Just a mere few decades ago tattoos were considered exceedingly sinful among professing Christians. Now as we live in the last days of the last days and we get closer to the coming of the Antichrist and the Great Tribulation, and more and more celebrities and others getting tattoos all over their bodies, we find professing “Christians” wanting to follow after the lusts of their flesh as well. Tattoos are a mockery to God and you know the sign of the times when such thing as “Christian” tattoo shops exist or tattoos are glorified.
A survey in Canada done over twenty years ago found that “75% of young conservative Christians believe tattooing is a valid spiritual expression” (“For the Love of God,” The Vancouver Sun, Feb 1999). Me thinks that number might be much closer to 100% today. Douglas Todd of the Vancouver Sun visited the Vineyard Christian Fellowship in Langley, BC, and found that tattoos are the newest “in thing” for Vineyard Christians. That heretical church by the way used to be the church of Brian Doerksen, a CCM musician, where he was a “worship” leader in the 1980’s and 90’s (see report on Brian Doerksen). Amy Bonde, who is a staff member at the Vineyard in Langley, has a large Celtic cross tattooed on the small of her back. Encircling the cross are Hebrew letters that allegedly mean, “I am my beloved, and he is mine.” Bonde says the tattoo signifies that she looks upon Jesus Christ as her “lover.” The Vancouver Sun report notes that tattooing represents “a sign of a seismic shift in evangelical Christianity, which has been associated for most of this century with harsh rules about controlling one’s body: no long hair on men, no pants on women, no drinking, no dancing, no jewelry and certainly no tattooing.” Yes that does speak volumes, not only about the wicked rebellion and fake faith but the fact that so much of Christianity is merely that by name alone. Most are as lost as the most pagan heathen that has never heard the gospel in his entire life. In North Dakota there operates a Christian Tattoo Association by Randy Mastre and two other members of New Song Community Church in Bismarck whose goal is “to bring Christianity to tattooers.” (Bismarck Tribune, North Dakota, Nov 1998).
Tattoos are most definitely and undoubtedly wrong, Lev. 19:28; and 21:5 make that crystal clear, as does 1 Th. 5:22, “Abstain from all appearance of evil,” and tattoos are evil and works of darkness. “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Eph. 5:11). Its quite frightful that mainstream Christianity is so far removed from the truth that even tattoos are considered permissible. One of the biggest reasons why professing Christians accept this practice is because of their inability or their lack of desire of applying the Word of God and obeying it. They want to live after their own lusts, and don’t understand the application of Scripture in principle to absolutely everything in this world, which also fits their inability to righty divide the word of truth. Partaking of the pagan practice of tattooing is what Gentiles do, and what
“The Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils. Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?” (1 Cor. 10:20-22).
You can not put the Christian tag on something that is pagan. Many people don’t actually want the Jesus of the Bible but rather the Jesus they have made up in the carnal imagination of their unsaved mind. These are Laodicean-type of lukewarm “Christians” which are false, lost, Christian by name only, and they fill the churches in our day, especially “evangelical” ones but one day God will spew them out into eternal hell fire (Rev 3:14-18):
“So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. “Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.” (vv. 16-18).
Repent, deny yourself, lose your life for Christ and His gospel, and follow Him (Mk 8:34-38). Then you will see the evil of this pagan practice.
Consider the following that reflects tattoos as sinful and pagan, which even many unsaved people are aware of.
1. The OT plainly forbade tattooing.
“Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD” (Lev. 19:28)
“They shall not . . . make any cuttings in their flesh” (Lev. 21:5)
This is such a clear command, that one would need a compelling reason to disregard it, even though it is an OT law.
Tattooing is body modification which is the practice of burning, inking, cutting, piercing, and otherwise desecrating one’s God-given body. In Scripture it is people that were demon possessed that cut themselves (1 Ki 18:28; Mk 5:1-9).
In some cases we are told in the NT that something in the OT is not for us. That is true for the OT dietary laws (Rom. 14:2-3; I Tim. 4:1-5) and for holy days and the sabbath (Col. 2:16), but there is no such statement in regard to tattooing.
For a Christian to get a tattoo would be to say that he or she can be certain that what God was concerned about in Lev. 19:28 and 21:5 He no longer cares about, and I don’t see any basis of interpretation that allows that.
2. God’s people are not to be identified with evil.
God forbade the Israelites to cut their flesh because it was an identification with paganism and idolatry, and the NT contains the same principles and restrictions.
“Abstain from all appearance of evil” (1 Th. 5:22)
“And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Eph. 5:11)
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world” (Rom 12:1-2a)
“But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils. Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?” (1 Cor. 10:20-22)
Tattooing continues to be intimately associated with idolatry, paganism, moral debauchery, and rebellion. Nothing has changed and “Christianizing” something doesn’t suddenly make it right. What is right is what the Bible says.
Even unsaved people know that tattoos are pagan and wrong. The author, Clay Thompson, of an article in the Pacific News Service for July 27, 1996, titled “Pagan Fashion’s New Frontier - Facial Tattoos,” who makes no claim to be a Christian, associates tattoos with paganism. He connects it with a “new reverence for pagan beliefs.”
Professing Christians have claimed that tattooing is addictive. The reason for that I hypothesize is because of rebellion and the flesh of the natural man, the lost person, loves rebellion. One woman interviewed by the Vancouver Sun admitted that she got a tattoo “partly out of rebellion against the normal Christian stereotype of ‘You can’t do this, you can’t do that.’” She admits that her mother did not want her to get a tattoo and did not like it (ibid). A July 2003 survey of more than two thousand people in the USA, reported in the AFP for October 11, found that among women who get tattoos, 34% “feel sexier,” and 29% overall “feel more rebellious.” Another member of that aforementioned Vineyard congregation in Langley, BC, Peter Davyduck, who has a tattoo of the word “SIN” on his ankle, says this is a message to “judgmental Christians that everyone is a sinner and should be accepted in spite of it.” Note the rebellious attitude in this statement. Every born-again Bible-believing Christian knows that everyone is a sinner, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t matter how professing Christians should live. Unsaved people have that kind of attitude towards “judging” and sin. Everything there dovetails to reveal a very obvious haven for unsaved heathen heretics.
This carnal rebellion that is so common in todays “Christianity” is absolutely forbidden in God’s Word and is completely reflective of false professing “believers,” which are hypocrites by Biblical definition (Matt 23). And this is the attitude that lies at the heart of apostasy. Those who desire to throw off restrictions on their lifestyles are not following the Bible but their own self-willed lusts. They are fulfilling 2 Tim. 4:3-4, which actually reveals their unregenerate condition:
“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but AFTER THEIR OWN LUSTS shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”
3. The born again believer’s body is not his own; it is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” (1 Cor. 6:19)
For the born-again Christian, tattooing is cutting graffiti on someone’s else’s temple. It is to permanently change the temple that God has created and now indwells.
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.” (Gen 1:27)
Is it okay to alter myself if I have been made in the image of God?
The following is a testimony of Pastor Charlie Haddad who got tattoos before he was saved:
“I was a professing Christian for 24 Years (Catholic) and growing up I was hanging out with some Muslim friends. Some of them got tattoos of a sword and the moon. I then thought I wanted to get a cross and the face of Jesus, and I did, one on each shoulder. Looking back I got them out of pride, it was more of religious pride. I was a Christian only by name, thinking these tattoos would identify me as a Christian, far from it, I didn't know the Lord. Had I really known the Lord and wanted to walk in His ways and the way of His Word I would have obeyed Him and written His Word upon my heart and not on my body. I would have memorised and mediated on His Word instead of having a form of godliness (Proverbs 3:3; 7:2-2). I regret getting these tattoos, and I am ashamed. I know it is not pleasing to the Lord.” (source).
4. Tattooing is entirely of the world and unsaved people love the world.
“Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” (Jam 4:4)
People that befriend the world are the enemies of God, and nothing speaks louder about befriending the world than tattoos. And enemy is the very antonym of a friend of God. These are very clearly unsaved people.
“Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” (1 Jn 2:15-17)
Loving tattoos is loving the world and loving the world means you do not have the love of the Father in you. That means you are unsaved since God’s love always remains and never leaves the truly saved person (Jn 5:42; Rom 8:34-39; Heb 12:5-11; Pr 3:11-12).
Excuses like putting Biblical things on your body for Gods glory does not usurp the commands of God. God is not glorified in it. You are deceiving yourself. Your excuses are just that: excuses. They hold no water. And mostly of what you claim with your mouth is a lie and the real reason is because you think it’s “cool” or “sexy.” Its actually rebellion and God isn’t fooled. Obedience is the only way to please and love God (Jn 14:23-24; 1 Jn 2:3-5; 2 Jn 1:6).
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jer 17:9)
5. Tattooing is pagan and honours false gods.
De 12:1-3 speaks of the pagan gods that the Israelites were supposed to destroy, and v. 4,
“Ye shall not do so unto the LORD your God.”
Tattooing is worshiping and honouring pagan gods.
“Hear ye the word which the LORD speaketh unto you, O house of Israel: Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.” (Jer 10:1-12)
In all this we also see the rejection of separation, which the Bible commands everywhere and all saved people will follow because separation starts in our conversion to Christ, in our salvation (2 Cor 6:14-18).
“Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spue you not out. And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.” (Lev 20:22-23)
Interestingly, the same language of spuing out is used here, as in Rev 3:16. Disobedience to God’s words, statutes, and judgments is only reflective of unsaved false professors (cf. Jn 14:15-24; 1 Jn 2:3-5). Walking in the ways of the world, of the pagan, is the way of unsaved people only, and this invites God’s abhorration and His vomiting out of you.
6. Tattooing is idolatry and saved people are not idolatrous.
The second of God's ten commandments warns against and forbids idols.
“Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.” (Ex 20:4-6; cf. De 4:23-25)
We live in the last days of great apostasy. I understand, people don’t want to hear the truth and they will do all they can to justify their rebellion. That substantiates the apostasy.
The Bible prophesies of this time:
“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” (2 Tim 4:3-4)
If you are thinking of taking a tattoo, please do not do that but rather turn to the Lord and be ye saved. He wants to save you from your sins. You will regret it one day and your tattoo will only bring very temporal pleasure but eternal anguish, while the Lord Jesus Christ brings eternal joy. Flee to Him in repentance and faith and He will save you. There is nothing better in this life and no matter how low you may be, He will lift you up and out of your miry pit and give you new life and a new heart. God promises that and His promises have never failed. He is faithful. Please read here for further info on how to be born again and have eternal life and to personally know the One who loved you so much that He willingly and gladly gave His life for your sins so that He might save you: How to be Saved.
If you already have tattoos, God can and will forgive you, if you also will turn to Him in repentance and faith. Please read the Gospel Tract in the link above.
For further reading on Tattoos please see: Tattoos: What is the Biblical View?