Isaiah 58--True and False Fasting

Isaiah 58
English Standard Version

True and False Fasting
58 “Cry aloud; do not hold back;
    lift up your voice like a trumpet;
declare to my people their transgression,
    to the house of Jacob their sins.
2 Yet they seek me daily
    and delight to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that did righteousness
    and did not forsake the judgment of their God;
they ask of me righteous judgments;
    they delight to draw near to God.
3 ‘Why have we fasted, and you see it not?
    Why have we humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?’
Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure,
    and oppress all your workers.
4 Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
    and to hit with a wicked fist.
Fasting like yours this day
    will not make your voice to be heard on high.
5 Is such the fast that I choose,
    a day for a person to humble himself?
Is it to bow down his head like a reed,
    and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him?
Will you call this a fast,
    and a day acceptable to the LORD?

6 “Is not this the fast that I choose:
    to loose the bonds of wickedness,
    to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
    and to break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share 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?
8 Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
    the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
9 Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer;
    you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’
If you take away the yoke from your midst,
    the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,
10 if you pour yourself out for the hungry
    and satisfy the desire of the afflicted,
then shall your light rise in the darkness
    and your gloom be as the noonday.
11 And the LORD will guide you continually
    and satisfy your desire in scorched places
    and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
    like a spring of water,
    whose waters do not fail.
12 And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
    you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
    the restorer of streets to dwell in.

13 “If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath,
    from doing your pleasure on my holy day,
and call the Sabbath a delight
    and the holy day of the LORD honorable;
if you honor it, not going your own ways,
    or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly;
14 then you shall take delight in the LORD,
    and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth;
I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father,
    for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

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The people are trying to live two lives--we might even say they are being two-faced.  They appear to be crying out to God in genuine repentance and offering genuine sacrifices, but they continue to live in sin.  Not sin that they fall into, but sin that they run too--sin that they love more than they love God.  They seek God daily hoping that He will continue to bless them though they live in open rebellion to Him.  They treat their relationship with God as if it is transactional like the false religion of the Baals.  They believed if they fasted and prayed and sacrificed enough that God would have to do what they wanted Him to do.  Who is really God in that situation if the LORD can be manipulated like that?  The answer is clear that they imagined that the LORD served them and not the other way around.

We still have this problem today where people think that God somehow owes them a debt because of their church attendance, amount of money they have given to the church and to charity and other "good deeds" they list off, but they have never experienced the transformation of the true gospel, so all their good deeds are as filthy rags.

Fasting is supposed to be about humiliating ourselves and exalting the LORD.  Only that kind of day of fasting is acceptable to Him.  Any "day of fasting" that seeks to elevate man and make God subservient to Him is an abomination to the LORD.  Fasting should loosen sin's hold on us.  If the fast instead means to loosen God's hold on us, it is an abomination.  We should not pretend we are worshiping the LORD while worshiping our flesh (like the Israelites did at Mount Saini).  Fasting also helps us to have compassion for those who are in need and experience true hunger every day.  It helps us to see the need in front of us and bee keenly aware of what we can do to help with housing and feeding our brothers who are in need--I'll just say on the authority of other passages of Scripture that this does not mean giving all your resources that the LORD intends for  you to use to take care of yourself and your family to those who refuse to work.  That is a different scenario covered by Scripture.  There will be plenty of times and places to talk about compassion ministry with other passages and the limitations of it, but that is not the point of today's passage.  This passage just points out the that heart of the people was wrong when they were going through the motions as if it was some kind of enchantment or incantation to force the LORD to do their bidding--like He was a genie in a bottle that had to grant their every wish if they rubbed His lamp the right way.

God calls on His people to obey His Covenant again so that they will be blessed and not cursed.  There is still time.  The most offensive Law-breaking that was going on though was that the people were treating the Sabbath days as ordinary days to do ordinary work.  They did not treat those days as if they belonged to the LORD and were holy and set apart for His plans and purposes.  Those who joyfully honor the Sabbath will learn to take their pleasure in the LORD and not in the fleeting pleasures of this world that are poor substitutes for the joy that the LORD has to offer.  The people need to simply learn the lesson of delayed gratification knowing that they LORD will provide something even better for them in the future.  That is also part of the idea of fasting, yet the people wanted their fleshly desires fulfilled now and they believed that what they called fasting (which was not true fasting according to the LORD) obligated the LORD to give them their evil desires instead of them letting the Law of the LORD change them so that His desires became their desires and then He would happily give them the desires of their heart--because they would be the desires of His heart too.