John Hogan

Someone asked when exactly I will be fasting in regard to petitioning from God a divine blessing for the people of Iraq, including possibly the Iraq currency revaluation. The answer is that I personally will begin my fast on Saturday, March 5th with an early supper and end my fast around dusk, 5pm on Sunday, March 6. For me fasting means abstaining from food and drink. I think a good period of fasting time, i.e. sufficient to feel the physical weakening, and humbling effects of fasting would be 24 hours. I would advise anyone contemplating to fast to consider your health/medical conditions and be wise. Fasting is normally safe, but not always. Persons with diabetes or hypoglycemia ought to not fast by going without food and drink. But, you can join your prayers to ours. Prayer is the focus of our fasting and without prayer, fasting would be simply being hungry. Fasting increases the power of prayer. Part of fasting in my mind also includes a limiting of normal activities, and engaging in more spiritually minded activities, such as praying, helping others, mending relationships, etc. Fasting is really a matter of feeding one’s spirit, and not the body. Having tried to follow the Spirit all my life, I have learned that there is a “feeling”, a still, small voice that leads us in what blessings we should ask God to give to us. I personally believe that God is willing to respond to our prayers of faith that He bless the people of Iraq and the whole world, including the blessings that will come from the Iraq dinar revaluation. Our fasting and prayers would best be done with the intent that God will use our petitions, our faith, our turning to Him to enable him to give the greatest possible blessing to the people of Iraq and the whole world. I don’t think we can instruct God in our prayers, that would be like a candle telling the sun how to shine more brightly. All we can do is ask that our increase in faith enable God to do a great thing for his children. God doesn’t work among men except according to faith. So, again, let’s increase our faith and our turning our hearts to God and ask the Almighty to pour out a blessing upon the people of Iraq and the whole world for that matter. If Sunday isn’t your Sabbath, or isn't otherwise a good day for fasting for you, then pick the day that is best for you and let’s help this miracle happen. After our fast, let’s continue in prayer until it does happen. John Hogan

As a newbie, I made my first post yesterday in the Two Cents section. I feel compelled to make another post today in the Rumors section. It may help to frame my post by saying that I always try to look at life from a viewpoint of faith in the purposes of God and from an operating mode of trusting in the still small voice of the Spirit that leads men and women to do good. My great, great, great grandmother was a midwife in the frontiers of the U.S. during the 1800s, delivering 3,000 babies in her career, almost never losing a mother or baby. In one arduous night, she delivered eighteen babies from dusk to dawn. In describing how she worked, she said that she could tell which mother needed her by feeling a warmth and peace surrounding that mother that indicated that angels were there to hand that baby off into mortality. In all that she did, she followed “the spirit”. Thinking about Iraq, and its future, there is a warmth and peace about the 15th of March. It feels like this time is a potential window for the birth of the revalued Iraqi dinar. It is very obvious that Satan has been working to keep the Iraqi people suffering as long as possible. Undoubtedly, Satan would like this suffering to continue. A great many people believe that the revaluation of the Iraqi dinar will be a blessing for the people of Iraq, and also for the many others who have purchased dinar. I would like to propose, however, that as people of faith, we can do more than discuss the technical issues that surround this future event. We can help bring it about with our faith; and through our faith we can assist God by becoming better and more capable of bringing to pass much righteousness during our turn on earth. Most of us have learned in our youth that God is all-powerful and doesn’t need anything from any human, but that we as humans need God’s blessings. This isn’t totally correct, however, because through careful study of the scriptures and pondering the purposes of life we learn that God is quite limited in what He can do. He is limited because he is limited by the faith of his children on earth. In fact, when Jesus walked on earth 2,000 years ago, he could do scarcely do any miracles in many cities because of the people’s lack of faith. With the concept of our faith being a limiting factor in drawing down to earth God’s blessings, I propose that we increase our faith through concerted prayer and that we join our faith together this coming weekend and petition God with our combined faith, prayers and fasting, that He will bless the Iraqi people, and begin to ease the suffering of these offspring of Abraham. Let us enable God to bind Satan by focusing our faith on a desire for God to thwart the efforts of Satan in causing suffering and despair in the Iraq region. God once said in speaking of a young man possessed of a devil – “this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting”. The purpose of fasting is to increase our faith… to enable us to declare to God that we want this good thing more than we want food for our physical body. When one cannot fast because of health reasons, then we can offer something else on the altar of faith, such as abstaining from other worldly pleasures, spending time in the scriptures and attending to those in need. Depending on one’s religious convictions, either Friday, Saturday and Sunday (March 4, 5 or 6) (dates fixed from first post) will be the first Sabbath of March. That would be a great time to put our faith together, and so I propose a day of fasting and a concerted effort to pray for the people of Iraq. I would also recommend that along with our fasting and prayers for the blessings to ourselves and the Iraqi people of a revalued dinar, we can ask God for purified hearts so that we will be more capacitated to use well the financial blessing that will be in our lives. I invite others to add to these thoughts and, for those who will commit to joining in this effort to enable God’s power to be shown forth at this time through our increased faith, to simply respond… I’ll join with you in fasting and prayer. Sincerely, John Hogan

March 5, 6, 7 – Days of Fasting and Prayer I was thinking about the Iraqi people, the world and the role of God, who overrules in the affairs of men. Depending on one’s religious convictions, this coming Friday, Saturday or Sunday would be the first Sabbath day of the month of March. I was thinking that if on one of those days, we all combined our prayers, and if we fasted for at least 24 hours from food and drink, when health permits, petitioning God to bless the people of Iraq and the world, asking that if it is right according to his tender mercies for his children that the RV occur as soon as possible, we might have influence on our Creator in this matter. We are taught in scripture that the fervent prayer of the righteous availeth much and that God is influenced by our petitions, and that fasting is the most powerful tool that we can add to our prayers – to influence his power to be manifest in behalf of his children. Fasting is indeed a sacrifice and sacrifice brings forth blessings. Fasting and praying is a way of humbly acknowledging our dependence on God for everything. I believe it would not be displeasing to God if we did this and would be answered with a blessing from God. I believe that the delay in the RV is through the influence of Satan and that Satan is pleased by the continuing suffering of the Iraqi people. The scriptures teach us that at times the influence of Satan “goeth not out except by prayer and fasting”. I would further suggest that each one of us who thus fasts and prays for the blessings of God in these important matters, also search his/her heart, and find areas in his/her life that ought be repented of, i.e. areas in which we can turn to God better than we have been doing. I suggest that we make covenants with our God to do better. It is my belief that nothing pleases God more than our turning our hearts over to Him so that he can make more effective use of us in His work of salvation, and so that we can return one day to inherit a forever blessing at his hand. We could discuss the roles of governments made of men forever in these matters. But, I believe firmly that God is the more important player in all the matters of earth life. So, I invite you to please join with me this coming weekend on the day you observe the Sabbath and let us pray and fast with all our hearts for God’s intervening in the affairs of men to happen, for his overruling the power of Satan in these matters, always according to his omniscient will for all his people. Sincerely, John Hogan