FASTING WEEK
Monday 17th - Friday 21 January, 2022
Fasting Week Daily Schedule
Monday 17th
8AM:
Virtual Prayer Room led by West End
Link: Prayer Room
6PM:
Family Time with Jamie & Crooksy
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
Join for prayer and fasting stories
7:30PM:
Prayer Walk at BOTH Re:Hope West End & Re:Hope Southside
Hot drinks provided
Tuesday 18th
8AM:
Virtual Prayer Room led by Southside
Link: Prayer Room
6PM:
Family Time with Laura Campbell
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
Join for prayer and fasting stories
8PM:
Prayer Call
Praying for: Salvations through Alpha
Link: Prayer Room
Wednesday 19th
8AM:
Virtual Prayer Room led by Brian Ingraham
Link: Prayer Room
6PM:
Family Time with Timmy & Jo Andersen
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
Join for prayer and fasting stories
7:30PM:
Prayer & Worship Night at Re:Hope West End
Join us in person or online
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
8PM:
Prayer & Worship Night at Re:Hope Southside
Join us in person
Thursday 20th
8AM:
Virtual Prayer Room led by Royston
Link: Prayer Room
6PM:
Family Time with Naomi Stirrat
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
Join for prayer and fasting stories
8PM:
Prophetic Encouragement Room
Sign up: Prophetic Encouragement
Join via: TBC
Friday 21st
8AM:
Virtual Prayer Room led by Abi Bull
Link: Prayer Room
6PM:
Family Time with Scott & Sarah Anderson
Link: rehopewestend.online.church
Join for prayer and fasting stories
DAILY WORSHIP SESSIONS:
FASTING WEEK PLAYLIST:
LOCATION PRAYER POINTS:
Clear direction and guidance for all the leaders across the Re:Hope family of churches
And increase in spiritual hunger and reawakening.
For reawakening, and opportunities to share the gospel
Men’s ministry with Street Connect to see 4 salvations in 2022
Wee:Hope to be a vibrant outreach to local Royston children with 20 children
For financial viability. Giving and donations to meet all our ministry needs in 2022
Pray for Leadership: Jamie, Crooksy and Brian for protection, health, and vision from God
Pray for Finances: Fiscal viability by 2023
Spiritual Awakening and Salvations in our community
Pray for Leadership: For Laura & Brian, for protection, health and vision from God
Pray for Provision: Of finances, resources, wisdom and help
Pray for Salvations: For missional strategy & spiritual awakening in our community
HELPFUL RESOURCES
Get Ready - Fasting
Extended Fasting
Reawakening Podcast, with Brian Ingraham.
Fasting Guidelines
Introduction
The Leadership of Re:Hope invite you to join us 17th - 21st January for a week of prayer and fasting as we seek God together for His incredible, supernatural break through and Reawakening.
This fasting week is right at the heart of what we believe we - as a church - should be doing: a people who pray together and seek God's direction, revelation, help, and power on behalf of our church, city and nation.
We are excited about the potential in this week, but also fully aware that it’s a huge challenge. In this fasting guide, we hope to explain the heart behind this fast and why we encourage you to join us and experience for yourself the incredible work God does when we seek Him together so powerfully.
What is fasting?
When the word "fasting" appears in both the Old and New Testament, it means "to abstain from food". Although abstaining from luxuries or habits like caffeine, watching TV or using social media can be helpful to realign and grow spirituality, our week of prayer and fasting will be a food fast.
In other words, we’re inviting you to join us in not eating for five days. Sounds crazy, and it is! That’s the point. Fasting is a spiritual discipline of extreme surrender to fleshly desires, and desperately seeking God's super natural intervention in revelation, direction, help and breakthrough.
Why do we fast?
We believe that fasting and prayer are extremely powerful in seeing God release favour, revelation, and breakthrough, not to mention the personal benefits.
You may choose to fast when prompted by the Holy Spirit, or based on a personal decision in a time of need. However, most of the fasts recorded in the Bible are ones where leaders call people to join them in seeking God with prayer and fasting together. Whatever the reason, fasting is an act of physical humility, a great posture for times of intentional prayer and seeking.
Yet when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth;
I humbled myself with fasting, and my prayer was genuine.
Psalm 35:13
At the end of a time of fasting, Jesus was led by the spirit into the desert to be tested. "Man does not live by bread alone." When fasting, we adopt this attitude too - acknowledging that God can sustain us even in physical weakness.
Why a corporate fast?
“But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen, and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
Matthew 6:16-18
Many Christians believe that fasting should only be done in secret. However, we believe that is a misapplication of what Jesus said. In this section, He challenges the people on their heart motives for fasting - are they fasting for the purpose of appearing spiritual, or for the purpose of meeting with the Father? When we read about fasting in the Bible, it is not kept a secret.
Fast Details
• Our fast will be Monday 00:00 through to Friday 23:59.
• Any beverage is okay for this fast.
• Start and end your fast in prayer.
• Set designated prayer times. If you are not accompanying fasting with prayer, it becomes a physical practice, not a spiritual one as you are just simply starving yourself.
Fasting tips
Fasting is hard. We are denying our bodies of a natural need in an act of spiritual dependence on God. We have all tried and failed many one-day fasts, but also succeeded at much longer ones.
Much like training your body and mind to run long distances without stop ping, fasting requires will power, determination and perseverance. Starting with shorter fasts will make a longer one much easier. These things come more naturally with practice.
As long as the heart motive is humility and a desire to seek God in prayer, you will not fail. And if you find it too hard the first time, don’t let this put you off. Just try again another time. In the meantime, here are some tips:
Before:
• If doing an extended fast, avoid high-fat and sugary meals in the days before the fast.
• Eat smaller meals.
• Eat plenty fresh fruit, raw vegetables and cereal like porridge.
During:
• Drink plenty of water.
• Some people avoid caffeine, sugary drinks and artificial sweeteners. Soy protein drinks can cause health problems during a fast.
• Raw fruit or veg juices help stabilise blood sugar.
• If doing an extended fast, taking multivitamins daily will help keep your stores up.
After:
• Break your fast with a light meal consisting of fruit and vegetables. Wait till later to eat animal proteins like meat or dairy.
• If you have fasted for more than two days, your stomach will have shrunk, so eat smaller meals.
• Keep taking multivitamins while your stores rebuild.
Do I have to fast?
There are many good reasons to not fast, medical being the foremost. Additionally, expectant or breastfeeding mothers, and people whose jobs require physical labor or exercise, may not be able to go five days with no food.
Please consider carefully if you are able to participate and do not feel pressured to join. You could try a partial fast, like vegetables only, or a short fast. Feel free to chat to us if you want to discuss what is right for you.
In short, our vision is this: to see God move in our church, city and nation, reawakening hearts to Him, and saving the lost. We believe that throughout history God has responded quickly and powerfully to the humble and urgent prayers of his people. We are convinced that if we take fasting and prayer seriously, we will see significant breakthroughs in our church, captives set free, the sick healed, the lost saved and our culture transformed. It happened before and we believe we can be a part of seeing it happen again.
To Him be the glory!