On one occasion, I was running out of
fuel in my car, and I was driving and it was clear that it wouldn't be long
before I would run totally out of gas. So naturally, I pulled over to the
filling station, and I said, "Fill 'er up," and the tank became full again. The
problem occurred as I was driving along. My car started to sputter. It started to
jerk back and forth. I pulled over to the side to try to figure out what in the
world is going on here. Everything looked fine to me, and my gas tank was full of
fuel, but it was obvious something was still not working. So I pulled over to
the mechanic at the local station to ask them to please help me figure out why
things were not working as they ought to be working. He examined it, and he said,
"Sir, I think I found your problem. I've
checked your fuel, and what you have in your tank is not what the car requires.
you've given it something; you've given it a type of fuel that it is not
designed to use, and that is causing all of your problems." In Isaiah 58, God's
people were concerned that their Christian life was not working, that
their spiritual relationship with God was not producing anything. In fact, they
say, "'Why have we fasted and you do not see? Why have we humbled ourselves and
you do not notice?' Behold, on the day of your fast, you find your desire and drive
hard all your workers." They wanted to know why heaven wasn't coming down and
intervening in their circumstance, even though they were
fasting. Now fasting is giving up a craving of the physical to gain
assistance from the spiritual. And they were doing that. They were having this
prayer fasting meeting, and nothing was changing. Well, that's when God comes in and He
throws a blockbuster curve, a curve we all need to hear and learn if we're
going to take seriously getting God into our circumstance—personally as families,
in our churches, and most certainly in our nation. If you're going to have a
successful, sacred time with God, whether individually or a gathering, you need to
learn this truth from Isaiah 58 as to why all of our spiritual efforts,
including fasting and prayer, many times are not working out at all. Listen to
what God says. He says, "It is a fast like the fast which I choose." I don't want the
one you're giving me. I want the one that my engine requires.
It must be acceptable to me, not just likeable to you. He says, "This is the fast
which I choose: a day for a man to humble himself.
It is the bowing of one's head like a reed and for the spreading out of
sackcloth and ashes as a bed. Will you call this a fast, even the acceptable day
of the Lord? Is this not the fast which I choose: to loosen the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the bands of the yoke and to let the oppressed go free and to break every
yoke? Is it not to divide your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor
into your house, when you see the naked to cover him and not to hide yourself
from your own flesh?" He tells them something was missing. They
wanted a vertical experience with God without a horizontal touch in the lives
of others. They wanted God to do something for them while they did
nothing for others. They wanted heaven to visit them while there was no touch on
Earth to improve the lives of others. This is a great truth that you and I
need to know. Whenever you go up to bring heaven down, heaven wants to see how you
went out to deliver help to others. Over and over and over again in the
scriptures, God connects the vertical with the horizontal. That's why Jesus
said, "By this shall all men know that you're My disciples."
Not that you praise and you pray and go to church, but that you love one another.
There is an impact beyond yourself. You and I get God's attention when we give
to others what we ourselves are asking from God.
That's why Luke 6:38 says, "Give, and it"— that is the thing you give—"will be given
back to you." God wants to see whether you are a conduit for the very blessing you
are requesting. Because if you want Him to work to you, but it can't also flow
through you, then He's much less interested in working to you because you
become a cul-de-sac. You don't become a conduit. You don't become a means through
which He can flow through. You just want Him to flow to. If you want to get God's
attention when you go to God, let me make a recommendation. Tell Him what you're going to do for somebody else if He comes through for you. Because now you've gotten
His undivided attention cause that's the fast He chooses,
that's the gasoline that'll make Him roll in your life and your spiritual
experience. What will God do when He sees that you've attached the vertical to the
horizontal and the horizontal to the vertical, where you've touched heaven while
wanting to benefit Earth? Listen to what He says in closing. He says, "Then your
light will break out like the dawn and your recovery speedily will spring
forth. Your righteousness will go before you and the glory of the Lord will be
your rear guide. Then you will call and the Lord will answer. You will cry and He
will say, 'Here I am.' If you remove the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the
finger and speaking wickedness, and if you give yourself to the hungry and
satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will shine in the darkness and
your gloom will become midday. And the Lord will continually guide you and
satisfy your desire in scorched places and give strength to your bones. And you
will be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose water does not
fail. Those from whom it will rebuild the ancient ruins; you will raise up the old
foundations. You will be called repairers of the breach, the restorers of the
streets in which you dwell." Did you get that? If He sees you calling on Him while
reaching out to bless somebody else, He is going to join you in what you are
requesting and needing from Him. We're living in a day when everybody wants to be
blessed, but those same people who say, "I want to be blessed with this and I want
to be blessed with that," are not equally saying at the very same
time, "And I want to be a blessing for the blessing that I'm requesting. I want you
to flow through and not just flow to, because I want to be a benefiter, not just a beneficiary. I want to be a helper and not only one who's helped."
When that kind of calling on God takes place with fasting and prayer, that kind
of sacred gathering occurs, now heaven is now giving you its undivided attention.
Over and over and over again, God says, "When you reach out to others, I'll reach
out to you. When I see that you are a helper to others, I'm going to be a helper to
you." Now why is God this way? Well, there's a statement made about God that sums it
all up. It says, "God is love." It doesn't just say, "God loves." People love. Because,
God is a Trinitarian being: Father, Son, and Spirit. One God composed of three equal
Persons who is distinct in personhood and One in essence. It's like a pretzel
with three holes. The first hole is not the second hole, the second hole is not the third hole, but they're all tied together by the same dough. Because They all bear the
divine nature, so God has never known what it's like to be alone. He's always
dwelt in community, so He's always dwelt in love. So, He is love. So, He is
comfortable when He sees us being what He is. And when He sees us being what He
is, He can be who He is to us, as we are being who He is, and that is operating in
a context of love. So if you need something supernatural from heaven in
history, if you need God to break through and bring light to your gloom,
joy to your despair, peace to your purposelessness, if you want to see that,
give away what you're asking for and then watch God—pressed down, shaken
together, running over—give you the very same thing that you have been requesting.
He's waiting to hear from you. He's waiting to see you give up the physical
for the spiritual, and then He's waiting to see how His answered prayer in your
life is going to touch somebody else. Isaiah 58 wants you to fast, wants you to
pray, but not the one that you put in the tank, but the one that He can roll on. Because
it's fuel from heaven that benefits Earth.
