Fasting is more about being ‘hungry’ than going without.
My knees give way from fasting; my body is thin and gaunt. Psalm 109:24
Why would anyone choose to make their body suffer and go without food? Not only do we need food for strength, but we like it for taste.
It’s not about losing weight. It’s not about a religious formula for blessing. Fasting is about being more hungry for an experience of God (or an answer to prayer) than whatever it is our body thinks it wants. When you fast you’re not torturing yourself. You’re training yourself. We’re all learning, all the time and in a variety of ways, that we need God more than food, more than entertainment, more than indulgence…more than the other thing we thought we needed.
And fasting can help us learn those lessons by design instead of disaster (i.e. when pain is forced on us).