True fasting should be accompanied by a righteous repentance. It is devoted to the sanctification of God and takes us a step forward. Abba Joseph, Bishop of Texas, in his article Why did we fast? asks what we got after all fasts. He said that it s all about the quality and not the quantity.
Mount Mokattam was moved in only three days through fasting and praying. Fasting therefore, should be accompanied by prayer, praise, love and forgiveness. The bible says:
Declare a holy fast;
call a sacred assembly.
Summon the elders and all who live in the land to the house of the Lord your God, and cry out to the Lord. (Joel 1: 14)
God showed us the quality such fasting in (Isaiah 58: 6-7)
“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
May God grant us to offer true acceptable fasting before Him until we reach the spiritual quality that He wants.
