Well, yeah, that is part of the equation.
It's a hard one to muddle through, because leaning too far into the argument that you have to do things to be blessed by God totally opposes the idea that it is Grace that saves us, which is not biblical.
That being said, there are things that those who call themselves "Christ followers", or those who are trusting in God to take care of them, need to do.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
This idea is the same for the Christian walk. Our American idea of who God is and what he does has become really muddled. We think of Him as some being up in the sky watching over us and smiling, someone that will "make everything ok if we just trust him and know he's with us." The element that is missing from this idea is the Relationship.
God designed us to be personal and connected, he wants to have conversations with, and give us direction with our lives so we don't screw things up and then wonder what the heck went wrong... "trusting he'll pull us out" of whatever pit we fell in.
God pursues us. He sends people into our lives and puts circumstances in our path to direct us toward him. He never stops drawing us to himself. Here is the key: we can be "around God," but if we don't spend time with him, we aren't drinking any of the life giving water that he is so desperately trying to give us.
And we feel parched and desperate or like we are running on empty, or trying our best.... The Word is the key.
Are you a horse standing at the river wondering why you're so thirsty? Wondering why you're so lost? Wondering why your circumstances are not working out for you? Or wondering why everything in your life seems great on the outside, but you're not happy in the inside?
We all get "thirsty," or parched, or spiritually dehydrated in different ways. Hear me out on this one: Like humans were made to consume H2O and cannot sustain on this earth without it, our spiritual souls were made to consume the presence and the Word of God.
I used to wish I could just hold my bible and just "absorb" the Word without actually reading it. I used to convince myself that showing up to church on Sunday, or reading a positive devitional was enough to keep my spiritually hydrated during the week.
I finally got sick of being parched all the time. And when I got sick enough of having zero spiritual growth year after year, I finally started asking God to give me a desire for his Word, and a desire to take time away from my busy life to read and pray- also called spending time listening to, and talking with, God. It is as simple as that.
He answered my prayer, and he will answer yours, but it starts with realizing you're thirsty.
Why would a horse get all the way to water and not drink? Because it didn't realize it needed it. And it probably didn't know what kind of journey it would be on. I'm visualizing a ticked-off cowboy who needs to get from Dallas to Houston (don't mock my geography skills), and is desperately trying to get his horse to drink. Silly horse won't drink, and doesn't have a clue that he's gonna regret not downing that water very soon. I just see the cowboy going "c'mon! You need this! Just drink!"
Don't be a silly horse. Don't be a stubborn horse. Be smarter than a horse, knowing you have a God who loves you desperately, and wants the very best for you, and wants to keep you healthy and away from harm.
The trusting should be happening when God says "hey drink this, you'll need it," rather than when you run off on your own adventure without any sustenance and then hope God is going to swoop in like Zoro to save you from whatever you've gotten tangled in.
Go read your bible. Ask for Him to soften your heart, unplug your ears, and pull the scales off your eyes so he can speak to you and you can understand what he's trying to say to you. Cause. You. Need. It.
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