Here are some questions based on last Sunday’s sermon text (Matthew 6:16-18), in case they’re helpful to you for personal growth or group discussion…

• Fasting is abstaining from food for spiritual purposes. It is something Jesus expects his disciples will do, and he connects it especially to mourning the absence of a dearly loved one (Matthew 9:14-17). We need food for life—spiritual fasting is the profession that we need God more deeply than we need food. It expresses (and cultivates) a hunger for Jesus, the Bread of Life. Have you done spiritual fasting? Why or why not? If you have fasted, what significance did it have for your relationship with God?

• Do you have a hunger for God, a hunger to be with Jesus? What is it about Jesus that makes you feel your need for him? Have you thought of fasting as a way to focus in prayer and grow in your hunger for God?

• The reward the Father gives us for being hungry for the Bread of Life is… the Bread of Life! Jesus fasted for 40 days in the wilderness, and the only thing he had to sustain him during that time was the Father’s declaration of love to him at his baptism (Matthew 3:13 – 4:2). He was hungry for food, but he was hungrier for God, he found his only true satisfaction in his relationship with the Father. He invites us to meet with him in fasting like his, he shares his hunger for God with us. Even in the very act of hungering for God we receive the Bread of Life, because we commune with Jesus in fasting. Does fasting seem like a gift, like good news for your relationship with God? Are you thankful to be able to meet with Jesus in places like fasting? What does it mean to you that you have the privilege of relating to him in your hunger for God? Can you think of some Psalms to use while fasting? Can you think of how Jesus himself would have used Psalms like this to give expression to his (perfect) relationship with God? How is a Christianity that includes fasting different from—and better than—a “prosperity gospel”?

• FOR THE CHILDREN: Can you think of a time when you skipped a meal or two? How did that feel, being so hungry? Can you imagine being hungry like that to see a loved one that you haven’t been able to see for a long time? Can you imagine being hungry like that to see Jesus? Pray that the Father would make you hungrier for your relationship with him than you are for food.