We Are Ambassadors!!

I have been mulling around the idea that we are Ambassadors of Christ! What does it mean that we are Ambassadors?

2nd Corinthians 5:17-20

¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:The old has gone, the new is here! ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹ that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰ We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

We are Ambassadors in Christ. Verse 18 talks about how God has allowed us to join in ministry with him! God allows us to serve with him! That is awesome!

So what is an Ambassador?

Ambassadors are those who speak in the name of someone. We speak on behalf of God. Talk about a huge responsibility! If God is a reconciler and we are his Ambassadors then therefore we are reconcilers. However we do not reconcile those to ourselves, but to him who we speak for.

God

Verse 17 says that ANYONE who is in Christ is a new creation. I have had people say to me, "Tyler I am not a pastor or an evangelist. That is fine, but in this passage God is not saying you are Pastors in Christ or Evangelists in Christ. We are Ambassadors in Christ. This is not for select Christians. If we are in Christ we are a new creation! Being part of that new creation is that we are Ambassadors.

If God has done something cool in your life, give Him the credit. Tell people about it.

"Dude you will never believe what God has been teaching me."

Ambassadors speak on behalf of someone, we speak on behalf of God. In this passage we read that God is a reconciler. So we as Ambassadors should implore people to be reconciled to God.

We speak the heart of God.

How do we speak the heart of God? We know the heart of God! How do we know the heart of God? By dying to ourselves, experiencing his Grace and digging into his Word.

How can I be an Ambassador? We must seek the example of the one we are an Ambassador for.

Jesus was Selfless even to the point of death! So as an Ambassador be selfless.

Jesus was Loving! So as Ambassadors be love. John 13:35!

Jesus was a Reconciler! So as an Ambassador implore others to be reconciled in Christ.

Be Selfless, Be Love, Be Ambassadors

Cattle on Hills

I was working on some finance stuff today. If you know me, you may know that I can worry at times. And there is nothing more I worry about then money. This is a constant struggle of mine, between God and I.

Money Sucks!

With Laura and I getting married this summer it has only been amplified!

Money Really Sucks!

Sometimes I find myself thinking man what if we were back when they did bartering? Anyone wanna buy a sister or something? Just kidding to my sisters!!!

But what I am getting at is this verse.

Psalms 50:10
"For every beast of the forest is Mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills"

Now you must understand that during this time Cattle was the stuff! You were measured for your wealth by your beef!

Where's the Beef??

This verse is talking about how God. The God who created us and loves us, has access to the wealth of the world. After all it is his.

So today I found myself worrying about paying for health insurance for Laura and I when she comes onto my plan. I was freaking out about how much it was going to cost! It is a little crazy! But Laura kept saying, "Tyler it will all be okay, God will provide, just pray about it." At that point I was thinking to myself

This is not what I wanted to hear!!

However looking back on it, it is exactly what I needed to hear! I was reminded of this verse. God is the God of everything. God will give me what I need if I am faithful to him. I thank God daily for Laura and her positive attitude when I don't have a good attitude! She is such a blessing to me, I do not even deserve it!

Praise God! In good times and bad! Praise God!

Jesus Paid it All

One of my favorite hymns of all time is Jesus Paid It All! I enjoy attending the Vespers service at Bethel University in St Paul, MN. Every time they play that song I just can feel the Holy Spirit fill the room.

Jesus Paid it all! All to Him I owe!

Here is a little shout out to Kaleb and Shane! A couple of Brothers in Christ of mine! They started an Acoustic Project and it is awesome, are know as ninety9for! They both have an amazing heart for God! I am encouraged to see other men so in love with God! Keep up the good work brothers!



The beauty of this song speaks about how Jesus paid the cost for us! We did not deserve it, yet he paid the cost. As the snow is falling outside the window I am reminded of the line in the song, sin had left a crimson stain, he washed it white as snow!

If we are in Christ we have been washed white as snow! No matter what happened to you in the past, no matter what you have done, or said, or seen! Jesus paid it all!! All he asked is return is to live by his Spirit!

Romans 8:1-4

¹ Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, ² because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. ³ For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

So how do we live by the spirit? We die to ourselves daily and give Jesus our lives 100%. We are made fully alive when we live in the Spirit! We were dead to sin, but Christ makes us alive in his Spirit!

Romans 12:1-2
¹ Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. ² Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

If you feel like I am preaching that is because I am! I am convince that we live in scary times! We live in days that I don't think we could have ever imagined! There are people even in the church that have not given their lives to Christ. They have not died to themselves so that they can be made alive in the Spirit! And I am sorry to be so blunt, but those people...

...will go to Hell if they do not surrender to Christ!

I do not say this to scare you! I say this in love to show you the way! If I did not love each and everyone of you I would not write this! If you are reading this and you have been made new in Christ! Amen I stand beside you in worship to God! If you have not experienced the Grace and Mercy of Jesus Christ, please we do not know how long we have on this earth!

Romans 10:13
¹³ for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

If you have questions please comment on here. If you do not feel comfortable commenting, email me at tyler.roland5@gmail.com. I am convince that everyone needs Christ. Not everyone will see that in time, but I pray that if you are reading this and you have not made that decision, NOW IS THE TIME! Email me, if you have my number, call me, if you know where I live, find me. This is life is to short to waste it on nothing! Do you want your life to have a purpose? Live for something bigger then yourselves!

Be Careful Little Eyes!

The title of by blog is based on the Hebrews 12:1-2 passage, but there are other passages in the Bible that talk about eyes. I am not sure what it is, but I am fascinated with the concept of eyes.

I have told my youth that...

...We must be careful what we allow in our eyes because what goes in our eyes effects our minds, as our minds are compromised so goes our heart. As our heart goes, our ill actions will stem from them.

Matthew 6 Jesus talks about the eyes...

Matthew 6:22-23

The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good(Healthy), your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad(Unhealthy), your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness.

Your eyes are the lamp of the body! So how important is it for us to protect our eyes! We protect our eyes to protect our heart. What we allow in our eyes will effect what our heart feels.

If we are focusing on what we want, then our mind tells us we need to get this for ourselves. If we become focused on ourselves then our heart is only concerned for what we want. We therefore become self-centered people. And our Heart is not in tuned with God's.

Your focus becomes your reality!

I want my heart to break for what breaks God's heart! I want my focus to be God so that God can be my reality!

If I focus on the things that breaks God's heart, then my mind with be in line with what God's will is! Then my heart will break for what breaks God's heart! Then my actions with reflect who God is!

Eyes-Mind-Heart-Action!

We do not just make the statement that I want to follow God, I want to do God's will! We must first Focus on God, then our mind will be in tune with God, then our heart will be lined with God's, So we can show God's Love to the world through our actions!

If we want to live for God, we must protect our eyes. God must be our Focus!

As Goes our Eyes, Goes our Heart!

Overflowing

I am starting my new communication in ministry class at Northwestern on Monday. In my reading for this class I am reading this monster textbook. It is like 780 pages! But as I was reading in it today I came across at chapter that talked about how to be an effective preacher you must be saturating yourself with God's word! I thought to myself, "shoot, this is not just for preachers. This is for every Christian!

So I asked myself! Am I saturated with God!?!

I looked up the word saturated. It says that it means to be soaked, charged thoroughly or completely. To be brought to a point of saturation!

I love that! Am I charged by God? You could put it this way...

...Am I satisfied in God?

If you want to be an effective Christian, if you want to impact people for Christ you must be satisfied in God!

Matthew 5:6
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

If we thirst and hunger for righteousness Jesus says we will be satisfied! I don't know about you but I want to be satisfied in God. If we are satisfied in God we are saturated with God. To be saturated is to be completely filled.

What happens when something is full and you add more to it!?

It overflows!

So you want to overflow? You want to be an impact to those around you? First you must be satisfied in God! Do you have a hunger for God's word? Do you cherish the Bible? Do you "eat it up?" I want to overflow, but first I must make sure I am being satisfied by God!

Are you satisfied in God?

I Am Blown Away!!

I am daily blown away by something that you can never understand just by reading more about it! This thing is nothing like math, you can't do some calculations and understand it. It is not science, nor can it be explained by science. It is not health but it can affect it. It is something that is superhuman yet it is attainable for every human! I know what you are thinking.

JUST TELL US ALREADY!!

I am talking about God's Grace!! I am daily blown away by the grace that God has lavished on us!

Ephesians 2:8-9

⁸ For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— ⁹ not by works, so that no one can boast.

For it is by Grace!! Grace is getting something you don't deserve. Grace is receiving a gift simply because the gift giver wants to give it to us. All we must do is accept it!

We have been saved through faith! To accept God's Grace we must have faith in him! It seems so simple! It is almost too easy?!? We live in a culture that says there ain't no such thing as a free lunch! TANSTAFL (Read and Economics book)! But God gave us this gift! All we need to is accept it and daily surrender to Christ!

How can I be proud of myself in such a thing! I can't! God's grace is amazing, I mean there is a song singing about how amazing it is. I hope that you have been blown away by Grace. You can never fully understand how awesome it is until you have felt and experienced it! So accept it! Experience it! Love it! Be amazed by it! God is so SWEET!!

Iron Deficiency

Proverbs 27:17 says this,

As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.

Okay this message is going out to my male readers, sorry ladies!

Dudes! Why do we always think it is weak to depend on others? Being a guy is tough, (Not as tough as being a girl) but it is still tough! I am reminded everyday of the things this world bombards us with! Sex, Money, Pride in being a ladies man. We are told to be so many things, or not do certain things!

-Real men don't cry.-
-Men don't ask for directions.-
-Men don't read directions.-

We put up this image of who we think we need to be and not who God created us to be.

I am gonna be a little personal! When I was in middle school and early high school I had a porn addiction and it was killing me! My relationships with my family, friends and most importantly God. I was dying, and I wanted to die!

The lies of the world were telling me don't seek help, you can beat this yourself. Bull....crap. I needed one thing and one thing alone, God! God freed me from that lifestyle of addiction! AMEN!

But it did not stop there. I had to set up safe guards! Things like not being on the computer alone after midnight! Another thing I did was find a friend I could trust. Proverbs talked about as iron sharpens Iron so one person sharpens another!

I had an Iron Deficiency!!

Guys we are not alone in our struggles! First and foremost we have God! I think we also need brothers around us, spurring us on!

Chris Maas has been a great friend and my Iron in my struggles throughout life, not just my addiction!

So how bout you? Do you have an Iron Deficiency? Are you being sharpened by God and by others in Christ? You are not alone in your sin and struggles! You don't have to play the macho man!

We are all broken people! But we can be made whole in Christ! So real men can cry, because our heart breaks for what breaks God's heart. Real men seek God for every direction in life! Real men not only ask God for help daily but others as well!

Don't be an Iron Deficient Boy! Be a Man of God!!

Are You Out of Your Mind?!?!

I was reading in 2nd Corinthians today, chapter 5. Then a verse jumped out at me and made me think.

¹³ If we are “out of our mind,” as some say, it is for God;

I know that this verse is surrounded by a larger context, but I began to think do people think I am out of my mind?

Do people think I am crazy??

I don't go out and get drunk on a Friday night, because it is fun. I go to Church every Sunday. I raise my hands when I worship. I don't say God Dangit, when I stub my toe, because I love God and his name is HOLY! I remember back in High School people were blown away at the fact that I, a senior in high school, had never tried beer.

"You have never tried beer? That's crazy!"

I don't write this to make myself look good, because there are so many other areas in my life that I am convicted about. I write this as a challenge to myself. Am I (Tyler Roland) out of my mind for Christ??

A crazy person cannot be sane, and a sane person cannot be crazy! Are you Crazy?

As I read on more into chapter five, I came across a powerful passage! Why am I so concerned about being crazy? Why do I want to stand out in this world? Is it for my own glory? NO!

¹⁶ So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. ¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹ that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰ We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. ²¹ God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Do you know what is crazy? It is crazy that God, the perfect, holy God reconciled me from my sins! You know what is crazy?! God sent Jesus, his ONLY son, to die for me, you and everyone! You know what is crazy?! God allows us to join Him in ministry! You know what is crazy?! We can become the righteousness of God, through Christ!

So the world thinks I am crazy? I hope so! Cause I serve a Crazy Powerful God! I serve a Crazy Loving God! I serve a Crazy Mysterious God!

I wanna be out of my mind!!!

Much Ado About Nothing!

So I am a part time Youth Pastor at Hope Fellowship Church in Ramsey, MN. In addition to that I am a Special Education Para for the Anoka Hennepin School District. In one of the English classes I help out in, they are reading the William Shakespeare's book Much Ado About Nothing. As I was helping my student with his test I was thinking...

...How many times do we as Christians make Much Ado About Nothing?

How often do we worry about things that really are not necessary to worry about? Now I am not saying that we should not be concerned about certain things. I don't think it is always smart to walk down a dark alleyway in Minneapolis at two in the morning. But, we worry about money and what we are going to wear. We make Much Ado About Nothing.

Matthew 6:25-27

²⁵ “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? ²⁶ Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷ Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

So many times I find myself not putting my trust in God. I think that I have to do this so that I can get this. I then begin to worry about it.

I am getting married in July of this year! I am super excited, but to be honest with you I am also nervous. I am not nervous to be married! I am nervous because it will be my responsibility to be the provider for the family.

Then it hit me!! Like a giant cinder block! I AM NOT THE PROVIDER! God is the provider of everything. Without Him I do have reason to worry. However, I have God with me. He is the provider and the sustainer! Matthew says that God even cares for the birds, and how much more important am I? Wow!

So when you start to make Much Ado About Nothing remember this. All your Ado is not to much for God. He is the provider, and more then capable to be in control of mine and my families life!

Give as much of your Ado to God, as you possibly can!

Fixing our Eyes on Christ!

Hebrews 12 1-2

1.Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

I think about the first part of this verse in terms of sports! This may seem kinda weird, but when I am playing a sport I need to make sure I have shorts and a t-shirt. I cannot go jogging in a pair of jeans. It holds me back, or hinders me. It is easy to get caught up in jeans. Sin is like a pair of Jeans.

If we want to live totally sold out for Christ, we must throw off sin!

Now here is the rub, we ourselves can't throw off sin! My pastor Josh talked in his sermon last Sunday about how we try to manage our sin. We say to ourselves...

“I wont sin, I wont sin, I wont sin…”

And what happens? We are so fixated on trying not to sin, WE SIN! It is not about managing our sin, it is about fixing out eyes on Christ so that we can become more like Christ! I fix my eyes I fix my eyes I fix my eyes on Christ, and run the race marked out for me, because Jesus has already paid the price! Can I get an Amen?

I fix my eyes on Christ because HE is worthy! I fix my eyes on Christ because HE is just! I fix my eyes on Christ because HE is love! I fix my eyes on Christ because he is GOD! What do you fix your eyes on?