Bible Supporting Step 1
Note: I Highly recommend going through all the steps before reading the Bible support behind them.
The entire idea behind singlevsporn.com is that unmarried people and married people are fighting very different battles when it comes to porn addiction. Married people are trying to establish a right and exclusive relationship with their spouse, and the unmarried people are really looking to fast in this area of their life until they are married.
I believe I Corinthians 7:3-5 speaks to both groups of people.
1Co 7:3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband.
1Co 7:4 The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.
1Co 7:5 Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.
Porn addiction defrauds marriage. Sex is exclusively for marriage but remember Jesus said that if you look upon a woman to lust after her then you have committed adultery. So marriage exclusivity is more than just sex, according to Jesus its also who you look at. I do not have time to go over all the areas where marriage is exclusive, go over that with whomever councils you, but this passage of scripture is really dealing with all of them.
What this passage of scripture is saying is that if a married couple cannot meet each other’s exclusive needs then they should be fasting. But as a single person you have no way to biblically have your sexual desires met outside of getting married, so until then fast.
The first time in the Bible that fasting is mentioned is in judges 20:26. In Judges 19 some men of the tribe of Benjamin committed a grave sexual sin, and it was made known to all of Israel. All of Israel showed up in the land of Benjamin and told the tribe to give up the men who had committed the sin, but they wouldn’t, so Israel fought with the tribe a Benjamin and lost. Then they fought again and they lost again. Twice Israel lost battles to sexual sin, so before the third battle they fasted, and then they were given the victory.
It is very noteworthy that the first mention of fasting in the Bible is due to sexual sin, and the battle to overcome it. It is worth noting that they lost the battle until they fasted.
The second fast mentioned in the Bible is in I Samuel 7:6. Before the fast Israel got the ark of the covenant back, and the people hearts lamented for the Lord. Samuel tells the people if they are going to serve God they need to put away all their strange idols. But in the middle of putting away their sin they fasted.
As you put away the things that draw you to porn fasting will significantly help you.
The third time the Bible mentions fasting is in I Samuel 31, and II Samuel 1. And it is because the people are mourning the death of Saul and Johnathan.
The fourth time Fasting is found in the Bible it is found after David has committed sexual sin with Bathsheba in II Samuel 12. David is fasting to avoid the consequences of his sin. That is not going to happen. You are going to reap what you sow. But after David is done fasting, it clearly shows the fasting helped him. He fasted as the consequences of his sin took place in his life, once the consequences of his sin passed, David worshipped. Fasting helped him deal with the consequences.
The consequences of the sin of porn are not fun. They are not going to go away quickly either. If you fast a few days with the mindset that fasting will magically allow you to avoid the withdrawal symptoms of porn you will be disappointed. But if you fast in order to withstand the consequences of porn then you will worship.
The fifth time fasting is found in the Bible is in I Kings 21. The king wanted a man’s (Naboth) land, and he wouldn’t sell. The queen told the king she would get him the land, and she had a fast proclaimed to destroy Naboth. We are not told the reason for the fast. I imagine everyone wanted to show how religious they were because this fasted had no reason behind it. During the fast the queen had a couple of men accuse the man of blasphemy and had him stoned to death. Fasting should always have a specific purpose behind it. Fasting for religions sake is dangerous, just ask Naboth.
In I Chronicles 10 we hear the retelling of men recovering the bodies of Saul and his son and fasting and mourning them.
In II Chronicles 20 a battle came to Jehoshaphat that he could not win. Three nations rose up against him, he was surrounded on all sides. The only way Jehoshaphat could think to fight this overwhelming battle was too fast. Fasting led to his victory.
In Ezra 8, Ezra needed to get people to Jerusalem but he already told the king God would protect him, so he was too ashamed to ask for the king to send soldiers to protect them on the journey, so he and the people he was journeying with fasted, and God entreated them, and kept them from being attacked on their journey.
In Nehemiah 1 Nehemiah heard the awful news about Jerusalem and due to his grief he fasted.
In Nehemiah 9:1 we find the children of Israel fasting, and after they fasted they confessed their sins. It is not saying they prayed a silent prayer confessing their sins to God without letting anybody else know what there sin was. It says after they fasted they stood and confessed their sin. I strongly recommend fasting before you confess your addiction to anybody, but due to the nature of the addiction I recommend only confessing to one person who can help you bear the burden of the withdrawal symptoms.
Fasting is mentioned 3 times in the book of Esther. The first time was when the Jews found out the king had sent out an ordinance that basically said that on a certain day he would pay people to kill the jews. They fasted because they were in mourning.
The next time fasting is mentioned is when Esther’s uncle tells Esther to save her people (in chapter 4). Her Uncle had told her to not tell anyone she was a Jew (in chapter 2), and then she became the queen, then her husband (the king) commanded for all her people to die. When he did that he did not know she was a Jew. To make matters worse he could have casually had her executed for entering the throne room without his permission. For her husband this was a marriage of his convenience. To sum it up he just ordered all the jews killed, she was a jew, he didn’t know it, and he could casually have her executed. In a very real way she fasted so that God would help her reveal her secret to her husband, because there could be some very bad consequences to revealing her secret to him. Her fasting gave her the courage to reveal her secret and through that fasting God gave Esther favor in the kings sight (Esther chapter 5).
The final time fasting is mentioned in the book of Esther is in chapter 9. The children of Israel were commanded to remember her fast, in which she revealed her secret, with feasting, on a day known as Purim.
Psalms 35 is the next time fasting is mentioned. David talks about how he fasted for his father in law when he was sick. In a very real way Saul was a boss, and a battle buddy before he ever became David’s father in law, but Saul still betrayed David. Again fasting does not fix everything, but, in part, because of David’s fasting when Saul was in David’s hands David honored God in how he treated Saul.
Psalm 69 is a psalm of mourning, and again fasting is linked to mourning.
When David was betrayed he wrote Psalms 109. The betrayal grieved David, and David through his grief fasted.
Psalms only mentions fasting 3 times but every mention of fasting has to do with grief, since the psalms where all meant to be sung it makes sense that the focus was grief. How many songs are on the radio today that are all about sorrow?
The next time fasting is dealt with in the Bible is in Isaiah 58. There are 4 verses in a row talking specifically about fasting, and the contrast between how men fast to do WICKEDLY vs the reason why God has men fast. The first two verses made it clear that God did not care for their fast because they fasted to show how religious they were. Heck it says they fasted to win debates. Today perhaps someone will fast to say they are a good Christian, or Muslim, or Hindu, or Buddhist. Isaiah 58 makes it clear this kind of fast makes God angry. This kind of fast cost Naboth his life back in I Kings!
Fasting is never about how strong you are. These wicked men in Isaiah who were fasting were doing so to prove how strong they were. They missed the point of fasting. Fasting always makes a man weaker. The times you fast are times where you are saying you are too weak to do something, and God must move on your behalf.
God then tells them very specific reasons to fast, “to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke.”
How does this not speak to my porn addiction? My porn addiction had me bound, but fasting loosens the bands of porn. Porn is a heavy burden, but fasting undo’s it. Porn oppressed me, but fasting let me free. Porn yoked me, but fasting breaks that yoke. No matter the addiction fasting is clearly part of the process of dealing with the addiction.
I do want to note here, there is no specific days of fasting called for in the Bible. Biblical God honoring fasting is always done when dealing with a specific situation. There are many feast days in the Bible, there are no fasting days in the Bible outside of bad situations. This is clearly highlighted on the day of Purim, where the people were commanded to keep a FEAST in order to remember a fast.
In Jerimiah 36 fasting is mentioned twice. Jerimiah was living in Jerusalem during a time of great sin. God told Jerimiah to write down what God told him and to give it to someone to read to the people. They proclaimed a fast and then read the words, in the hope that the people would repent. They didn’t. Fasting is strongly linked to repentance but fasting isn’t magical, just because you fast doesn’t mean that someone else will get right with God. In this case they brought what Jerimiah had written before the king and he cut it up and threw it in a fire. Fasting in essence is very effective as a part of personal repentance but it does not force other people to do right.
This does not negate the fact that at times you will likely be brought to grief by someone’s sin and fast and pray for them because of that grief. God isn’t a genie, fasting does not make God grant you a wish immediately. But we need to keep fasting in its proper context, fasting does not make other people do right. But it does sooth the soul when we are in grief.
In Daniel 6 the king is grieved because Daniel is thrown into the lions den so he fasts.
In Daniel 9 we find fasting to be a part of repentance, and confession.
In the book of Joel fasting is mentioned 3 times. When you read the book it is clear that God is upset with the children of Israel and he is telling the people the judgement he is about to send, unless they repent and fast. The book of Joel is clearly showing fasting as a stage of repentance. Not to mention weeping and morning. Sin always brings sorrow to the believer.
The book of Jonah continues where Joel left off. Jonah tells the people of Ninivah that God is going to destroy them, so they fast AND turn from their wicked ways. Again fasting is often a part of repentance.
The book of Zechariah is the last book of the old testament to mention fasting and it mentions it twice. The children of Israel had been in captivity for 70 years fasting to be free and get Jerusalem back, finally after all these years God was going to answer their prayer. Then in chapter 8 God tells them that the fasting they did for 70 years in the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth month would be turned into feasting. This is the second time where God specifically turned a fast into a feast. God wants to turn all righteous fasting into worship, and joy.
The first time fasting is mentioned in the new testament is the only time Jesus fasted, in Matthew 4. Jesus fasted during temptation.
Then in Matthew 6 Jesus warns against using fasting to look religious. Fasting is about doing business with God.
Matthew 9, Mark 2, and Luke 5 all have the same story of the disciples of John asking Jesus why they fast and the disciples of Jesus don’t. Jesus told them that the children of the bride chamber cannot fast as long as the bridegroom was with them, but there would come a day where they would need to fast.
In Matthew 15 and Mark 8 Jesus was followed by a multitude and when it came time to send them away Jesus wouldn’t do it because they needed to eat before they left. He said that if he sent them away fasting they would faint. Fasting makes one weak and they were in a place where they should not be weak and therefore should not fast.
Matthew 17 and Mark 9 mention fasting in a very eye opening manner. Jesus tells his disciples that this kind doesn’t go out but by prayer and fasting. There are times in our life where fasting is mandatory. I believe addiction, especially porn addiction, is one of those times.
In Luke 2 we find an amazing widow who serves God with prayer and fasting. A widow in those days had no rights, yet she was a widow for over 84 years and served God in the temple. A widow in those days especially one without children was a humbled person. And yet she served God with prayer and fasting. It says that she spake of him to all those who looked for redemption in Jerusalem. I would imagine that her prayer and fasting were all about the redemption of Jerusalem.
In Luke 18 Jesus gives a parable about a Pharisee that fasted twice a week (among other religious nonsense) to exalt himself, and Jesus makes it clear that he will be abased.
In Acts 10 we find Cornelius a lost man fasting, and in that fasting God tells him where to find Simon Peter. And Simon Peter gets to lead him to Christ.
In Acts 13 we find men fasting as they served the Lord, and God called Paul and Barnabas to be sent away, so the men there fasted and prayed over them and sent them away. In Acts 14 they ordained elders in the church with prayer and fasting.
In II Corinthians 6 there is a long list of things we should do to approve ourselves ministers of God and one of those things is fasting.
The final time fasting is mentioned in the Bible is in II Corinthians 11 fasting is mentioned along with a lot of other infirmities, and Paul finishes out his list of infirmities by saying he GLORIES in his infirmities. There is going to come a day where you are past the suffering of fasting, and past the suffering of the withdrawal symptoms, and past the suffering of porn, and you will look back and glory in your infirmities. There will come a day where you are thankful for all the suffering you went through to overcome this addiction.
Conclusion
The very desire to stop looking at porn and masturbating is a desire to fast. Although this list does not include every instance of fasting in the Bible it includes most of them. I wrote this so that you can better understand what you are doing or desire to do.
I hope you understand that if someone tries to fast because they think they are a strong Christian, then it makes God mad. God honors our fasting when we do it because we recognize our weakness. Perhaps you thought you couldn’t fast because of your addiction, but that very addiction makes you one of the most qualified people to fast. Fasting is not about being a strong Christian, its about recognizing your need for God’s strength in your life.
Fasting may need to become part of your regular schedule, several new testament figures fasted often. That’s fine, as long as you don’t do it out of pride I think God will honor that.
It is worth noting the first time fasting is mentioned in the Bible it is very much in reference to a sexual sin. It is worth noting that David fasted because of his sexual sin with Bathsheba. Two times fasting is mentioned in reference to sexual sin. That is worth noting.
Many times fasting is mentioned because men could not win battles.
In two Gospels Jesus said some things can only be dealt with by prayer and fasting.
I say this because I see fasting as a major step in overcoming addiction in the Christian life.
That said there were two times where God commanded the people to remember their fast with feasting. It is my hope for myself that as I no longer look at porn or masturbate that this fast of the libido will become a feast in my marriage. Not so much a feast of sex, but a feast of intimacy.
Unfortunately porn and the world has largely taught me that sex is a better form of masturbation, but around the 90 or 100 day mark I saw sex radically different for the first time. I clearly saw it as intimacy (Marcie Aikens book the Crooked stick gave me a peek into that view but until I was past the 3 month mark I couldn’t clearly see intimacy).
Porn and masturbation is all about getting the orgasm, intimacy is about the whole man.
I guess the reason why I am writing this part is because so often the advice given to the unmarried Christians who struggle with a porn addiction is that when you get married you will be able to have lots of sex, and the truth is no one can know that, the truth is no one can even know if you will get married.
The reality of the situation is that after you are married disease, distance, or depression can easily keep you from having sex, or sex that often. If your hope is that because you stopped masturbating as a single person God owes you a lot of sex when you are married then you are wrong. God doesn’t owe you anything. You owe your wife and you owe yourself intimacy when you are married, if that involves a lot of sex or not doesn’t matter.
The reality is you or her could have a job or situation where you are separated for long periods of time. I know a guy who did six 1 year tours in the middle east. He was married at 18. He has spent more years away from his wife than with her. Yet they could still practice intellectual, emotional, and spiritual intimacy when they could not practice physical intimacy.
The reality is your wife may have a physical condition that makes her unable to have sex. One lady tells of the first 3 and a half years of her marriage not being able to consummate her marriage due to the physical pain on her website https://unveiledwife.com/ (use your discretion on whether you should visit this site or not) because she was allergic to something in her face cream. Took her and her husband 3 and a half years to figure it out. She described the pain by saying she cried when they tried to have sex but did not cry during childbirth. During this time they could practice intellectual, emotional, spiritual intimacy, and some physical intimacy, but they could not practice sex.
As a Christian when we say we are trusting God, are we trusting God just in the good times or in all things? If this situation were to happen to you would you unconditionally love your wife?
Many times because women have been abused sexually they recoil at the idea of sex. 1 in 5 women under age of 18 have been sexually abused. Intimacy will allow you to work through her pain. Furthermore it is not uncommon for a guy to talk a girl to having sex with him and then after her first experience he never has anything to do with her again, which links sex to abandonment in her mind. It is not uncommon for women to be depressed by the idea of sex because of her past. Intimacy deals with that.
I wrote this simply because I strongly want to discourage the idea that because you cut out porn now means God will give you lots of sex with a wife latter. God designed marriage for intimacy, and that is the feast we are going to celebrate our porn fast with. Porn by its very nature destroys intimacy, God designed marriage to be the most intimate relationship possible but that level of intimacy is only possible when we are prepared to be exclusive in marriage, no matter what.
I want to be clear here, I am not fasting from porn, so that I will have a great future marriage, great future marriage sex, or lots of future legal sex. I am fasting from porn because porn is sin, porn makes me depressed, porn makes me desperate, If I die a virgin then I am fine with that too because I HATE PORN. If the only thing this fast does for me is allowing me to never look at porn again or masturbate again then I am thrilled. It was worth it.
If this fast is remembered with feasting, I will rejoice, if it is not remembered at all I will still rejoice!
The entire idea behind singlevsporn.com is that unmarried people and married people are fighting very different battles when it comes to porn addiction. Married people are trying to establish a right and exclusive relationship with their spouse, and the unmarried people are really looking to fast in this area of their life until they are married.
I believe I Corinthians 7:3-5 speaks to both groups of people.
1Co 7:3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband.
1Co 7:4 The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.
1Co 7:5 Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.
Porn addiction defrauds marriage. Sex is exclusively for marriage but remember Jesus said that if you look upon a woman to lust after her then you have committed adultery. So marriage exclusivity is more than just sex, according to Jesus its also who you look at. I do not have time to go over all the areas where marriage is exclusive, go over that with whomever councils you, but this passage of scripture is really dealing with all of them.
What this passage of scripture is saying is that if a married couple cannot meet each other’s exclusive needs then they should be fasting. But as a single person you have no way to biblically have your sexual desires met outside of getting married, so until then fast.
The first time in the Bible that fasting is mentioned is in judges 20:26. In Judges 19 some men of the tribe of Benjamin committed a grave sexual sin, and it was made known to all of Israel. All of Israel showed up in the land of Benjamin and told the tribe to give up the men who had committed the sin, but they wouldn’t, so Israel fought with the tribe a Benjamin and lost. Then they fought again and they lost again. Twice Israel lost battles to sexual sin, so before the third battle they fasted, and then they were given the victory.
It is very noteworthy that the first mention of fasting in the Bible is due to sexual sin, and the battle to overcome it. It is worth noting that they lost the battle until they fasted.
The second fast mentioned in the Bible is in I Samuel 7:6. Before the fast Israel got the ark of the covenant back, and the people hearts lamented for the Lord. Samuel tells the people if they are going to serve God they need to put away all their strange idols. But in the middle of putting away their sin they fasted.
As you put away the things that draw you to porn fasting will significantly help you.
The third time the Bible mentions fasting is in I Samuel 31, and II Samuel 1. And it is because the people are mourning the death of Saul and Johnathan.
The fourth time Fasting is found in the Bible it is found after David has committed sexual sin with Bathsheba in II Samuel 12. David is fasting to avoid the consequences of his sin. That is not going to happen. You are going to reap what you sow. But after David is done fasting, it clearly shows the fasting helped him. He fasted as the consequences of his sin took place in his life, once the consequences of his sin passed, David worshipped. Fasting helped him deal with the consequences.
The consequences of the sin of porn are not fun. They are not going to go away quickly either. If you fast a few days with the mindset that fasting will magically allow you to avoid the withdrawal symptoms of porn you will be disappointed. But if you fast in order to withstand the consequences of porn then you will worship.
The fifth time fasting is found in the Bible is in I Kings 21. The king wanted a man’s (Naboth) land, and he wouldn’t sell. The queen told the king she would get him the land, and she had a fast proclaimed to destroy Naboth. We are not told the reason for the fast. I imagine everyone wanted to show how religious they were because this fasted had no reason behind it. During the fast the queen had a couple of men accuse the man of blasphemy and had him stoned to death. Fasting should always have a specific purpose behind it. Fasting for religions sake is dangerous, just ask Naboth.
In I Chronicles 10 we hear the retelling of men recovering the bodies of Saul and his son and fasting and mourning them.
In II Chronicles 20 a battle came to Jehoshaphat that he could not win. Three nations rose up against him, he was surrounded on all sides. The only way Jehoshaphat could think to fight this overwhelming battle was too fast. Fasting led to his victory.
In Ezra 8, Ezra needed to get people to Jerusalem but he already told the king God would protect him, so he was too ashamed to ask for the king to send soldiers to protect them on the journey, so he and the people he was journeying with fasted, and God entreated them, and kept them from being attacked on their journey.
In Nehemiah 1 Nehemiah heard the awful news about Jerusalem and due to his grief he fasted.
In Nehemiah 9:1 we find the children of Israel fasting, and after they fasted they confessed their sins. It is not saying they prayed a silent prayer confessing their sins to God without letting anybody else know what there sin was. It says after they fasted they stood and confessed their sin. I strongly recommend fasting before you confess your addiction to anybody, but due to the nature of the addiction I recommend only confessing to one person who can help you bear the burden of the withdrawal symptoms.
Fasting is mentioned 3 times in the book of Esther. The first time was when the Jews found out the king had sent out an ordinance that basically said that on a certain day he would pay people to kill the jews. They fasted because they were in mourning.
The next time fasting is mentioned is when Esther’s uncle tells Esther to save her people (in chapter 4). Her Uncle had told her to not tell anyone she was a Jew (in chapter 2), and then she became the queen, then her husband (the king) commanded for all her people to die. When he did that he did not know she was a Jew. To make matters worse he could have casually had her executed for entering the throne room without his permission. For her husband this was a marriage of his convenience. To sum it up he just ordered all the jews killed, she was a jew, he didn’t know it, and he could casually have her executed. In a very real way she fasted so that God would help her reveal her secret to her husband, because there could be some very bad consequences to revealing her secret to him. Her fasting gave her the courage to reveal her secret and through that fasting God gave Esther favor in the kings sight (Esther chapter 5).
The final time fasting is mentioned in the book of Esther is in chapter 9. The children of Israel were commanded to remember her fast, in which she revealed her secret, with feasting, on a day known as Purim.
Psalms 35 is the next time fasting is mentioned. David talks about how he fasted for his father in law when he was sick. In a very real way Saul was a boss, and a battle buddy before he ever became David’s father in law, but Saul still betrayed David. Again fasting does not fix everything, but, in part, because of David’s fasting when Saul was in David’s hands David honored God in how he treated Saul.
Psalm 69 is a psalm of mourning, and again fasting is linked to mourning.
When David was betrayed he wrote Psalms 109. The betrayal grieved David, and David through his grief fasted.
Psalms only mentions fasting 3 times but every mention of fasting has to do with grief, since the psalms where all meant to be sung it makes sense that the focus was grief. How many songs are on the radio today that are all about sorrow?
The next time fasting is dealt with in the Bible is in Isaiah 58. There are 4 verses in a row talking specifically about fasting, and the contrast between how men fast to do WICKEDLY vs the reason why God has men fast. The first two verses made it clear that God did not care for their fast because they fasted to show how religious they were. Heck it says they fasted to win debates. Today perhaps someone will fast to say they are a good Christian, or Muslim, or Hindu, or Buddhist. Isaiah 58 makes it clear this kind of fast makes God angry. This kind of fast cost Naboth his life back in I Kings!
Fasting is never about how strong you are. These wicked men in Isaiah who were fasting were doing so to prove how strong they were. They missed the point of fasting. Fasting always makes a man weaker. The times you fast are times where you are saying you are too weak to do something, and God must move on your behalf.
God then tells them very specific reasons to fast, “to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke.”
How does this not speak to my porn addiction? My porn addiction had me bound, but fasting loosens the bands of porn. Porn is a heavy burden, but fasting undo’s it. Porn oppressed me, but fasting let me free. Porn yoked me, but fasting breaks that yoke. No matter the addiction fasting is clearly part of the process of dealing with the addiction.
I do want to note here, there is no specific days of fasting called for in the Bible. Biblical God honoring fasting is always done when dealing with a specific situation. There are many feast days in the Bible, there are no fasting days in the Bible outside of bad situations. This is clearly highlighted on the day of Purim, where the people were commanded to keep a FEAST in order to remember a fast.
In Jerimiah 36 fasting is mentioned twice. Jerimiah was living in Jerusalem during a time of great sin. God told Jerimiah to write down what God told him and to give it to someone to read to the people. They proclaimed a fast and then read the words, in the hope that the people would repent. They didn’t. Fasting is strongly linked to repentance but fasting isn’t magical, just because you fast doesn’t mean that someone else will get right with God. In this case they brought what Jerimiah had written before the king and he cut it up and threw it in a fire. Fasting in essence is very effective as a part of personal repentance but it does not force other people to do right.
This does not negate the fact that at times you will likely be brought to grief by someone’s sin and fast and pray for them because of that grief. God isn’t a genie, fasting does not make God grant you a wish immediately. But we need to keep fasting in its proper context, fasting does not make other people do right. But it does sooth the soul when we are in grief.
In Daniel 6 the king is grieved because Daniel is thrown into the lions den so he fasts.
In Daniel 9 we find fasting to be a part of repentance, and confession.
In the book of Joel fasting is mentioned 3 times. When you read the book it is clear that God is upset with the children of Israel and he is telling the people the judgement he is about to send, unless they repent and fast. The book of Joel is clearly showing fasting as a stage of repentance. Not to mention weeping and morning. Sin always brings sorrow to the believer.
The book of Jonah continues where Joel left off. Jonah tells the people of Ninivah that God is going to destroy them, so they fast AND turn from their wicked ways. Again fasting is often a part of repentance.
The book of Zechariah is the last book of the old testament to mention fasting and it mentions it twice. The children of Israel had been in captivity for 70 years fasting to be free and get Jerusalem back, finally after all these years God was going to answer their prayer. Then in chapter 8 God tells them that the fasting they did for 70 years in the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth month would be turned into feasting. This is the second time where God specifically turned a fast into a feast. God wants to turn all righteous fasting into worship, and joy.
The first time fasting is mentioned in the new testament is the only time Jesus fasted, in Matthew 4. Jesus fasted during temptation.
Then in Matthew 6 Jesus warns against using fasting to look religious. Fasting is about doing business with God.
Matthew 9, Mark 2, and Luke 5 all have the same story of the disciples of John asking Jesus why they fast and the disciples of Jesus don’t. Jesus told them that the children of the bride chamber cannot fast as long as the bridegroom was with them, but there would come a day where they would need to fast.
In Matthew 15 and Mark 8 Jesus was followed by a multitude and when it came time to send them away Jesus wouldn’t do it because they needed to eat before they left. He said that if he sent them away fasting they would faint. Fasting makes one weak and they were in a place where they should not be weak and therefore should not fast.
Matthew 17 and Mark 9 mention fasting in a very eye opening manner. Jesus tells his disciples that this kind doesn’t go out but by prayer and fasting. There are times in our life where fasting is mandatory. I believe addiction, especially porn addiction, is one of those times.
In Luke 2 we find an amazing widow who serves God with prayer and fasting. A widow in those days had no rights, yet she was a widow for over 84 years and served God in the temple. A widow in those days especially one without children was a humbled person. And yet she served God with prayer and fasting. It says that she spake of him to all those who looked for redemption in Jerusalem. I would imagine that her prayer and fasting were all about the redemption of Jerusalem.
In Luke 18 Jesus gives a parable about a Pharisee that fasted twice a week (among other religious nonsense) to exalt himself, and Jesus makes it clear that he will be abased.
In Acts 10 we find Cornelius a lost man fasting, and in that fasting God tells him where to find Simon Peter. And Simon Peter gets to lead him to Christ.
In Acts 13 we find men fasting as they served the Lord, and God called Paul and Barnabas to be sent away, so the men there fasted and prayed over them and sent them away. In Acts 14 they ordained elders in the church with prayer and fasting.
In II Corinthians 6 there is a long list of things we should do to approve ourselves ministers of God and one of those things is fasting.
The final time fasting is mentioned in the Bible is in II Corinthians 11 fasting is mentioned along with a lot of other infirmities, and Paul finishes out his list of infirmities by saying he GLORIES in his infirmities. There is going to come a day where you are past the suffering of fasting, and past the suffering of the withdrawal symptoms, and past the suffering of porn, and you will look back and glory in your infirmities. There will come a day where you are thankful for all the suffering you went through to overcome this addiction.
Conclusion
The very desire to stop looking at porn and masturbating is a desire to fast. Although this list does not include every instance of fasting in the Bible it includes most of them. I wrote this so that you can better understand what you are doing or desire to do.
I hope you understand that if someone tries to fast because they think they are a strong Christian, then it makes God mad. God honors our fasting when we do it because we recognize our weakness. Perhaps you thought you couldn’t fast because of your addiction, but that very addiction makes you one of the most qualified people to fast. Fasting is not about being a strong Christian, its about recognizing your need for God’s strength in your life.
Fasting may need to become part of your regular schedule, several new testament figures fasted often. That’s fine, as long as you don’t do it out of pride I think God will honor that.
It is worth noting the first time fasting is mentioned in the Bible it is very much in reference to a sexual sin. It is worth noting that David fasted because of his sexual sin with Bathsheba. Two times fasting is mentioned in reference to sexual sin. That is worth noting.
Many times fasting is mentioned because men could not win battles.
In two Gospels Jesus said some things can only be dealt with by prayer and fasting.
I say this because I see fasting as a major step in overcoming addiction in the Christian life.
That said there were two times where God commanded the people to remember their fast with feasting. It is my hope for myself that as I no longer look at porn or masturbate that this fast of the libido will become a feast in my marriage. Not so much a feast of sex, but a feast of intimacy.
Unfortunately porn and the world has largely taught me that sex is a better form of masturbation, but around the 90 or 100 day mark I saw sex radically different for the first time. I clearly saw it as intimacy (Marcie Aikens book the Crooked stick gave me a peek into that view but until I was past the 3 month mark I couldn’t clearly see intimacy).
Porn and masturbation is all about getting the orgasm, intimacy is about the whole man.
I guess the reason why I am writing this part is because so often the advice given to the unmarried Christians who struggle with a porn addiction is that when you get married you will be able to have lots of sex, and the truth is no one can know that, the truth is no one can even know if you will get married.
The reality of the situation is that after you are married disease, distance, or depression can easily keep you from having sex, or sex that often. If your hope is that because you stopped masturbating as a single person God owes you a lot of sex when you are married then you are wrong. God doesn’t owe you anything. You owe your wife and you owe yourself intimacy when you are married, if that involves a lot of sex or not doesn’t matter.
The reality is you or her could have a job or situation where you are separated for long periods of time. I know a guy who did six 1 year tours in the middle east. He was married at 18. He has spent more years away from his wife than with her. Yet they could still practice intellectual, emotional, and spiritual intimacy when they could not practice physical intimacy.
The reality is your wife may have a physical condition that makes her unable to have sex. One lady tells of the first 3 and a half years of her marriage not being able to consummate her marriage due to the physical pain on her website https://unveiledwife.com/ (use your discretion on whether you should visit this site or not) because she was allergic to something in her face cream. Took her and her husband 3 and a half years to figure it out. She described the pain by saying she cried when they tried to have sex but did not cry during childbirth. During this time they could practice intellectual, emotional, spiritual intimacy, and some physical intimacy, but they could not practice sex.
As a Christian when we say we are trusting God, are we trusting God just in the good times or in all things? If this situation were to happen to you would you unconditionally love your wife?
Many times because women have been abused sexually they recoil at the idea of sex. 1 in 5 women under age of 18 have been sexually abused. Intimacy will allow you to work through her pain. Furthermore it is not uncommon for a guy to talk a girl to having sex with him and then after her first experience he never has anything to do with her again, which links sex to abandonment in her mind. It is not uncommon for women to be depressed by the idea of sex because of her past. Intimacy deals with that.
I wrote this simply because I strongly want to discourage the idea that because you cut out porn now means God will give you lots of sex with a wife latter. God designed marriage for intimacy, and that is the feast we are going to celebrate our porn fast with. Porn by its very nature destroys intimacy, God designed marriage to be the most intimate relationship possible but that level of intimacy is only possible when we are prepared to be exclusive in marriage, no matter what.
I want to be clear here, I am not fasting from porn, so that I will have a great future marriage, great future marriage sex, or lots of future legal sex. I am fasting from porn because porn is sin, porn makes me depressed, porn makes me desperate, If I die a virgin then I am fine with that too because I HATE PORN. If the only thing this fast does for me is allowing me to never look at porn again or masturbate again then I am thrilled. It was worth it.
If this fast is remembered with feasting, I will rejoice, if it is not remembered at all I will still rejoice!