A few days ago, I decided to try one of those ChatGPT trends that has been floating around. I asked a simple question: Based on everything you know about me, choose ONE song released between 1980 and today that represents me. Any artist. Any genre. Tell me the song and exactly why you chose it.

I expected the answer to be fun, maybe a little sentimental. I was mostly curious what it would choose after all the conversations we have had about my writing, Walking with Jordan, my family, the things I care about, and all the plans I keep making.

The answer was “Anyway” by Martina McBride.

What caught me off guard wasn’t really the song itself. It was the explanation that followed. ChatGPT said the defining thing about me wasn’t simply that I had walked through difficult things, but that I kept trying to build something meaningful in the middle of them anyway.

It pointed out that I didn’t wait for life to become uncomplicated before I started writing. I published Walking with Shadows and began working on its sequel. Walking with Jordan grew from a place to share personal updates into a blog, then into ideas for a devotional, a memoir, children’s stories, and something I increasingly believe God may be able to use as a ministry. At the same time, I am still trying to love my family well, celebrate the people I care about, take care of the animals that depend on me, keep working, keep planning, and keep moving forward.

None of that comes with a guarantee.

I don’t know exactly where Walking with Jordan will lead. I don’t know how many people will read the devotional when it is finished, how my books will sell, which doors will open, or which plans will change along the way. I certainly don’t know what every part of the next few years will look like.

Apparently, though, I have a habit of doing things anyway.

At first I smiled at that description, but the more I thought about it, the more that one word stayed with me.

More Than Just Determination

There is a version of anyway that sounds a lot like stubborn determination. Keep trying. Push harder. Don’t give up. Believe in yourself long enough and eventually everything will work out.

That can sound encouraging, but life has taught me that it isn’t always true.

Sometimes we work hard and still lose. We love people well and relationships still change. We pray faithfully and receive answers we didn’t want. We pour ourselves into something only to watch it turn out differently than we imagined. We make careful plans and then life rearranges them without asking our permission.

Christian faith doesn’t require us to pretend those things don’t happen. The Bible doesn’t promise that enough persistence will guarantee the earthly outcome we want, and faith isn’t a formula where enough prayer, effort, or optimism forces life to cooperate.

So if anyway simply means, Keep going because eventually you’ll get what you want, that isn’t enough for me.

Scripture gives us something stronger. It gives us a reason to remain faithful even when we cannot control what comes from our faithfulness.

Paul writes in Galatians 6:9, “So let’s not get tired of doing what is good.” The verse sits inside a larger passage about sowing and harvesting, living by the Spirit, carrying one another’s burdens, and choosing what is good. Paul knows something we probably all learn eventually: doing good can become exhausting when we cannot see what it is accomplishing.

It is easier to keep planting when something is already growing. It is easier to keep encouraging someone when we can see the difference our words are making, easier to keep writing when people are reading, easier to serve when someone notices, and easier to pray when answers seem to come quickly.

The harder seasons are the ones where we keep planting seeds into ground that still looks like dirt.

Paul doesn’t tell believers to keep digging the seeds back up to see whether they are growing. He tells them not to grow weary in doing good and reminds them that the harvest comes in God’s time.

That changes the question for me.

Instead of constantly asking, Is this working? maybe sometimes I need to ask, Is this faithful?

When You Can’t See the Harvest

I think I have spent more time than I realized measuring things by visible results. Did enough people read it? Did it help anyone? Is this growing fast enough? Am I making the right decision? Is all this effort actually worth it? Where is any of it going?

Those aren’t necessarily bad questions. We should use wisdom. We should evaluate what we are doing, and sometimes God does close doors, redirect our plans, or show us that something we were holding onto needs to be released. Faithfulness doesn’t mean blindly continuing something just because we started it.

But there is also danger in believing that visible success is the only evidence that our obedience mattered.

Some of the most meaningful things we do may never give us immediate feedback. We may never know what happened after we encouraged someone on a difficult day. We may pray for someone for years without seeing the change we hoped for. We may teach something to a child that they don’t appreciate until much later. We may choose patience when anger would have been easier, forgive when resentment would have felt more satisfying, or quietly show up for someone who never completely understands what our presence meant.

The result isn’t always ours to see, but the faithfulness is still ours to choose.

That distinction matters to me because there are days when I look at everything I am trying to build and wonder whether I am getting ahead of myself. I have ideas for books, devotionals, stories, and ways Walking with Jordan could grow. Sometimes all of those possibilities feel exciting. Other times I wonder whether I am dreaming too big or trying to do too much.

I don’t know what God intends to do with all of it, but maybe knowing the outcome was never my assignment.

Maybe my responsibility is to be faithful with what He has placed in my hands today: to write what I am supposed to write, encourage the person in front of me, love my family well, use the opportunities He provides, keep learning, keep praying, and keep pointing people toward Jesus.

Then I have to trust Him with the harvest.

Because Our Hope Is Bigger Than the Outcome

Another passage takes this idea even deeper. At the end of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul writes that nothing we do for the Lord is ever useless.

That sentence can sound like another motivational quote until we pay attention to what comes before it. First Corinthians 15 is Paul’s long discussion of the resurrection. He spends the chapter explaining the truth of Christ’s resurrection and the hope believers have because of it. His argument is clear: if Christ had not been raised, Christian faith itself would be empty.

But Christ has been raised.

That is why Paul can tell believers to stand firm and continue in the work of the Lord. His confidence is not based on our ability to make everything succeed. It is based on Jesus.

That gives us a different kind of hope than the world usually offers. Christian faithfulness doesn’t say, Do the right thing because eventually life will reward you. It says that because Christ is risen, our hope is secure in Him, even when we cannot see every result of our obedience.

Some stories remain unfinished from our perspective. Some questions stay unanswered much longer than we would choose, and some seeds may grow in ways we never get to witness.

Our hope isn’t that every chapter will unfold exactly the way we wrote it in our heads.

Our hope is Jesus.

Faithful Anyway

That is what the song choice eventually made me realize. I don’t want anyway to describe me simply because I am stubborn enough to push through every obstacle. There are things we are supposed to surrender. There are seasons when wisdom means resting, changing direction, asking for help, or admitting that our plan may not have been God’s plan.

But I would be grateful if anyway described something deeper.

I want to keep loving when love costs something and serving when nobody applauds. I want to encourage people even when I don’t know whether my words made a difference, pray when the answer hasn’t come, write when I don’t know who will read it, choose grace when irritation would be easier, and keep following Jesus even when I cannot see where the next turn in the road leads.

Not recklessly. Not because outcomes don’t matter or disappointment isn’t real. But because faithfulness matters more than my ability to predict the ending.

Maybe there is something God has placed in front of you that feels that way right now. Maybe it is something good you have been doing for so long that you’re starting to wonder whether it matters. It could be a prayer you have prayed hundreds of times, a person you have continued loving, a responsibility you quietly carry, a calling that hasn’t developed as quickly as you expected, or a seed you have planted in ground that still looks completely unchanged.

I can’t promise you what the harvest will look like. Scripture doesn’t give me permission to promise that every situation will resolve the way we want.

But I can remind you of what Paul told believers nearly two thousand years ago: don’t grow tired of doing what is good, and remember that what is done for the Lord is not meaningless.

Maybe today you don’t need to know how the entire story ends. Maybe you simply need enough faith for the next thing God has placed in front of you.

Take the step. Say the prayer. Offer the kindness. Write the words. Love the person. Use what God has put in your hands, and when you cannot see what He could possibly make from it yet, trust Him with what happens after your obedience.

Be faithful.

Anyway.