When: Saturday, September 19, 10am – 1pm
Where: Chinese Community Church, Fellowship Hall

Please be sure to sign up here by Wednesday, September 16 so we can prepare for everyone!

Join us for our annual Day of Vision & Prayer, a time to reflect, pray, and celebrate together. 

Once a year, the Grace Downtown community sets aside a special day to reflect on how God has worked in our lives over the past year and to prepare for the ways he is calling us to love and serve our city in the year ahead. 

This will be a crucial opportunity to renew our understanding of what God is doing in and through our church.

If you consider Grace Downtown your primary church family, please mark your calendar for September 19 and let us know which potluck dish you plan to bring. 

Childcare will be available for those who sign up by 9/16. We will have childcare available for children in 5th grade and younger from 11:00 am- 1:00 pm. 

Schedule for the Day 

Morning: Personal Reflection and Prayer. 

10:00 am-11:00 am Potluck Brunch: Breaking our two-meal fast as a church

11:00 am-12:00 pm Worship and Thanksgiving: Table share & Open mic [Childcare provided]

12:00 pm-1:00 pm Casting the Vision: Hearing from our ministry leaders about the new ministry year

Food Instructions

We encourage you to bring a hearty dish to serve 8 people, if you are able. For example, breakfast casseroles, chicken stew, sausages, and baked oatmeal are a few of the dishes people have brought previously! Please place gluten-free only dishes on the designated table. Please complete your food prep before you come, including washing produce, plating, and warming. The kitchen at CCC will not be available for prep. 

Fasting and Prayer

As we prepare for the Vision Brunch, the leadership of Grace Downtown is calling for all those in our community who are able to fast from solid food for two meals on Friday or Saturday (or during the week). While all fasts declared after Jesus’ resurrection are voluntary, this one is strongly encouraged. Pregnant and nursing mothers, as well as those for whom fasting would pose a health risk, are excused from the fast. We will be breaking the fast at 10:00 am on Saturday.

While we might not typically think about fasting, Jesus assumes his followers will fast: “But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face…” Matthew 6.17 The early followers of Jesus fasted as part of their worship: “While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting…” Acts 13.2

Therefore we would do well to explore what Scripture says more broadly about the purpose and practice of fasting.

Purpose of Fasting

Overall the purpose of fasting is to learn more about our dependence on God and to cultivate the humility that grows out of that dependence. Fasting is a stark reminder that God is the Creator and that we are the creature. Humility at its essence is remembering this basic truth. Fasting is never a way to manipulate God, get his attention or generate a particular experience. God’s Spirit dwells in us; He is constantly giving us his attention.

A survey of fasting in Scripture reveals at least nine specific purposes. Here are five purposes of fasting that are directly related to our Day of Vision and Prayer:

-To seek guidance and wisdom (Judges 20.26–27; 2 Chronicles 20.3–4)

-To seek intercession for mercy and protection (2 Samuel 12.16–23; Ezra 8.21–23; Esther 4.16; Psalm 35.13; 109.24; Daniel 2.18, 9.3)

-To resist temptation, for resolve (Esther 4.16; Matthew 4.2)

-To express love and worship (Luke 2.37; Acts 13.2)

-For commissioning and sending off (Acts 13.3, 14.23)

Whether you have a robust practice of prayer and fasting or this is your first time trying it out, our hope is that this community-wide fast will enrich the time we spend on our own and together this Saturday, and that all of us will grow in humility.

Pointers for Practicing Fasting

-Fasting should always be God-focused, never self-focused.

-Scripture warns against fasting with wrong motives. Zechariah 7.5; Matthew 6.16–18

-Thoughts of food remind us of our dependence upon God.

-Ask for God’s grace. God’s grace must sustain us through the fast and convince us anew of our great need for him in all things.

Please be sure to sign up here by Wed 9/16 so we can prepare for everyone!