The longest I had ever fasted was two days.
Until last week.
Over the past several months, God has been making me more and more aware that I do not understand relationships. I don't understand how to love people selflessly. I don't understand how to need someone without being dependent on them. I don't understand how to have boundaries that are not walls.
I have been praying fervently for over a month now, hours daily, that God will teach me how to be in right relationship, first with Him, and then with other people. That He will fix my heart that doesn't understand love and trust and friendship.
A week and a half ago, I hit a breaking point. I was tired of constantly being anxious about friendships. I was tired of being unable to love people without feeling loved in return. I fell on the floor of my room and cried, cried out to God, "You have to fix me because I've tried and I can't fix myself."
And He said to me, "I am fixing you. Don't eat."
He didn't say for how long. He also didn't say that a week into my "regular" fast. I would be "people fasting."
It started with a friend saying, "You need to take a break from me."
And she was right. So I've been taking a break from all of the people in my discipleship group this week that I have come to love and cherish and depend on over the past months and instead spend that time with God.
The people fast has been ten times harder than the food fast. And I'll admit that at the "You need to take a break from me," I ran to my room and cried for hours.
I was trying. Couldn't they see? Couldn't they see that I was doing everything I possibly could to be less dependent, to learn how to do friendship the right way? I was praying like crazy, I was constantly reminding myself to be more concerned about what I could give than what I could get, and now I was even fasting.
And my anger, of course, eventually turned to God. And, oh, I was angry. Why haven't you fixed me!? I yelled. I'm trying! I'm trying to seek You first; I'm trying to do things Your way! I'm doing the best that I can! What more do you want me to do!?
And a sneaking suspicion finally came into the light and made itself known. What if He never fixes me? What if I just never learn to do relationships right? Do I trust Him? Do I really trust Him?
You see, I have to decide before I see results that I trust God with my broken and distorted heart.
There is no faith involved if I trust Him only when I can see what He is doing.
Do I believe that He is going to patch together my tattered heart so that I can be in right relationship with Him and right relationship with others?
Yes. I believe it. I believe it even when it's hard. I believe it when I can't see it. I believe when it seems like He's not doing anything. I believe it even when there's parts of me that say, You're being ridiculous. You will never be healed. You will never be fixed.
I don't yet understand why God wanted me to abstain from solid food for two weeks.
I don't understand why I had to be away from some of my closest friends for a week.
But I don't have to understand.
I just have to trust.
