“God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things, at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every [all] good deed.” 2 Co. 9:8

Did you notice all the all’s in today’s verse?  Webster’s definition of “all” is “any whatsoever; being the utmost possible; everything being taken into account and everything else; in any and every way; to any extent.” (Webster 1984)  However, most Christians’ concept of grace is not this generous.  Grace is seen as a pretty, yet innocuous word to say at the dinner table, and grace is understood to be there at our initial salvation experience: “by grace you have been saved through faith.” (Eph. 2:8)  But the implications of God’s ‘all grace’ span vastly beyond our entry point and into all of our “any whatsoever” things, times, and needs.  In order to live coram Deo, grace needs to become our favorite feast that we freely find before His face for all things, for all times, and for all needs.  

Grace is “charis,” which in the Greek means, “favor, acceptance, unearned benefits; what we cannot do; the bounty and free heartedness of the Giver.” (Zodhiates 1990)  Grace is the bounty of heaven dripping down like honey on any whatsoever we cannot do.  Grace is stepping aside so as not to settle merely for what we can do, but rather make room for Him to “do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us.” (Eph. 3:20)  God’s ‘all grace’ poured out in our lives is like discovering a tool on the computer that allows us to do in 10 minutes what would have taken 10 hours!

By faith in His ‘all grace,’ we can declare daily, “I’m in the right place, at the right time, doing the right things,” even if that means we appear to be stumbling forward more than backwards in life.  Grace is having what we need when we need it for any whatsoever He leads us to do, even if we’re “surrounded and battered by troubles…not sure what to do…spiritually terrorized…and thrown down…to prevent anyone from confusing God’s incomparable power with us.” (2 Co. 4:8-9, 7 MSG)  Christ in us wants His grace to freely flow so that we are whatever He wants to be through us.  It is to God’s glory (i.e., Jesus is seen) when ordinary clay pots bear His extraordinary fruit. 

Adapted from the Coram Deo Secret
http://www.marisarickerson.com/coram-deo.html

Fasting is renouncing the natural by turning to God to invoke the supernatural. When Jesus came out of the desert after fasting for 40 days He, “returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit.” 
(Lk. 4:14)  

Fasting evidently was one of the keys to unlocking the power of the Holy Spirit to flow through His life, for when He returned He began His ministry of empowered, miraculous compassion.  How does this apply to us?  Jesus told the church in John 14:12 that we would do the works that He did, and even greater works.  The works that Jesus did began with fasting.  Jesus specifically used the word “when” instead of “if” in Matthew 6 when He instructed the Church in three Christian disciplines: “when you pray…when you give…when you fast.”  The early church set for us the example of moving out of the natural realm through fasting.  They regularly depended on the Holy Spirit’s supernatural revelation and power to lead them.  And they knew humble fasting released His power, making them instruments through which He was invited to work without hindrance. (Prince Fasting 1986)  

Fasting breaks down barriers in our carnal nature (e.g., self-will of the soul and self-gratifying appetites of the body) so that the Holy Spirit can work unhindered in His fullness through our prayers.  There is an area of God’s will and provision for each of us that can be appropriated only through prayer and fasting.  Simply put, no other part of God’s provision is a substitute for fasting.  Derek Prince uses the following diagram to illustrate this.  The whole triangle ABC represents the complete will of God for every believer.  The unshaded area DBCE represents the area of God’s will that can be appropriated by prayer without fasting.  The smaller shaded triangle ADE represents the area of God’s will that can be appropriated only by prayer and fasting combined.  
    
Many of God’s choicest provisions for His people lie within that top shaded triangle.  (Prince Shaping History Through Fasting 2002)  Fasting was an important part of the life of Jesus’ and the New Testament Church, and it should be an important part of our life.  Yet, many Christians today don’t fast for one simple reason: we just haven’t been doing it!  Give fasting a chance to personally show you its benefits. 
Adapted from the Coram Deo Secret
http://www.marisarickerson.com/coram-deo.html

“No desire of the human heart is safe unless the natural heart is first satisfied by God.”          - Oswald Chambers


There is an unholy trinity at work in our midst: the devil, our flesh, and the world.  Self-sufficiency and pride of life epitomize the character of the unholy trinity.  Fasting is a powerful and extreme act of defiance against the main thing this trio would have us do: rely on any source other than God.  

One of the most amazing patterns I’ve seen after having fasted regularly now for years, is that when I fast even when I can’t afford to because of all the things I have to get done, somehow it all gets done!  Like the promise says, “all those things get added unto me!”  When we fast, even when it seems we can’t afford an empty gas tank, we tap into God’s supernatural fuel and resources.  When we empty our pockets of our scant fish and bread, the Lord of abundance takes that offering and multiplies it so that we have more at the end than we did at the beginning!  David wrote, “I humbled my soul with fasting.” (Ps. 35:13)  When we humble ourselves before His face, it qualifies us for the provision He wants to pour upon us, for God opposes the proud but exalts the humble. (Prince Fasting 1986)

The abundance that has been poured out during my regular fasting experiences, have overcome that core fear of laying down my life; instead, I fear not laying down my life.  When we seek Him and His kingdom business first, He takes care of ours.  Fasting is the one discipline that we can purposefully engage in to experience the principle of true humility firsthand: “I am the power outlet, you are the plug; without Me you can do nothing.”  Fasting tangibly illustrates the Christian life is all about—the great exchange of our meager life for the power of His resurrection life

Fasting reveals the mystery underlying God’s economy: when we lay down our life, we find it.  So often we mindlessly default into living for ourselves.  We give into the pressures of life when we are not regularly and purposefully seeking His face.  We so easily become like the disciples who told Jesus that they would put Him first once other things weren’t so pressing (Mt. 8:22, Lk. 9:60).  At our very core is the fear that if we don’t live for ourselves, we will miss out.  Fasting on a regular basis is like pre-scheduling a tow truck to snatch us out of self-absorbed ditches and get us back on the track of purposefully seeking Him and living for Him!   
                                     
Adapted from the Coram Deo Secret
http://www.marisarickerson.com/coram-deo.html

“There are simply no shortcuts to His Presence, and the surest path…is found in the powerhouse combination of prayer and fasting…Fasting is a choice for God and against the flesh.  When you fast you are making a conscious inward decision demonstrated by an outward act that you want God’s power to flow through you, not your own.” Mahesh Chavda

The message of Anna’s life is that when we abandon ourselves to a spiritual lifestyle of ministering to the Lord with prayer and fasting, which trains us to perceive Him by the Spirit, we will be rewarded with knowing Him and seeing Him. (Pickett 1998)  We see this in Scripture in that only a few people recognized Jesus for who He was even as an infant.  One of them was Anna.  None of the religious experts who were wise in their own eyes ever saw Jesus for who He was.  God as an infant was already declaring that we will only know Him by the Spirit!  We can only truly see His face—see Him for who He is—in Spirit and in truth, or not at all.  Therefore, we must train our hearts to live by what is unseen.  Fasting is a lost key to successfully doing this as seen throughout the Bible, but has been misplaced by the Church today. (Prince Fasting 1986)

Mahesh Chavda, who has completed twenty-nine 40-day fasts and numerous other long-term fasts (and has lived to tell about it!) says, “If you are not in the Spirit, then you cannot see the things of God and experience His glory.  If you will pay the price to seek His face in prayer with fasting then you will experience a life transformation as you literally put on the strength of the Lord and the power of His might!” Cornelius in Acts 10:30-31 is one such example.  He was a man who prayed and fasted for more of God.  As a result he was the first Gentile to believe in Jesus and receive the Holy Spirit.  (Chavda Power of Prayer and Fasting  1998, 107) 

Too often, we Christians are so carnal-minded and so sated by the things of this world, even good Christian works, that we lose our taste buds for what is best.  But just as fasting sensitizes our natural taste buds, it also quickens our spiritual taste buds for discerning His Presence and other things of the Spirit.  Fasting comes with the reward of heightened spirituality, which means we become more sensitive to Him than to even our natural senses. 
                                     
Adapted from the Coram Deo Secret
http://www.marisarickerson.com/coram-deo.html