Fasting simply means abstinence from food: "And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry." Mt 4:2
The Lord Jesus was hungry after forty days and forty nights of fasting because He abstained from eating food during those times.
What does fasting connote? It connotes control of our physical appetites. Bodily appetites are God-given. But if they are allowed to control our lives, if we have become slaves to it, then it has become sinful.
Fasting is also an expression of grief and sorrow. Notice:
Mt 9:14 Then the disciples of John came to Him, saying, "Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but Your disciples do not fast?"
15 And Jesus said to them, "Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.
When we are in grief and sorrow, we lose appetite, we are not disposed to eat. Fasting then is the expression, the physical result of a soul burdened and grieved with sin in one's own life and in others. We sorrow in a godly manner that it affects our appetite.
