Stop Waiting: How Prayer, Fasting, and Bold Obedience Unlock the More of God
What if the very thing standing between you and the more of God isn't your circumstances, your past mistakes, or your lack of talent — but fear? Not just any fear, but a calculated, deliberate spiritual assault designed to keep you small, silent, and stuck?
I want to talk to you about that today. Because this is not the hour to be silent anymore.
Ready for More — But What's Holding Us Back?
We are in a season where God's people are crying out for more. More of his goodness, more of his wisdom, more of his discernment, more of his self-control, more of his correction, more of his involvement, more of his presence, more of his miracle-working power.
But here's the honest question: How many of us have truly been asking for the more of God, yet failing to see it?
The truth is, we desire the more of God — until he asks us to be bold and lay things down.
The Spirit of Fear Is a Direct Assault
In 2 Timothy 1:7, the Apostle Paul writes to his young protégé Timothy, "For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline." That verse keeps coming up for a reason. Because the spirit of fear — the kind that is not of God — will take us away from the things of God.
Here's what fear sounds like: Maybe this is for later. But what if it doesn't work? I've made too many mistakes. Someone else could probably do this better than you.
The spirit of fear stands at the doorway of obedience and exhausts years of our lives imagining everything that might go wrong.
And I'm here to tell you — spiritual fear is a direct assault on Christians from the devil. The devil is truly fearful of God's people having reckless abandon for Jehovah and understanding the authority we have under the blood of Christ and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. That's what he's really scared of. So he does everything on his part to make us fearful, because he's really scared of who you are going to be.
People miss out on the more of God because they have more fear of the devil in them than faith in the great I Am. But if we will overcome our uncertainty with the certainty of who God is, we will see more of him and more of his miraculous wonder-working power.
Stop Waiting for Confidence Before You Obey
Here's something I need you to hear. Stop waiting for your confidence to grow before your obedience is put into action.
Courage does not mean that your knees will never shake. Most of the time, courage means your knees are shaking, but you're obeying God anyway. You might not ever feel completely confident in what God asks you, but he didn't ask you to be completely confident. He's asking you to be obedient. Your confidence will grow every time you see how God works. The first step is to be obedient.
Think about Moses. In Exodus 4:2, God is calling Moses to go back to Egypt — a land handed over to the enemy, filled with false gods — and Moses is saying, I'm not good enough. I can't do this. And God simply asks him, "What's in your hand?" Moses replied, a shepherd's staff. And God used it.
What's in your hand? Because whatever's in your hand, God can use it.
How We Access the More of God: Prayer and Fasting
So how do we get the more of God's power? I'm glad you asked. There's this amazing connection that happens when we do this thing called prayer and fasting.
In Matthew 17:14-21, a desperate father comes to Jesus because his son suffers terribly from seizures. He had already brought the boy to Jesus' disciples — men who had walked with Jesus, seen miracles, and preached the gospel — but they couldn't heal him. Afterward, the disciples asked Jesus privately, "Why couldn't we cast out that demon?"
Jesus answered, "You don't have enough faith... However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting" (Matthew 17:20-21).
Jesus identified two problems. First, they were faithless — not connected to God as their main power source. Second, they were too connected to the world. And then he gives the solution: prayer and fasting.
As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 3:1-2, "Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit, but as people who are still worldly, mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it."
The church has been drinking a lot of milk for many years. It's time for us to start eating some steak.
What Fasting Actually Does
Fasting is not a 1-2-3 step to getting what you want from God. Fasting is all about weakening us so that we can hear what the Holy Spirit desires from us — what he wants to do in us and through us.
Whatever you starve dies, but whatever you feed will thrive.
Fasting allows us to quiet the appetites of our bodies and the desires of our soul so our spirits can grow closer to God. It's less of us and more of God.
Here's what prayer and fasting does practically:
It declares your dependence on God — redirecting your attention to the most important priority in your life, your relationship with Jehovah.
It creates space for forgiveness and reflection — emptying yourself of sinful habits, making room for his goodness in your life.
It refocuses us on the spiritual — reminding us that our time on this earth is temporary, as Ecclesiastes 1:2 warns us that everything done without God's guidance is vanity, "a vapor that vanishes, merely chasing the wind."
It invites the presence of Yahweh — as James 4:2 reminds us, "You do not have because you do not ask God."
And as Charles Spurgeon once said, "Our seasons of fasting and prayer at the tabernacle have been high days indeed. Never has heaven's gate stood wider. Never have our hearts been nearer the central glory."
Putting It Into Practice
So how do you get started? Here are three clear steps:
1. Write your plan down. Decide what type of fast God is calling you to — whether that's a complete fast (liquids only), a selective fast like the Daniel fast (removing certain foods), a partial fast (skipping one or two meals), or what I call a soul fast (removing social media, television, TikTok, video games — all your default methods of zoning out). Whatever it is, it needs to push and challenge you. It has to hurt a little bit. If it's easy, how is it a sacrifice? Share your plan with someone who will help you follow through.
2. Follow through. Actually do what you wrote down. So many times we get fired up and say we'll start next week — and next week becomes the week after. Declare your dependence on him. Ask forgiveness for what's separated you from him. Refocus on the eternal.
3. Expect results. We have the God who is the creator of the universe, who is for you and not against you. Why would we not expect results from the One who loves us, who sent his Son for us? Come with expectation that you are going to gain ground on the more of God — that bonds of wickedness will break, that heavy burdens will be laid down, that freedom is coming.
The answer to fear is not I'm strong enough. The answer is his grace is enough. And when I fail, I will repent, get right, and keep following Christ. I will not be ashamed of the Gospel.
This is not the hour to be silent. This is the time for the church to take a stand, to rise up to the calling of God, to hear his voice and say, Yes, Lord. Here I am. Send me.
It's time to walk in the more of God.