In the mid-1940s, Franklin Hall was a relatively unknown pastor in San Diego, California. He had become convinced through his study of Scripture that extended fasting was the missing ingredient in the American church — the reason why the book of Acts power seemed absent from modern Christianity.
The Fasting Experiment
In 1946, Hall organized a sustained fasting-and-prayer gathering in San Diego. For weeks, participants rotated through fasting shifts — some on water-only fasts of seven to twenty-one days, others on partial fasts. The goal was continuous corporate intercession, sustained by fasting, around the clock.
Hall meticulously documented the physical, emotional, and spiritual effects of the fasting. He published his findings in a book called "Atomic Power with God Through Fasting and Prayer" — the title a deliberate echo of the atomic age that had just dawned.
The Ripple Effect
The book circulated widely among Pentecostal and Holiness preachers. It reached the hands of several men who would become the central figures of the post-war Healing Revival: William Branham, Oral Roberts, Jack Coe, and T.L. Osborn all read it. Many of them adopted extended fasting as a regular discipline.
By 1947, the Healing Revival was underway — the largest sustained healing movement in American history. Tent meetings drew tens of thousands. Reports of miraculous healings filled newspapers. The movement reshaped American Christianity and birthed the modern charismatic movement.
Hall did not cause the revival single-handedly. But his work on fasting provided the practical framework that many of the revival's key leaders adopted. He demonstrated that fasting was not mystical self-punishment but a concrete spiritual discipline with observable results.
What This Means for You
Hall's legacy is the reminder that ideas have consequences. His simple conviction — that fasting was underused and powerful — spread through a community and contributed to one of the largest spiritual movements of the twentieth century. You do not have to lead a revival. But if you take fasting seriously and share what you learn with others, you may be placing a seed that grows far beyond what you can see.