The Power of the Fast

Many times in my life I have exercised faith in the principle of fasting. As a result I have seen marvelous and miraculous things.  I also participate in the paying of tithes and offerings.  Here too I have seen many miracles.  These are principles of the Bible that a lot of people don't as frequently participate in, but I can't help but want to when I see so many immediate blessings in my life.  Malachi is an expert when he explains the commandment and blessing in chapter 3 vs. 10 "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it."

There are lots of ways to tithe.  I try to tithe both my income (money) and time (service).  Each one I strive to give a minimum of 10%.  One such blessing happened this particular week.  As a default I pay tithing the first week of every month, for the income I plan to receive that month.  My husband gets paid quarterly bonuses as well.  Without going into too much detail, the first week of this month, I paid the tithing for our household on both April's income as well as the first quarter bonus.  The bonus that had come in the check I noticed was not as much as it should have been, but before we had time to address it with his employers, I decided to still faithfully pay on the intended amount assuming the details would work out later, because I had trust in the Lord.

Just yesterday, my husband came out to me as I was working in the backyard and he said, "Good news, bad news"  Of course I wanted the bad first and he said, "Bad news is they are doing another round of layoffs/furloughs today, good news is I am safe once again."  You see this is the second round since this COVID stuff has started.  I felt hugely relieved, even though I hadn't realized they were going to do another round.  These are scary economical times and Travis is one of their newest employees.  Immediately the words came to my mind, "this is your blessing for paying your tithes".  Now this isn't to insinuate that every tithe payer will never lose their job or face economic difficulties, but that Heavenly Father spoke from heaven to me regarding my circumstances this past week.

Despite my initial relief for my own personal circumstances, I couldn't feel joy yet.  My heart hurt as we discussed who may be going from his company.  People I have been getting to know and coming to love.  We discussed a lot of other people's fears and concerns at this time that we knew about who have been adversely affected and I am worried for.  And so tonight my family is eating dinner and starting a fast for tomorrow.  Because I can't be happy for myself when so many other people are hurting, I fast for them.  I fast for solutions, that I can't conceive of.  I fast for people with bigger brains than mine to come up with medical answers, economic answers, for peace, for comfort, for God's will to be done, and our hearts to humbly accept his will even when we don't understand it.  Please join me in fasting.  I really believe miracles can and will occur in our life and in the world at large!