In which I find a loophole...

So, depending on how you look at things, I have already broken my New Years Resolution. If, by “posting at least every week”, I meant posting every 7 days… then I have obviously failed. If by “posting at least every week”, I meant posting at least once in every 7 day period (from Sunday to Saturday), then I still have a chance to make this work…barely.

I am setting out on a twenty-one day Daniel fast with my church…I mean, with the church I used to attend… I mean, the church that I currently attend when I am not attending the other church that I attend when I’m at Biola… I mean…

Well, the point is, I’m fasting. Daniel abstained from all food other than vegetables at least twice.

The point of fasting, as a good friend reminded me, is to remove something from your life, and allow God to fill it. Otherwise, there’s no point to it.

So here’s what I am removing from my life (as per my church’s instructions) :

1. All animal products.
2. All Dairy products.
3. All sweeteners.
4. All leavened bread.

Ideally, I am supposed to be filling my life with prayer and Bible reading, but in all honesty, I’ve done none too well at that in the past few days… just the same as I’ve done with blog posting. Hopefully, I’ll do better at both this next week… hopefully, I can use this blog to share my “profound insights” from these three weeks as a wannabe ascetic…

In all seriousness, though, I’m looking forward to the rest of this fast. I’ve reconciled with tofu, and I’ve developed a new appreciation for the state of Idaho and all their potato farms, but I hope to gain far more than this. I hope that through this experience, I will indeed learn to follow in the footsteps of Daniel, and others, saints and prophets both famous and unknown, who so loved God that they neglected other, lesser goods in order to better know and love He who alone is Good.

Godspeed,
Jonathan Diaz