Back in January when we started the year with a week of fasting and prayer, I offered a series of posts throughout the week that you may want to review THIS week if you're planning to participate in our week of prayer and fasting. The week-long fast in January was my first week-long fast, and I learned a great deal from it practically speaking. Below is a reprint of a couple of suggestions I made at the start of the January week of fasting and prayer, and they WILL be useful if you are considering joining us this week:
If you are considering participating in the week of prayer and fasting, you may want to consider a "Daniel Fast." You may remember that Daniel and other young Hebrew men were taken captive by the Babylonians and placed into training to become leaders. Part of the "training" was eating a diet rich in wine and meat. The Hebrews decided to eat only vegetables and water. (This is a "partial fast") After a couple of weeks Daniel and his compatriots were in better health than the others! This shows that obedience to God and a desire to do His will is more important than anything else, and that is certainly why we are holding our week long fast next week! [I will be doing a Daniel fast this week, as I will eat some fruit and raw vegetables in limited quantities through the week, mainly at dinner time. I also plan to add some vegetable or fruit juice occasionally to the water that will be the "mainstay" of my fast. I guess I'm going to do a "modified 'normal' fast," since a normal fast consists of taking in only water during the week. During my first week-long fast, I found that in order to keep a normal pace, I needed to add a bit of juice and vegetables early in the week. As the week went on, I relied more and more only on water.] As always, you should consult with a health care professional if you have any questions about fasting, although as one of the resources I read about fasting during my last week-long fast put it: since most doctors have never actually fasted they don't have much of a clue of the impact of fasting, which for healthy people is generally positive both physically and spiritually.
One last practical suggestion if you are planning to take part in the fast---if you are a heavy caffeine drinker: coffee, tea, colas, etc... and you plan to restrict your intake of caffeine as part of the fast, you may want to "wean" yourself off of the caffeine starting NOW, and for the first couple days of the fast. Otherwise, you may experience headaches, fatigue and other symptoms of caffeine withdrawal. Thankfully, after the week-long fast in January before which I eliminated iced tea and Dr. Pepper from my "diet," I have gone back to abstaining from caffeinated drinks, except for a rare Dr. Pepper at a restaurant.