Setting Goals

Setting goals for our spiritual life is a very important thing. Without it we can get nothing done. This is a very important principle and I will repeat it again, without setting goals, WE CAN GET NOTHING DONE! Because our whole faith is based off a goal, which is the salvation of our souls, as St. Peter the Apostle says, “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.” 1 Peter 1:6-9

St. Peter talks about us having been grieved by various trials that our faith would be proven true in the end. It is so easy for us today to become discouraged by anything. I was listening to a sermon this morning about missionary work and its difficulty, and I would like to give this as an example. It was a Bishop giving the sermon and he was talking about his days as a monk priest and how difficult it was for him to start up an Orthodox Church in the country he was preaching in. He continued on by saying that of the Orthodox Christians who were there, much of them left the country, and others didn’t have the enthusiasm for Church. This story, if one hears it, might discourage him or her from becoming missionaries, but we must remember the words of the Lord Jesus, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” This entire experience (and many others like it), go just to show how God works in our weaknesses to show His power, so that we cannot boast and take credit for anything He has done. And St. Paul continued afterward saying, “Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” -1 Corinthians 12:9-10

So we must be encouraged, and we cannot rely on ourselves for effectiveness. We must rely on God by prayer. And when I say prayer, I don’t mean prayer at Church. If one only prays at Church and the rest of week when he or she does not pray, this is a lost soul. We should have personal prayers outside of the Church, and I am not talking about “Our Father.” Praying “Our Father,” reciting some Psalms, praying the Book of Hours and such are all great prayers, and they cause us to come closer to God, but these are one form of prayer, and there is another form, which is very crucial, that form is vocal prayer. Vocal prayer is when we pray using our own words coming straight from our heart. That means we tell God what we want directly, not thinking of it while reciting a Psalm or “Our Father.” This is confusion and “God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints” (1 Corinthians 14:33). God enjoys hearing our prayers, and hearing us from our hearts. The Psalms began as vocal prayer, and you see how close David was to the Lord. If we need encouragement, wisdom, and organization let us ask God.

The next step to setting goals is going to the Confession Priest. An often misunderstood fact about Fathers of Confession is that they are there to give you advice, and how great is the advice they give. Fathers of Confession have existed from the beginning of the Church, and this aspect of advice from them is not anything new, it goes back to the beginning too. Among the greatest examples of the Fathers of Confession are the Desert Fathers of Egypt. They were simple yet deep in the advice they gave, and they used the greatest of analogies and illustrations. If we want to set goals we should go to our Fathers of Confession, because unlike us they will look objectively, and the Holy Spirit will be working in them, as we shouldn’t forget, Confession is a Sacrament! They will guide us as to whether or not we should do something, and also how to go about achieving it.

Also, we should constantly be reading the Bible, because the Bible will help us while we are trying to achieve our goals. The Bible is called the Canon. The word canon is derived from the Greek word which means “the fixed reference point.” The Bible is inerrant, and the Church knowing so canonized it. Christianity and the message of the Bible has changed the entire world, it brought civilization to it. Most people don’t know that the nations that seem civilized today were very savage and practiced things that most would not be able to handle if they saw. But the Gospel of Christ brought order to the world. We should read the Bible regularly knowing it is the canon, and that it is the inerrant word of God. It will keep us focused on the faith, and will cause us to always be thinking about God. With this in mind, it will cause us to pray more often, and through prayer we will be closer to God.

Seeing this article we come to the final thing before setting out on achieving our goals, we must draw up a plan. We must have some structure as to what we are going to do before we do it, not after. This way we will focus on what we should do, and our goals will become easy for us, because everything will run smoothly. For example a student who wants to get an A on an exam without spending an all nighter and without cramming or going insane will draw up a plan. That plan might include starting to review the week before the exam, taking little by little every day, and then the final day before the exam, go over what was studied. This a well structured plan on how to achieve this goal. So we must make a plan for our spiritual goals, even by doing this we will reflect God’s image in us because He Himself made a plan. The Church Fathers use the word “economy” often, and if one doesn’t know the understanding of this term as used by the Church and the Church Fathers, he or she will become confused. This word simply means the plan that God had made for the salvation of mankind. So God Himself has a plan, so we should follow by making plans for our spiritual life, of course.

One final thing to remember is that if we expect some type of grace from God to just come to us without us doing anything, it will not. It says in Matthew 11:12, “And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” If we want something in our spiritual life we must fight for it, by prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and all other ways we can think of. Nothing will just come to us without us fighting for it before.

So let us be watchful and pray concerning our spiritual lives, that we would set goals about how we are to serve God, so that we are able to say like St. Paul in Philippians 3:14, “I PRESS toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” That way we can be closer to our salvation, Jesus Christ Our Lord. And glory be to God both now and ever and unto the age of all ages. Amen.