew 6:34) about these things and seek Him first, you are demonstrating the kind of faith that is pleasing to Him, because you are trusting Him to also give you all the things that you need.

Lastly, I want to share a highlight of this past week.  My Dad was not a loving  dad and as a consequence, I grew up with rejection and an unloving spirit.  I protected myself through the years and was not able to feel or express the level of love that God wanted me to have.  At the Healing Room we pray for each other as we wait for people to come in for prayer.  A few weeks ago, I asked one of the team members to pray that I would be able to receive the love of God.  It was only when I could receive that love in its fullness, could I convey God’s love to myself and others.  In addition, I realized that compassion is a  factor and goes hand in hand with love. During the past week His love and compassion has been so magnified in me that I have been able to receive and convey His great love  and compassion to my wife and children.  I now understand that without compassion, there is not true love. Thank you Father for Your love and compassion!!!!

I pray that you are able to get something out of my experience.  Thank you all for your prayers and encouragement.

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

Tony Sanchez

Resources: NKJV, Jentezen Franklin Fasting Jounal

Fasting - Week 1 of 3

I started a fast a week ago and I had people ask me to share my thoughts along the way.

Sometimes we need renewal in our spiritual lives.  Fasting has been a way to cleanse my body and aid the process of communicating with Father God.  God is raising up people in this hour who do not want a diet of just “church as normal” any longer.  These people are hungry and desperate for a closer relationship with God

If we are not careful, we can allow life to get us into the same old ruts and routines without even realizing it.  Our relationship with the Lord can suffer the same fate.  When we don’t do what it takes to stay sharp and sensitive to the Holy Spirit, our praise, worship, offerings, and even preaching can become heartless routines to God.  As a believer, we can pray, read our Bible, and go to church week after week and still be losing sight of our first love.  It is not that we don’t love the Lord, but the business of life can bring us to a point of losing our desire, our freshness, our hunger, our enthusiasm, and our sensitivity to His Spirit and what pleases Him.

I remember as a kid eating potatoes in one form or another every night.  I had potatoes this and potatoes that, over and over.  Same old stuff every night.  What if God was hungry and all we have to feed Him is our same dull religious routines (potatoes) day after day?  Where is our overwhelming hunger for Him?  Is all we have to offer Him is potatoes?

God does not want or need our routines.  He does not savor heartless activity.  He does not want our “leftovers” when He can get “fed” elsewhere.   God is a jealous God and He wants us to put Him first (Deuteronomy 4:24 For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God).     True worship that comes from our hearts feeds Him and satisfies Him.  It is something He desires and deserves.  Our religiosity of going through the motions once a week does not please Him as much as our obedience to Him and His Word.

Fasting is a constant means of renewing yourself spiritually.  The discipline of fasting breaks us out of the world’s routines.  It is a form of worship offering your body to God as a living sacrifice that is pleasing to Him (Romans 12:1 NASB Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship).  The discipline of fasting will humble us, remind us of our dependency on God, and bring us back to our first love.  It causes the roots of our relationship with Jesus to go deeper.

There are dimensions of our God that will never be revealed to the casual, disinterested worshiper.  There are walls of intercession that will never be scaled by dispassionate religious service.  But when we take steps to break out of the ordinary and worship Him as He deserves, we will begin to see facets of His being you never knew existed.  He will begin to share secrets, visions, discernment, wisdom, knowledge, revelation, and peace that we never knew existed.  He will share His plans and desires for you.

When we are truly hungry for God, we will push past the routines, we will set aside the rituals, rules, regulations, and traditional thinking to more of His presence, more of His power to turn situations around, more of His healing power, and more of His miracle-working power!  When we worship God as He deserves, He is magnified and we are blessed.

Through the fasting God has reminded me how important it is to be humble.  He has reminded me the importance of having compassion.  For without compassion, we cannot love those around us and those who offend us.  He brought to my attention that I must pray God’s perfect love over individuals in my family and in the Healing Room so that they may overcome fear (1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love).

Lasting, I am praying for many out there for breakthrough in your lives.  I thank you for your prayers during my time of fasting and prayer.                                                                                                                                 Tony Sanchez   1-11-15

Fasting

There is a series of events leading up to the subject of Fasting that I need to share before we get started.  As you may remember, I started in the Healing Room ministry last year and a short time later I started taking Faith Bible Institute classes at Faith Bible Chapel.  The packet we received included a book by Jentezen Franklin on Fasting.  Cheryl Morrison was the teacher for the eight week class and she said that this Fasting book was the only book she has read twice.

I proceeded to read this book in a very short time and it allowed me to truly understand the meaning and benefits of fasting in the Bible.  A short time later I was on the patio listening to Hymns minding my own business when I was instructed to start fasting Sunday and Monday leading into the Healing Room.  My response was “Lord, you know how much I like food.”  The following weeks I learned how important it is to pray continuously these two days and to understand my relationship with God as it pertains to fasting and breakthrough in what I was praying for.

I came to understand that prayer alone was not enough for me as we ministered to people in the Healing Room or outside the Healing Room.  There are strongholds that require both prayer and fasting as it says in Matthew 17:21  However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.  Fasting, prayer, and the Holy Spirit give us the wisdom, knowledge, discernment, power, authority, etc. to overcome the dark kingdom.

Does fasting work?  Yes it does!  It is no coincidence that my relationship with my son has been restored during this time of fasting.  It is no coincidence that when I fasted for almost seven days early in December to prepare for a 21 day fast in January, that my daughter who had been extremely estranged from us went to the Healing Room and the team led her to the Lord.  This relationship has also been restored.  Thank you God!  Fasting has benefited me so much in my family the ministries that I have been involved in.

I would like to share with you and edited version in what Jenezen Franklin says in his Fasting Journal book.

There are different kinds of fasts.  There are private fasts that you do privately, and the Bible also describes “called fasts”-when unusual times and situations call for unusual measurements and supernatural responses from God.   At Jenezen Franklin’s church, he says that they have found that the greatest time to fast is at the beginning of the year.  If you give God time at the beginning of the year, He will do amazing things in your life.

There are three things you must ask yourself before you fast.  One, what are the motives behind the fast?  Losing weight cannot be your motive.  Second, what are the specific needs I am fasting for?  People fasted in the Bible for a specific need.  Sometimes they were in trouble, sometimes it was for finances, and other times they were fasting for their children or for help or for direction.  It is important to know the specific reasons for which you are fasting.  These reasons must be the focal point of you prayer and fasting.  Understand that the Holy Spirit may bring forth other things to pray for.  Third, are you determined to minister unto the Lord during your fast.  Acts 13:2 tells us that the prophets and teachers at the church in Antioch “ministered to the Lord and fasted.”  Fasting is a time we set aside for ministering to the Lord; it’s not about us getting what we can get from God all the time.  God will move when we fast, but it should be a time when our heart is crying out, “I want to minister to You; I want to love You; I want to know you; I want to draw closer to You; my heart cries out to you.”

The way you approach your fast is extremely important.  If you are not serious about it, then you won’t get real serious results.  The more serious you are about the fast, the more serious God will respond.  If you are frivolous or lighthearted about it-“Well I’ll fast, but I don’t really feel lie it”- that’s not going to work.  Your heart has to be in the fast, and when your heart is in it, there will come a fellowship with God Like you have never known before!

There is an amazing Scripture verse in Zechariah 7:5 “Say to all the people of the land, and to the priests: When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months during those seventy years, did you really fast for me?”  After fasting for this way for seventy years, God asked the question, “Are you fasting for me?”

Did you know that it’s possible to go on a fast and have so many personal motives and agendas that you’re not even fasting unto God-you are fasting for your own wants and desires?  God told the people of Zechariah’s day, “You have been doing this every year at the same time for seventy years, but I want to know if anybody is hungering for Me and My kingdom, for My agenda and purpose and plan in the earth.”

Every time I fast, I get closer to God.  Every time you fast, you will get closer to God.  There is no greater reward than Him.

Perhaps, as a church, we failed to emphasize the importance of prayer and fasting in the body.  The Bible is very clear on this matter.  Is it prudent to follow what the Bible says?  I encourage you to do a word search on fasting in www.biblegateway.com to understand what it says in the Bible and how important fasting is and can be in your life.

Moses fasted:  Exodus 34:28 So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments

Daniel fasted:  Daniel 10:2-3 In those days I, Daniel, was mourning three full weeks.   I ate no pleasant food, no meat or wine came into my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, till three whole weeks were fulfilled

Jesus fasted:  Luke 4:2 being tempted for forty days by the devil. And in those days He ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, He was hungry.

Anna fasted:  Luke 2:37 and this woman was a widow of about eighty-four years, who did not depart from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.

Jesus addressed the question on fasting in:

Mark 2:18-20 The disciples of John and of the Pharisees were fasting. Then they came and said to Him, “Why do the disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but Your disciples do not fast?”  And Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them they cannot fast.  But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days. 

 Folks, we are in the last days and we are to “fast in those days.”  I encourage you to make fasting a consistent part of your life and experience the breakthroughs and blessings God has for your life and the lives around you.

In Jesus Name,

Tony Sanchez

January 3, 2015