We’ve been talking on re/CALL about self-control, and let’s face it: we can all use more self-control. If you ask almost any Orthodox Christian about how we develop self-control, you’ll usually get the same answer: prayer and fasting. We just spent three episodes talking about how prayer can help us develop self-control, so now let’s talk about how fasting helps us. I talked a lot about fasting in episode 20, so I’m not going to repeat all of that here. (Remember, you can hear episode 20 — and all the other episodes — at orthodoxyouth.org/recall). But I do want to say a little about fasting, since it’s so central to developing self-control.

Orthodox Christians fast for almost half of each year. We observe the six–week fast of Great Lent, as well as the forty–day Nativity fast. We also fast most Wednesdays and Fridays, a number of days before the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the first fourteen days of August, Holy Cross Day and the Vigils of several other great feasts. While there are variations in the foods that are restricted and allowed during the various fasts, we generally fast from all animal products (meat and dairy), wine, and olive oil. On certain days, particularly on specific days during Great Lent (and more specifically during the last days of Holy Week) a strict fast calls for abstaining from all food. We further fast from all food and drink before receiving Holy Communion.

What’s the reason for all this fasting?

We fast because it increases our awareness of our sinfulness, and our reliance upon God to be freed from our sins. St. John of Kronstadt writes,

It is necessary for a Christian to fast, in order to clear his mind, to rouse and develop his feelings, and to stimulate his will to useful activity. These three human powers we blur and stifle above all by gluttony and drunkenness, and cares of this life. Through these we fall away from God, the Source of life, and fall into foulness and vanity, perverting and defiling the image of God within us. They fasten us to the earth, and cut off so to say, the wings of the soul.

Okay, all that seems fairly easy to understand. But now you probably want to know—how does avoiding pepperoni pizza during Great Lent help you with your spiritual life? St. John explains it like this—it’s a rather long quote, but it really answers the question:

Fasting is a good teacher:
(1) It soon makes everybody who fasts understand that man needs very little food and drink, and that in general we are greedy and eat a great deal more than is necessary.
(2) Fasting clearly discloses all the sins and defects, all the weaknesses and diseases, of our soul, just as when one begins to clean out muddy stagnant water the reptiles and dirt that lurk in it are revealed.
(3) It shows us the necessity of turning to God with the whole heart, and of seeking his mercy, help and saving grace.
(4) Fasting shows us all the craftiness, cunning and malice of the bodiless spirits, whom we have hitherto unwittingly served, and who now malignantly persecute us for having ceased to follow them.

St. John concludes,

To what end do fasting and penitence lead? For what purpose is this trouble taken? They lead to the cleansing of the soul from sins, to peace of heart, to union with God; they fill us with devotion and sonship, and give us boldness before God. There are, indeed, very important reasons for fasting and for confession from the whole heart. There shall be an inestimable reward for conscientious labor.

Let’s get right to the heart of the matter—what do we get out of the practice of fasting? St. John Climacus emphasizes the holistic benefits of fasting when he says:

The path of fasting leads to the path of purity. Fasting is the cutting off of lust and evil thoughts, the purity of prayer, the illumination of the soul, the guarding of the mind, He goes on to say, “Fasting is the door to contrition, the occasion for silence, the health of the body, freedom from the passions, the remission of sins.

We of course do not believe that fasting alone accomplishes these things. Instead, as St. John states, fasting leads to the path of purity. Taking attention away from ourselves, and namely through the ways in which we attempt to satisfy our passions with food, enables us to better focus our attention where it belongs: on God and others.

We’ve spent the last couple of episodes talking about how praying—and specifically praying the Lord’s Prayer from Matthew 6:9–13; Luke 11:2‑4, which we say during each Divine Liturgy—can help us develop self-control. The reason for this is that the Lord’s Prayer focuses on some of the areas of life in which we most need self-control. If we pray for God to work in those areas, He will give us the strength we need to develop self-control.

We almost finished the prayer in the last episode, but there are still two phrases left about which we need to quickly talk.

We left off with the phrase, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” In this phrase we pray for divine strength to resist falling into sin. St. Cyprian of Carthage notes, “When we ask that we may not come into temptation, we are reminded of our infirmity and weakness, in that we need to ask this.” Blessed Augustine points out that this phrase does not mean that God Himself leads us into temptation. Rather, “God does not Himself lead, but suffers that man to be led into temptation whom He has deprived of His assistance, in accordance with a most hidden arrangement, and with his deserts. Often, also, for manifest reasons, He judges him worthy of being so deprived, and allowed to be led into temptation.”

The final part of the Lord’s Prayer is the conclusion, “For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.” This phrase is particularly important because it reminds us of the reasons for which we should worship God. Here’s what St. John Chrysostom says,

Having then made us anxious as before conflict, by putting us in mind of the enemy, and having cut away from us all our remissness; (Christ) again encourages and raises our spirits, by bringing to our remembrance the King under whom we are arrayed, and signifying Him to be more powerful than all. ‘For Thine,’ He says, ‘is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory’…Thus He not only frees you from the dangers that are approaching you, but can make you also glorious and illustrious. For as His power is great, so also is His glory unspeakable, and they are all boundless, and no end of them.

So, with all of this you can see how praying the Lord’s Prayer is an essential part of the spiritual life, and absolutely necessary if you’re going to develop true self-control. Here’s what St. John of Kronstadt tells us about how we should pray, not only the Lord’s Prayer, but every prayer:

Be true to God always and in everything. If you say the prayer “Our Father. . .” pronounce each word sincerely, with reverence, fixing your mind and heart upon God alone, not paying attention to anything or anybody around you. If you say any other prayer, say it also with all your soul, not with your heart divided, not paying undue attention to anything or anybody.

We’ve been talking about how we can develop self-control, and in the last episode we talked about how the Lord’s Prayer can help us with our self-control. You see, the Lord’s Prayer focuses on some of the most important, pressing parts of life, and learning what we should pray for will help us better understand specifically where in our lives we most need self-control. So, let’s get right back to it.

We left off with the phrase, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven…” In this phrase we pray that God will lead us in His will, just as the heavenly hosts exist to serve and praise God. Sergei Nilus applies this to our lives when he says,

Let us love God’s will alone — then earth will be for us like heaven…Let us pray to God that His will might be fulfilled in us, that we might love His will, that we might delight in it, that it would root out our self-will and become the sole ruler of our hearts. For God’s will alone is all good, pleasing, and perfect-and it is our duty to fulfill it.

St. John Chrysostom notes that this phrase is not only directed to us as individuals, but asks that the whole earth live in accordance with God’s will:

For He did not at all say, ‘Thy will be done’ in me, or in us, but everywhere on the earth; so that error may be destroyed, and truth implanted, and all wickedness cast out, and virtue return, and no difference in this respect be henceforth between heaven and earth. ‘For if this come to pass,’ says He, ‘there will be no difference between things below and above, separated as they are in nature; the earth exhibiting to us another set of angels.’

The next phrase in the prayer is“Give us this day our daily bread…” In this phrase we pray to God for our daily provisions; implied is not only food, but also the other necessities of life. Alluding to Christ’s admonition to not worry about the necessities of life because God will provide for them, St. John Chrysostom states,

For it is neither for riches, nor for delicate living, nor for costly raiment, nor for any other such thing, but for bread only, that He has commanded us to make our prayer. And for ‘daily bread,’ so as not to ‘take thought for the morrow.’ Because of this He added, ‘daily bread,’ that is, bread for one day. And not even with this expression is He satisfied, but adds another too afterwards, saying, ‘Give us this day;’ so that we may not, beyond this, wear ourselves out with the care of the following day.

St. Cyprian of Carthage, who states that this phrase can be understood literally to refer to physical sustenance, also teaches that the phrase can be understood spiritually to refer to the Holy Eucharist:

For Christ is the bread of life; and this bread does not belong to all men, but it is ours. And according as we say, ‘Our Father,’ because He is the Father of those who understand and believe; so also we call it ‘our bread,’ because Christ is the bread of those who are in union with His body. And we ask that this bread should be given to us daily, that we who are in Christ, and daily receive the Eucharist for the food of salvation, may not, by the interposition of some heinous sin, by being prevented, as withheld and not communicating, from partaking of the heavenly bread, be separated from Christ’s body.

The last phrase we’re going to discuss in this episode is, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors…” In our series on being longsuffering we talked about the importance of forgiveness. Our Lord tells us that, when someone sins against us, we should forgive “up to seventy times seven” times, meaning that we should be infinitely patient and forgiving. In this phrase we are forced to be as forgiving of others as we ask God to be with us. Blessed Augustine puts it like this,

We daily beg, daily knock at the ears of God by prayer, daily prostrate ourselves and say, ‘Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.’ What debts of thine? All, or a certain part? Thou wilt answer, All. So then do thou with thy debtor. This then is the rule thou layest down, this the condition thou speakest of; this the covenant and agreement thou dost mention when thou prayest, saying, ‘Forgive us, as we forgive our debtors.’

St. John Chrysostom relates the phrase about forgiving debts to the previous parts of the prayer:

What we should most observe is this, that whereas in each of the clauses He had made mention of the whole of virtue, and in this way had included also the forgetfulness of injuries…still He was not satisfied with these, but meaning to signify how earnest He is in the matter, He sets it down also in particular, and after the prayer, He makes mention of no other commandment than this, saying thus: ‘For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you.’