Would you say that you would love for this next year to be the best year of your life? My guess would be YES—after all, who wouldn’t want this year to the best year so far?! And let’s face it, 2020 was pretty weird.
Well, I have to be honest with you. This will only be the best year of your life if it’s the best year of your life spiritually. Yep. And I think it’s so important that it bears repeating…say it out loud…
This will be the best year of my life if it’s the best year of my life spiritually.
That’s the first thing to realize, and it’s huge. The second thing is that you and I need to put first things first. Order is very important. Scripture teaches that doing the right thing first will find God’s blessing and favor on all the other things to follow. It’s called the Principle of First Fruits or the Principle of First. At The Summit, where I pastor, we practice this every week. In fact, every Bible-believing church does this when we gather to worship God on the first day of the week. We’re giving Him the first of our week. This is the best way to see God’s favor in the rest of our week—by giving Him the first of the first day, of the first week.
Maybe you started out your day today with prayer and Bible reading. That’s huge. It greatly increases your chances of God’s favor this very day for you. I wish more believers did that. Again, it’s this Principle of First, and it keeps us focused on the things that are very important—the eternal things. Psalm 90:12 says this way, “Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.” God’s answer so many times in Scripture is to seek Him first and foremost. Press into God; there’s nothing more important than that. So start each day with a conversation with the King. Pray first, and then spend time in His Word, the Bible.
Keys to Making this the Best Year
So we know that praying and spending time in God’s Word is essential to living our best life, yet it always seems so hard to do—or at least to start doing. In fact, most Christians, when surveyed, say that PRAYER was the single most challenging thing about the Christian life to consistently keep up with. So how do we develop a stronger prayer life? I believe there are six keys to helping make this a successful experience for you—and the best year of your life. Here are the first three keys.
Key #1 – Set Your Prayer Purposes
Prayer purposes, for lack of a better term, are the objectives that you have in prayer. I know it sounds a bit business-y, but I don’t want you doing this just because “preacher boy” said so. You need a better reason than that. How about doing it because prayer works! There are many promises in the Bible regarding prayer, so I want you to focus on purposes—objectives, if you will—as you pray that you’re going to trust God for. In fact, I’m going to suggest that you write them down. Journal them. Write down what you’re going to believe God for in 2021.
Now, I probably don’t have to say this but…if the one thing you’re believing for is to win the Powerball lottery, that’s not what the biblical prayer is about. It’s not about figuring out how to manipulate God (which you can’t do) or treat Him like some sort of heavenly vending machine. It’s about getting to know the heart of God so well—getting so close to Him—that you begin to pray for the things that God has on his heart anyway. Your heart is becoming like the heart of Christ. Isn’t that awesome?!
James 4 puts it this way, “You do not have because you do not ask God. And then when you do ask, you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives that you may spend what you asked for on your own pleasures.” So you want a prayer list or prayer objective—really, you want both—that has the right motive, but that’s also very specific. “God, here’s what I’m believing You for. I’m writing it out. I’m showing it to You every day.”
Key #2 – Supercharge Your Prayers with Fasting
The Bible says prayer with fasting is more powerful. Matthew 6 puts it this way, “When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it won’t be obvious to others that you’re fasting, but only to your Father in heaven, who’s unseen, and your Father who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” You might be thinking, why would God reward us for fasting? Well, in context, the Bible makes it clear that if we fast just to get some kind of spiritual brownie points from God, we won’t. But, if we are fasting because we really want to know God better, the Lord loves that, it’s pleasing to Him, and He’ll bless us out of our genuine pursuit of Him. So, prayer and fasting is a great way to start the year.
Next, decide what type of fast you’re going to do. The Bible talks about four or five different types of fasting. There’s a total fast of water only (which if you’re going to do that, make sure you check with your doctor first). There’s also juice fasting in the Bible (denying yourself the pleasure of chewing—yeah, it’s in there) or the Daniel fast, which is one of my favorites. You may want to fast from only certain meals or certain foods every day. You get the point. Find the one that works for you.
Key #3 – Make It About the Heart, Not the Food
Here’s the third key. Make it a heart thing rather than a food thing. We want God to have our hearts; ultimately, that’s what He’s after. We want to connect deeper with Christ at a heart level, and we’re trying to capture this through the spiritual discipline of fasting. But, this is not about food; it’s about us getting closer to Jesus and us doing whatever it takes to do that.
Joel 2:12-13a says the following: “‘Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.” Rend means to tear. So what he’s saying here is that, somewhere in the habit of fasting or publicly praying (so that they can impress others with how spiritual their torn, old looking garments were), it was all fake—only an outward sign of repentance. The problem, of course, is there was no inward sign.
God’s not interested in the outward. He’s not interested in how many prayer meetings you go to, whether or not you can say all the books of the Bible frontwards and backwards, or if you can fast your way down to 80 pounds (please don’t do that!). It’s always been the heart He’s after. So if God doesn’t get your heart, then all you did was fasted for 21 days and basically starved yourself. I believe this is the most important thing we need to focus on here. Make it about the heart more than the food, the heart more than the fast.
I have three more keys to share with you that will help you start this new year off with a real bang! Join me next week for those. In the meantime, I’d like to invite you to join me and The Summit family as we seek God’s heart in 21 days of fasting and praying. We started this morning at 6am MST, but even if you missed a day or two, it’s not too late to join us. Hope to see you online!