DAY 8

Are you still in it?

“So the king of Israel answered and said, “Tell him, ‘Let not the one who puts on his armor boast like the one who takes it off.’” — 1 Kings 20:11

“Trash talking,” the exchange of players in games or between people in conflict, is nothing new.  In this verse, we see the king of Israel respond to the verbal barbs of the enemy by indicating, “it’s easy to talk about fighting, but it’s another thing to go into and come out of battle.”
 
As you are now into week 2 of our fasting, I want to encourage you to keep your eye on the goal, finishing the 21 days. I’ve always found starting a project sort of energizing, and completing a task very satisfying.  But right in the middle, what baseball players call the “dog days of summer” (the weeks of late July through August) have always seemed to be a matter of mind over matter, a moment-by-moment choice. I know in my fast, I am experiencing body cravings for my normal food, but I am utilizing those moments as cues to seek God and remind myself of why this discipline is important.
 
Whatever the expression of your fast, let me encourage you to stick with it, to be the one who “takes off the armor.”
 
I’m still in it!