After the fast is over: Life crashing into you.

So our fast is over, now what? I honestly feel like I have been the only one participating in this fast and thats ok. But lets be real here. Life is crazy. It is uncertain and just when you think you have one foot moving in motion BAM something runs right into your path causing a major stumbling block. I randomly did a Daniel Fast with my church last year with only this guiding scripture . “At that time I, Daniel, mourned for three weeks. I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips; and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over." Daniel 10:2-3. 
I say that I randomly did a Daniel Fast because I just randomly came to church that day and they were passing out the specifics for the fast and I just felt like I should do it. What happened was that God actually started speaking to me and I was open and willing to hear His voice. It was odd the visions and ideas He would give but I remember feeling closer to Him then ever before. God became real to me. But you hear all these stories about people fasting and praying and their lives just changing for the better. You hear of miraculous change. Well, that wasn't what happened for me. It was like I opened my eyes and nothing made sense, to me. But I'm sure it made perfect sense to God where I was at and how He was going to save me. But looking at my life from the worlds standard made it easier for me to go back to my freewill and boy, let me tell you all the heartache and pain I caused myself. The end of 2015 felt as if I was in my own personal hell and then you all know how God saved me and led to do another fast (it wasn't a Daniel fast) that totally rocked my world.
Now back to our fast being over, I opened my eyes and looked at what the world would see as reality and man it sucks. It sucks so much that I found myself crying and the spirit of depression trying to cast itself on me. And after 3 people prayed for me at church BAM! Life literally ran into me. After feeling hopeless and crying a minor river I pulled it together. I tried to get all the hopeful scriptures drilled into my head like "All things work together for good for those who love Christ"or "No weapon formed against me shall prosper" but still it sucked. Still I had no answer. So while I was getting ready for work and trying to not dwell on my situation God said "Why don't you see what happened to Daniel after he fasted?" Because you see, I've read the book of Daniel before but I've never READ the book of Daniel before. And I had all the time in the world to read the book of Daniel because an uninsured motorist had ran into the back of my parked car the day before leaving me to ride the bus to work. And after a super long intro, lets talk about Daniel :)
Daniel went through a lot, but through it all he was always faithful to God, giving him much favor with the Lord. If you read Daniel 1:8 which is also one of the scriptures used sometimes for the Daniel Fast.  "But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the kings food, or with the wine that he drank. Therefore he asked the chief of the eunuchs to allow him not to defile himself." Daniel did not want to dishonor God so he refused to eat the food that the king offered while Daniel and his friends were in training. God found favor among Daniel and his friends and so they were appointed to high places in the kingdom.
And then Daniels friends refuse to worship an idol and the king gets mad and tries to force them to worship the statue made of gold. And he gives them the option of worshiping the idol or getting thrown into the furnace. Well, they tell the king “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. 17 If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. 18 But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” So the king gets

so mad that he makes the furnace fire hotter then its ever been before, so hot that the guards that put them into the fire burned up as well, but as the king looked on he saw that  not only were they not being burned by the fire that there was another man walking around in the fire with them. When I read that I literally started to dance because I imagined that these three men were dancing in the fire with God. And while I'm no where near in the fire I feel like I'm in over my head. And its comforting to know that regardless to what happens to me God is with me. And I can dance and he will dance with me, Man just writing that, God is here even when we don't hear Him. We are never alone.  No matter what the outcome, if we trust in Him things will be so much sweeter. Why will it be so much sweeter? Because sometimes God does things so that he can get glory and bring people to know Him. There is nothing I want more than to lead people to Christ and give Him all the glory.
My last example is what happened before Daniel fasted and  after his fast was over. When Daniel first fasted he had a disturbing vision and he couldn't understand what it meant so he was in mourning. After his fast was over an Angel appeared to Daniel again and explained the troubling visions to him. Once again God was with Daniel and answered his prayers.
What I got from reading the book of Daniel is that problems will come. Troubles will come and sometimes you wont have the answers but God does. And because we love and trust in the Lord He will always be with us covering and protecting us. He will give us answers for those questions, visions and dreams. He will be dancing with us when our life gets tested by the fire and he will be with us promising us our inheritance with Him when he gives us visions of whats to to come. But he requires us to trust in Him no matter what. Surrender to God. Give him your whole life and everything in it and then get ready to rumble.

ps. read all of Daniel when you get the chance, the NLT version. Its just as juicy as Genesis :)