Feasting and fasting

Sunday 4^th May

Read Luke 5:29-35

“Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. ³⁰ But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, ‘Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?’ ³¹ Jesus answered them, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but those who are ill. ³² I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’

³³ They said to him, ‘John’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.’ ³⁴ Jesus answered, ‘Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? ³⁵ But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.’” (NIVUK)

Last year we investigated BELLS, one of which involved eating with at least three people each week.  The basis for that discipline is grounded in Jesus’ ministry itself. Eating together is medicinal. If Jesus pictures us as the salt of the world, we need to consciously and deliberately be finding opportunities to season! There is joy in the presence of Jesus that we should share.

It is interesting that the regularly practiced discipline that the religious folk who are scandalised by Jesus’ encouragement of the good life is fasting. Feasting and fasting are placed side-by-side by Luke. Jesus does not condemn fasting. He simply points out that there is a time for everything, both feasting and fasting.

Like Paul’s instructions to the church in Corinth there is a principle that undergirds discerning the ‘right’ time for different practices – and it is the good of others. Love guides our behaviour at all times. If one needs to eat before gathering in order to allow more to share with the hungry, then eat before you meet. If you need to fast and pray to lift others up before God, then fast and pray. If you need to eat with others to build friendships and show love for them, then feast fully. But the principle remains – love comes first.