“One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.’

Jesus said to them, ‘When you pray…'” (Luke 11:1-2).

The disciples had seen others pray. Seeing someone pray was nothing new.

But the way Jesus prayed was different.

What was different? Well, Jesus was different. Jesus would pray, and after prayer he was different. After Jesus spent time with God in prayer, Jesus was changed.

The disciples had never seen such a thing.

So they asked Jesus to teach them how to pray the way Jesus does. So Jesus does. He teaches them how to pray.

In his instruction to the disciples regarding prayer, there’s no instruction about the posture of one who prays, or the location of the one who prays, or the length of prayer, nor the time of prayer. Jesus simply tells the disciples, “When you pray…”

There is no magic formula for how one prays. The thing that matters is that we pray. When we pray, it’s not so much to get our way. The purpose of prayer is to seek God and God’s will.

That’s what made Jesus’ prayer so different. That’s why Jesus was different after he prayed compared to who he was before Jesus prayed. Jesus encountered God.

It’s not how long, or using the right words, or about when or where to pray.

Pray. Seek God. Always. Throughout the day. Seek God. Seek God’s will.

Pray.

A New York woman named Victoria Ruvolo was minding her own business one snowy night, driving her car down a New York motorway.

A group of teenagers out joyriding that night approached Victoria in the opposite lane of the same motorway. One of the teenagers, eighteen-year-old Ryan Cushing, reached into a grocery bag, pulled out a twenty-pound frozen turkey they’d purchased with a stolen credit card, and just for grins, lobbed it out the back window and into the lane of oncoming traffic.

That large frozen turkey smashed through Victoria Ruvolo’s windshield and crushed nearly every bone in her face. She almost died at the scene of this horrific accident – and she was in a coma for weeks. Ryan was soon arrested for the crime.

Victoria is no stranger to personal loss. The youngest of seven children, she had already lost two older brothers, a nephew, and a beloved brother-in-law in unrelated accidents and a murder. Then, when she was thirty-eight, her full-term baby died. Now this. If anyone had a reason to feel like a victim, Victoria fit the bill.

After several surgeries, months of recuperation, indescribable levels of pain, and permanent scarring, Victoria decided to attend the sentencing of the young man who had done this horrible thing to her. The judge gave Victoria permission to speak in the packed courtroom.

With a steady voice, she said, “There is no room for vengeance in my life, and I do not believe a long, hard prison term would do you, me, or society any good…I truly hope that by demonstrating compassion and leniency, I have encouraged you to seek an honorable life. If my generosity will help you mature into a responsible, compassionate, honest man, whose graciousness is a source of pride to your loved ones and your community, then I will be truly gratified, and my suffering will not have been in vain.”

In a public courtroom, she forgave him. She said, in effect, “Father, forgive him. Forgive Ryan; he had no idea what he was doing that night.”

Upon hearing Victoria’s words of forgiveness, Ryan broke down in the courtroom and wept. The judge was so moved that she sentenced Ryan to six months in prison and five years of probation instead of the maximum penalty of twenty-five years.

As Ryan was being led from the courtroom to begin serving his greatly reduced sentence, he stopped in front of Victoria, speechless, with tears streaming down his cheeks. She wrapped him in her arms and hugged him. “I was the last person to hug him before he went to prison,” she later recounted. Victoria did the hard work of forgiveness, and it changed the trajectory of Ryan’s life – and her own.

“But God…” (Ephesians 2:4).

Two simple, tiny words.In these two tiny words contain the whole of the gospel.

But…when you see this word it is a word that precipitates a change. A change in direction. A change in circumstances. A change in destiny. This word functions like a hinge. It changes the direction. Something was heading down one way –> and then the “but” and now it’s heading down the other way <–.

God…He’s the difference maker. He’s the reason for the change. He’s the reason for the difference.

Put these two words together and you have the greatest news in the history of the world.

• I was dying…but God!
• I was hopelessly lost…but God!
• I am a sinner, destined for judgment and damnation…but God!
• I had no clue what the purpose of life was all about…but God!
• I was a selfish jerk who hurt everyone who loved me…but God!
• All was darkness and death…but God!

That’s gospel.

Thank God for “But God!”