The Aim of the Christian Life

"The Lord has revealed to me," [said St. Seraphim] "that in your childhood, you had a great desire to know the aim of our Christian life, and that you have continually asked many great spiritual persons about it."

 

I must admit, that from the age of twelve this thought had constantly troubled me.  In fact, I had approached many clergy about it.  However, their answers had not satisfied me.  This could not have been known to the elder.

 

"But no one," continued St. Seraphim, "has given you a precise answer.  They have said to you: "Go to church, pray to God, do the commandments of God, do good -- that is the aim of the Christian life."  Some were even indignant with you for being occupied with such profane curiosity and said to you, "Do not seek things which are beyond you."  But they did not speak as they should.  Now humble Seraphim will explain to you of what this aim really consists.

 

"However prayer, fasting, vigil and all the other Christian practices may be, they do not constitute the aim of our Christian life.  Although it is true that they serve as the indispensable means of reaching this end, the true aim of our Christian life consists of the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God.  As for fasts, and vigils, and prayer, and almsgiving, and every good deed done for Christ's sake, [they] are only the means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God.....

 

But to this end, we must begin with a right faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Who came into this world to save sinners and Who, through our acquiring for ourselves the grace of the Holy Spirit, brings into our hearts the Kingdom of God....

 

"That is it, your Godliness.  Acquiring the Spirit of God is the true aim of our Christian life, while prayer, fasting, almsgiving and other good works done for Christ's sake are merely means for acquiring the Spirit of God."

 

[In the parable of the wise and foolish virgins], what [the foolish virgins] were lacking was the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God.  These virgins practiced the virtues, but in their spiritual ignorance, they supposed that the Christian life consisted merely in doing good works.  By doing a good deed, they thought they were doing the work of God, but they cared little whether they acquired the grace of God's Spirit.  These ways of life, based merely on doing good, without carefully testing whether they bring the grace of the Spirit of God, are mentioned in the patristic books: "There is another way which is deemed good in the beginning, but ends at the bottom of hell."

 

...The oil is not the good deeds, but the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God...which changes souls from one state to another--such as...from spiritual death to spiritual life, from darkness to light, from the stable of our being (where the passions are tied up like dumb animals and wild beasts) into a temple of the Divinity, the shining bridal chamber of eternal joy in Christ Jesus our Lord, the Creator, Redeemer and eternal Bridegroom of our souls.

 

---From On Acquisition of the Holy Spirit:  Saint Seraphim of Sarov