Photos that will never make the news

my christian diary entry, after about 1 day of my 2-day fast:
"I have come to the realization of why fasting’s important in a Christian life; habitual fasting helps us to remember God’s provision and how weak we are. There’s a lot more reasons why it’s so important as a stepping stone God uses to draw us closer to him, but I’ve realized that(at least for today) it creates adversity and trouble when it is not there. As the saying goes, “an ounce of prevention is worth a lb of cure.” However, it is well-known that Christians have to suffer adversity to grow, so how can we solve this problem? Fasting: we allow habitual occurrences of testing to occur upon ourselves so as to place ourselves in the rich soil for spiritual growth; it’s easy to be loving, patient and kind when all is well. Does this mean we’ll never suffer trouble outside of fasting if we do so? Of course not, but we become that much more equipped to handle modern society’s problems. Note that this thought only deals with fasting as a mechanism God uses to help you grow; there are many other benefits and insights to God using a combination of prayer and fasting to reach you that I personally haven’t discovered yet; I would hope with God’s grace that I can eventually discover these things sometime soon."

"I’ve also come to realize that due to the above paragraph, that unless if God directly tells you to, there’s no useful purpose in fasting beyond 10-12 days w/o solid sustenance. What you want to use to glean yourself is the hunger pangs, fatigue and what no from starvation. As you know, after 10-12 days, the pains stop until ~40 days. But b/c we use that hunger for God to shape us, I really don’t see a reason to fast beyond that time; if it doesn’t hurt(and hence, can’t be used to bring you closer), why fast?"

i'd also like to add that when fasting, it's not that good of an idea to do any strenuous activity, which is quite weird, since if you try strenuous activity on a buldging stomach(as i have painfully experienced after the 200 m dash to the bus stop after a pot-full of dinner soup), you feel DA PAIN. but it's true also for fasting; your stomach will hurt; slow your motions down, take your time walking around.

everytime i'm tempted to cut my fast short or delay it, i have to ask myself "what are you doing this(fasting) for?" then i have to remind myself that god is more important that the bowl of noodles i would've been whipping up, then consuming at the apt or what not. yeah, it is a struggle each month to attempt to fast; to begin it, and then to prolong it. i really had no idea i loved food this much. but i know about how valuable it is, so i'll keep fighting myself to do it once a month.

(although i would like to end the fast tomorrow w/a jack in the box fish n chips combo w/fish fillet... that'd be good, but whatever, that's later)