Keep Showing Up
Your Nightly Prayer
By Chelsey DeMatteis
TONIGHT'S SCRITPURE
"Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us." - Hebrews 12:1
SOMETHING TO PONDER
When someone tells you to "keep showing up", what do you think of? As peculiar as it sounds, I'm taken back to my childhood home, curled up on the couch, watching Remember the Titans. In that film, we saw a unique perseverance in the coaches' hearts and, eventually, in the team. All because one person, Coach Boone, chose to keep showing up when things were not easy. The environment was contentious, and the attitudes from outsiders were equally as tense. But it didn't matter to him. What mattered most was his ultimate goal: to have a unified team of brothers who not only viewed themselves as family but also lived as an example to the community around them. It was hard work, heart work, and a holy work, really.
Being called to keep showing up is really the call to keep persevering. And in faith, it's the call to keep pursuing Christ, no matter what. It means keeping up the hard work, the heart work, and the holy work, even when life's circumstances or the world is preaching a different narrative. The hard work I'm speaking of is not a legalistic approach of checking boxes to maintain a balanced scale with God. Absolutely not, we know such a thing doesn't exist in the heart of the Creator of the world.
What I'm talking about is the work that happens when He is chiseling away the parts of our flesh that need to be softened. Or the way He is working things together, in his timing, over a mess that someone else has created - that is somehow bleeding in your life. Perseverance in these seasons deepens our dependence and offers an opportunity to know God in a new, more intimate way.
I think of Paul and all the hardships he endured during his lifetime. If anyone could've taken a seat on the sidelines and had the approval of all men, it was him. He was beaten, stoned, and left for dead once, and endured shipwrecks and hunger. He experienced imprisonment in various places and was on several occasions falsely accused. He suffered greatly, and yet - he kept showing up.
He didn't show up grumbling either; he showed up boasting all the more about the grace of God and the gospel of Christ. It was as if his suffering was a gift - not to his flesh, but to his spirit. He said, "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." Romans 5:1-5
Paul knew - Christ knew - and we know because of what we, too, walk through, that suffering produces an enduring faith. Hardships deepen dependence and strengthen one's testimony to the world. Hebrews 12:1 echoes this all the more, "Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."
We can run the race well. We can persevere. With our hearts and faith fully tethered to the heart of God, keeping the ultimate goal at the forefront of our minds, we can keep showing up. We can keep showing the world who we are in Christ, and that in contentions and emotional seasons, it is Christ alone that we boast in.
YOUR NIGHTLY PRAYER
Father,
Thank you for the gift of your enduring love as we persevere in this life. You have called us to keep showing up, trusting that you have marked out a particular, very personal race for me to run that has an eternal impact. Please help me stay faithful to the call. Do not let pride or weariness get in the way of what you are doing. Make my life a light in the world, give my testimony an aroma that draws one's heart to you. Please provide me with strength and make me more like you.
In Jesus' name,
Amen.
THREE THINGS TO MEDITATE UPON
1. Where is God asking you to show up right now—even when it’s hard?
Is there a relationship, responsibility, or area of faith where perseverance is your quiet testimony?
2. What part of your life is God chiseling through hardship?
Let your suffering deepen your dependence and reveal more of Christ’s strength in you.
3. Are you measuring your race by ease or endurance?
Remember: faithfulness is not about perfection—it’s about showing up with a heart surrendered to Jesus.
Reflect on tonight’s prayer and share how God met you there. Join the Your Nightly Prayer discussion on the Crosswalk Forum.
Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/Made Suta / EyeEm
Chelsey is the voice behind the Living with Less Podcast and author of the 52-week devotional More of Him, Less of Me: Living a Christ-centered Life in a Me-centered World. She writes devotions for Lifeway Women's Journey Magazine, Crosswalk.com, and iBelieve.com. She also writes Bible reading plans for the YouVersion Bible App. Chelsey lives in Ohio with her husband and two children. You can connect with her on Instagram @chelseydematteis and at her website ChelseyDeMatteis.com.
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