Abortion

Elbows on the Table

by Ben Zornes · Oct 24, 2024

Introduction

You may have noticed that we are drawing close to another presidential election. This whole cycle has been…weird, for sure and certain, as the Amish say. I wanted to offer some commentary on the lay of the land as I see it from my perch here in Northern Idaho.

The presidential election is between Trump and Kamala. But let’s be honest, since Biden was clearly an empty suit and the Bureaucracy ground away at their progressive goals regardless of who the figurehead was, the Dems seemed to presume that any warm body would work. Problem is, Kamala isn’t a warm body. She’s quite cool. But regardless, the Bureaucracy is trying its darnedest to eke out a legitimate looking win. I say legitimate, because the antics surrounding the 2020 election have not necessarily been remedied. However, the GOP, having done little to address the glaring holes in our election process, are urging a strategy of “too big to rig.” I heartily applaud and am hopeful that strategy actually comes to fruition.

A Face for the Faceless

That said we are faced with two choices in this election. Trump or Kamala. You can of course vote 3rd party or abstain, and it is your right to do so. But that’s like going to play tennis with some friends but refusing to use a racket. Our system is winner-take-all and that is particularly true for those in the Battleground states; those of us in deep red states get to be like a grain of sand in a kid’s sandcastle. Battleground voters get to be the seashell decorations.

We might acknowledge that God is providentially working in the events of history, but the last few years He has been writing this story in big block letters. He is upsetting the order of things. He is dumping out our tidy baskets of complacent pride. He is filling up our empty buckets of humility. We are a stiff-necked people, and he’s giving us stiff-necked rulers. The schoolmarm Bureaucracy that we endured through Covid and beyond is the just recompense for our national compromise with the abominations of abortion, sexual sins, and unholy warfare.

Kamala has made it plain that she despises Christianity, she is devout in her commitment to abortion, and would do nothing to stop the endless flood of illegal immigration and would not turn off the printing press sending money to foreign wars. “Jesus is Lord” was recently shouted at her rally, and she replied with a dismissive, “You’re at the wrong rally.” Indeed, she is the face for a faceless Bureaucracy that despises the Lordship of Christ.

Throwing in a Wrench

Trump on the other hand has been incredibly preserved through both law-fare and assassination attempts. He is glaringly imperfect as a man. His Christian faith seems to wobble between insincerity and over simplistic. But he stands for defending the safety and prosperity of our nation. This is the responsibility of the office he is running for. If the Bureaucracy is intent to grind us away as a nation, he stands as the best shot we have of mangling the machinery of that Bureaucracy. It will not be pretty or perfect. But my estimation is that he has the willpower and determination to make a big enough blast radius to give us the opportunity to do some rebuilding.

His stance on abortion is the most challenging aspect for many Christians to figure out. So let me give you my impression, and this is only my impression. I have not received any hidden words of knowledge. He is the only prominent politician I can think of that declared that women should be punished for procuring an abortion. He is the only GOP President that gladly attended the march for life. He put a spotlight on the ghoul Governor of Virginia (Ralph Northam) for advocating for abortion after birth. He gave us the supreme court which tossed Roe to the curb. Trump has said that pro-lifers have a welcome seat at his table. If he wins, we must ensure that we take that seat, put our elbows on the table and begin making the case for abolishing abortion completely across the nation. With Kamala pro-lifers will not be at the table; with Trump, we will have a seat.

Down Ballot

It is also crucial that you study the down ballot candidates and issues. In Idaho we have a Proposition for ranked choice voting that deserves to be laughed back to Portland. Florida’s Prop 4 needs to be defeated, and soundly. Right now, it doesn’t look promising on that front. Christians there ought to step on the gas to defeat that proposition restoring abortion and through 9 months. In short, do not be complacent. This is how a democracy in a republic functions, and being a nuisance to tyrants never gets old. In fact, as Thomas Jefferson would propose, “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.”

Bumpy Ride

The wise man foresees evil and hides himself. Our descent into whatever administration wins will be like arriving at DIA during a thunderstorm. That is, turbulent. You must do three things to prepare. Have faith in the Living God, whose Son took on flesh and now holds the scepter of the world. Second, instruct your children and family and friends in the ways of the Lord. A man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels, and this means that if you would be a decision-maker rather than subject to the whims of others, you must be a man of understanding. That is a summons to know your Bible inside and out, and believe its every word and labor to live it out entirely.

Lastly, prepare for difficulty. We are faced with hard work, and it will not be for the faint of heart. Wicked men and women currently wield power and have done so with the aim of establish wickedness in our land. They will not roll over so easily. Don’t chicken out. Stay steady. Stock up your groceries, and make sure you have what is needful for protecting your family and community. But never panic.

If Trump wins, as it appears is likely, we must not become complacent. In fact, that is when the most difficult work begins. But it will be joyous work for it will be the work of establishing Biblical justice in our land, and I think if he wins, we have a good shot at doing so.

Turning Things Upside Down

by Ben Zornes · May 17, 2024

Introduction

Although Roe was overturned, we still have plenty of skirmishes to undertake in order to overthrow the great evil of abortion. Psalm 146 outlines the strategy for overthrowing the wicked.

The Text

Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the LORD his God: Which made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that therein is: which keepeth truth for ever: Which executeth judgment for the oppressed: which giveth food to the hungry. The LORD looseth the prisoners: The LORD openeth the eyes of the blind: the LORD raiseth them that are bowed down: the LORD loveth the righteous: The LORD preserveth the strangers; he relieveth the fatherless and widow: but the way of the wicked he turneth upside down. The LORD shall reign for ever, even thy God, O Zion, unto all generations. Praise ye the LORD.
Psalm 146:5-10

Our Happiness

First, we must be joyful warriors in this battle. We must be noted for our happiness. The way of the transgressor is hard, is misery. You can’t fight misery with misery. We have solid joys and lasting pleasures, while our opponents have fleeting baubles which bring eternal misery. Our evangelistic undertakings must be happy. That happiness must be rooted in the right worship of the God of Jacob. When activism is divorced from worship of the Triune God it inevitably leads to capitulation to injustice. Faith in Almighty God, the One who made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that therein is, is where this joy comes from. So then, we must be diligent to keep a watch in our own lives so that we do not preach to others and ourselves be castaways and reprobates.

The God of Justice

What worship of the living God leads to is the certain vindication of His justice. He is not an aloof deity. He is the judge of all the earth. We shouldn’t think of Him in this office of judge as a blake-robed figure with a furrowed brow pouring over reams of legal argumentation from Behemoth Law Firm, Inc. The image of a judge which Scripture paints for us is more akin to Robin Hood or William Wallace than it is to even the good Mr. Clarence Thomas. Justice guards the weak (i.e. strangers, widow, poor, hungry) from the insatiable lust and greed of the mighty wicked.

But the categories of “oppressed” and “victim” have become so muddled in our age because we have abandoned the worship of the God which “keepeth truth for ever (Ps. 146:6).” We have redefined victims because as a nation we no longer worship the God who is the eternal keeper of truth. Our culture sees a pregnant woman choosing to slaughter her child as a way for her to be delivered from oppression.

Biblical justice is grounded on God’s eternal truth. This is found in His revealed word, and in His manifest witness in nature. So, we need to be well versed in the categories of Scripture, the wisdom of Scripture, as well as the inner witness which makes it plain that a woman devouring her young is an evil. There is a reason we recoil when we see an animal creature devour one of its offspring. Our conscience bears witness that this is an evil.

Turning the Wicked Upside Down

So we must be joyful by worshipping the God of Jacob according to Scripture. This demands that we understand His system of justice. His system looks like truth with callouses. Word and work. Faith and faithfulness.

And all this being true, we walk in the knowledge that the way of the wicked will be, very soon, turned upside down. The Lord reigns, and this means that Planned Parenthood, even with its deep pockets and lobbyists and blackmail on pro-life congressman is not reigning.

Our evangelism is announcing an eschatological reality: that the kingdoms of this world are a Jenga tower about to topple. Not only that, but Christ and His eternal justice and truth will forever reign in Zion, His church. We must not be apathetic. God, through His body the church, is bringing about the certain end for those who walk in wicked ways. That certain end is that they will end up, in the Psalmists words, upside down. Every abortion clinic will one day have a vacant sign on the front door. Every participant in abortion will be made to give an account. This demands that we minister in faith and not by sight.

March for Life 2024 | Bloodguilt

by Ben Zornes · Jan 27, 2024

Introduction

We live in a nation that for a half century has insisted on quibbling over the acceptable amount of innocent blood to be spilled. Roe was ruled unconstitutional by the Dobbs decision in June of 2022; although that was a victory, it was a victory of redrawn battle lines. It sent the duty of abolishing abortion back to the various state legislatures.

Happily, many states have acted swiftly to eradicate, or at least severely curtail, abortion in their state. Idaho is amongst the handful of states which have passed Heartbeat Laws. And for that we should continue to give thanks. And continue to work towards complete abolition of this horrific practice of abortion.

Sadly however, the overturning of Roe has been a baseball bat to a hornet’s nest in many states. These states have doubled down on continuing the bloodshed of the unborn. In some places like NY, CA, and CO our nation has not only continued the shedding of innocent blood, but insisted on expanding the scope of how old that blood can be when it is shed. While no innocent blood should be shed, our progressive states are deranged with bloodlust to slaughter unborn babies even until birth. European countries, which progressives view as the cool kid they need to impress, don’t even have such heinous laws, and would be considered repressive by these progressives.

The explanation for this heightened madness is that the guilt of sin (both individually and collectively) is like water. It will wear down and grind away and seep through all barriers eventually. Roe was the dam which held at bay their guilty conscience, now that it has burst they are racing to find anything to stop the flood of bloodguilt which is bearing down upon them. I want to highlight how pervasive guilt is for both the individual and the community.

Guilt Hiding Around the Corner

Those who are complicit in abortion as individuals need to remember this, the thing about guilt is that it finds a way to get around every garrison we put up to keep it out. Guilt knows its way away around the prescriptions you take to numb your emotions. Guilt is there after the high. Your guilt doesn’t take pity on your hangover headache. Guilt knows how to find you at midnight and in the broad daylight. Your therapist cannot extract the guilt that plagues you. All the ways you try to hide from your guilt are like the proverbial screen door on a submarine. A guilty conscience weighs upon you and motivates all other actions. The guilt influences every other decision, consciously and unconsciously.

This partly explains why there is such affection between abortion advocates and champions of establishing an overweening nanny-State. They’ve slaughtered their babies and to soothe a guilty conscience they adorn themselves with robes of State-run empathy. But advocating for a Matriarchal Government won’t take away the guilt. Trying to express the feminine virtue of nurturing via the arm of Government is like performing brain surgery with a backhoe.

This is why the advocates for choice are so very wrong about abortion being a private matter. The weight of the bloodguilt of abortion cannot be kept at the individual level. The stench of that guilt has seeped into our nation as a community. Our civic leaders have snuck language into our laws that they think will be a bulwark against the guilt that gnaws at them when they are alone with their thoughts.

Recently, the US Senate voted down the Women’s Health Protection Act, by a 51-49 margin. However, despite it failing as a bill, the Senate Democrats once more revealed their endgame. They sought to codify Roe as law of every state in the Union, an attempt to overrule laws (like Idaho’s Heartbeat Law) which prohibit or severely restrict abortion. In the aftermath of Roe’s downfall the mask has slipped and abortionists have begun insisting for abortion up to birth, nationwide, for any reason. The guilty conscience reasons if abortion is lawful at 12 weeks it must be lawful up to birth.

A gathering of Christian pro-life advocates like this is lectured for being heartless, unreasonable, and unfeeling towards the most exceptional instances of abortion. But guilty consciences are unreasonable. Nationally, we’ve heaped up five decades of crushed skulls, turned wombs into chemical wastelands, and trafficked the body parts of the unborn (using the unusable bits of their corpses to heat our hospitals and universities). We have boyfriends, husbands, and parents who have persuaded women to slaughter their own offspring in order to maintain their own comfort and standing in society. We have doctors who’ve perverted the noble office of physicians of mercy to become the rubber-gloved hands which terminate innocent lives made in the image of God.

Deliverance from Bloodguilt

Our guilt is heaped high indeed. But what I declare to you is the Gospel tidings of Jesus Christ who rose from the grave. Here is what King David the Psalmist declared in Psalm 51:14, “Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation: and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.”

The only way to escape the haunting presence of guilt is to have the Judge of all the earth reckon you as righteous. The only way to obtain this glorious deliverance from guilt is to turn with sincere repentance to Jesus the Son of God. Christ gladly takes your guilty sentence upon Himself, and then offers to you His decree of righteousness. This is why David says that if God delivers him from bloodguilt he will sing aloud of God’s righteousness. Deliverance from bloodguilt is followed by God’s justice being proclaimed.

So then, you cannot build a wall high enough to keep the guilt out. You can’t legislate your guilt away, or have a Supreme Court ruling assuage your plagued conscience. But your guilt can be taken away entirely. And here is how: confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. So, to the meek of the earth gathered here, and to the great ones in Washington, D.C., board rooms of Planned Parenthood, and City Councils near and far, I adjure you to repent of your sins, turn to Christ, and so have your bloodguilt taken and cast into the deeps of the Atlantic Ocean.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, Amen.

Obedience But Only After 15 Weeks.

by Ben Zornes · Sep 13, 2022

The Republicans in DC have decided, with Lindsey Graham as their mouthpiece to pursue passing legislation which would ban abortions after 15 weeks. Here he is in his own words:

This is what you get when you derive your morality from public opinion polls instead of from Scripture. https://t.co/ZTww2XuKtE
— Ben Zornes (@benzornes) September 13, 2022

Now, on one hand I applaud him for not sitting on his hands post-Dobbs. The Dobbs ruling wasn’t a final victory. Roe until Dobbs was like the pre-season, and now we’ve got a 50 game season to decide the champion.

However, as my tweet of this video articulates, the GOP has decided to couch their moral reasoning in two things: the opinion of the average American voter, and what the coolest nations over at the UN doing. If your teenager made a decision like the GOP has made here, you’d probably respond with the cliché about jumping off a cliff if all their friends did. Public opinion polls are not where our morality should be derived from. Morality can’t be decided by a vote. Morality must be transcendent, or else it will be transient. Scripture should be the basis for our civil laws and how we understand morality, justice, and equity.

Regardless of whether this bill has a shot of even coming close to passing, our elected officials are not tasked by God to execute justice and peace only insofar as public opinion will go along with it. Our standard for what constitutes murder shouldn’t be drawn on the basis of where other 1st world nations draw the line.

As we await more information on this bill and the strategy behind it, the concern which we ought to raise is that it will be very easy for pre-Dobbs pro-life politicians to weasel their way (post-Dobbs) into a spot where they can preserve their pro-life credentials while sidling away from language such as “from conception”. They can now look reasonable, respectable even, without having to continue the fight further.

Make no mistake, I hope every GOP member of congress supports & votes for this bill, and it would be a wonderful step forward if it became law. But it is also rife with temptation to stop there. The Bible doesn’t tell us that compliance to God’s law in 62.5% of cases is good enough. Rather, Moses promises Israel, “But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries (Exo. 23:22).” The GOP should take heart, and by faith walk in the promise of those words, regardless of how many Handmaid’s Tale costumes are on the capitol steps. We are to obey all that God commanded us in His Word, not just to the extent that Gallup tells us will satisfy voters during the mid-terms.

The GOP should be pressed to clarify that this is just step one of their plan to ban abortion from conception. Is that a steep political hill? Yes. Does that matter? No. God’s Word condemns half-hearted obedience far more than just rank disobedience (Jer. 3:11). In other words, keep a close watch on how this proceeds, and don’t step off the gas.

The Joy of the Lord is Our Strength

by Ben Zornes · Jun 26, 2022

Through unforeseen workings of God’s providence, a great victory was brought about this week. Abortion was effectively made illegal in a great number of our states. Giving thanks, praise, and rejoicing are all quite appropriate responses.

Nehemiah, in rebuilding Jerusalem, enjoyed a similar moment of joyous celebration. God had brought about a great triumph by giving the saints stamina for repairing Jerusalem’s wall. They accomplished this in spite of the conniving of numerous enemies. Once the wall was completed, Ezra & Nehemiah led the people in a holy day of covenant renewal.

Nehemiah exhorted the people in this way, “Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared: for this day is holy unto our Lord: neither be ye sorry; for the joy of the LORD is your strength (Neh 8:10).”

Godly celebration includes sweet wine, perhaps some fireworks, and plenty of food to share. And don’t feel a twinge of sorrow. Sorrow has been weaponized by those who hate the Gospel to blackmail the kindness of the saints into compromise. This victory we enjoy isn’t the end of the work. No one’s claiming that. But it is a victory. So rejoice accordingly.

Finally, consider Nehemiah’s concluding phrase: the joy of the Lord is our strength. Which raises the question, strength for what? Strength is given for repentance & reform. The abundant joy which God fills His people with enables them to face down their own sin & gladly turn from it. It imbues them with strength to continue the work of rebuilding the ruins. The Lord’s joy brings strength to confront tyranny & traitors; and boldness for the conflicts which are certain to arise. Joy brings courage to speak a clear Gospel to fearful women. Receive the Joy of the Lord, and be strengthened for the inward repentance & outward reform.

We are weak, but He is strong. We are feeble, but our God is omnipotent. We are poor, but He is rich. As that old hymn of Luther reminds us, “did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing.” May the Lord forgive us for trusting in our own strength, or cowering in our own fears. God calls us out of our cowardice and into His courage. Not by our own might, but by the Spirit are we to face our foes. Whether they be the foes of inward sin, the corruption of worldliness, or the ferocious roars of that lion the devil. Grant that we may walk in the boldness which comes from union with Jesus, and so may we be turned from our sin. By this obedient humility, may our nation be led to repent; from President to plumber, from Chief Justices to college students, from Wall St. to Main St. grant us a total repentance.

Pursue the Enemy

by Ben Zornes · May 9, 2022

The heartening news this week is that the Supreme Court is poised to roll back the scourge of Roe v. Wade. This is a tremendous victory in the fight for defending unborn babies. But victory must be accompanied by pursuit. If you rout your enemies, and then yawn while they retreat and rearm, you will find the victory is short-lived.

Our celebration of this pending ruling is in good order. Godly women should imitate Miriam and get out the tambourines in celebration of God’s deliverance. Godly men should raise a shout of joy for God’s sovereign hand being displayed.

And then, we should pursue the enemy. Many states like Colorado, New York, & California have enshrined draconian abortion laws, and the saints must assist in repealing such laws. We must call other nations to repentance for this particular bloodshed. Gender mutilation clinics need to be rid from our land. Porn must be given no quarter, that sniveling worm must no longer be allowed to be produced & consumed while hiding behind the banner of free speech.

This victory will be short-lived if it isn’t accompanied by vigorous repentance. The asterisk that accompanied several of Judah’s good kings was that “the high places were not taken away (2 Kings 14:4).” They brought about some level of reformation, but didn’t pursue when once the enemies of the Lord were routed.

Yet we serve a King who sits enthroned forever. Christ will not cease to conquer His enemies until all of them are subdued under His feet. So we shouldn’t cease to yield to His reign in us as individuals, families, states, and nations. For not the intrigues of Supreme Court clerks, nor the cudgel of wicked Executive Orders, nor weak-sauce ecclesiastical statements, nor even the gates of hell shall prevail against the Lord or His Anointed, our Lord Jesus.

God has brought about, by the strangest order of events (i.e. Trump, RBG’s death, COVID, leaked SCOTUS docs), a mighty deliverance. Who could have foreseen the way in which the Lord would work to answer our prayers to free us from the abomination of abortion, and yet He has so worked. While many who hate God are gnashing their teeth and screeching their demands to be free to murder their unborn, the Lord reminds us in His word that “such were some of you; but we are washed, but we are sanctified, but we are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.”

May God forgive us as a nation for taking 50 years to undo this sin. May He forgive us as the church for harboring compromise in our own hearts and lives. May He forgive us in our families for the ways in which we’ve cherished the murderous thoughts of unrighteousness anger and rivalry toward our brother. May He forgive us individually for the times when we’ve called our own evil good, and good evil.

The battle isn’t done, but it must be fought by those with clean hands & pure hearts. The saints of God have only one way to overcome: the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. We overcome by being justified freely by His grace, and then laboring according to His grace that works in us to do the good works He has prepared for us. And the basis of our testimony are these words of Gospel kindness, God has washed away all our sin, through Christ.

Cuttings for the Dead

by Ben Zornes · Apr 18, 2022

Listen to an Audio Version of the post.

Introduction: The Weight of Grief

Death is an enemy. We were warned in Eden that this enemy would be unleashed if we disobeyed, and as certain as the Bible, death came for us. Though our first ancestors still lived long lives, stretching nearly a millennium, it came for them all. Not one could escape. As the weight of grief and the fear of death haunted mankind, the people of the earth sought for ways to satiate the pain, honor the dead, and keep the specter of their own mortality at bay.

Of course we have the archaeological evidence of how ancient cultures grieved their dead, how they buried them, and honored them, and––more importantly to my point here––how they dealt with their grief. The Scripture offers us a hint in Moses’ law:

Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.
Leviticus 19:28

This prohibition explicitly rules out mourning for the dead by marring, branding, or inking your flesh. It is striking that what we might call “self-harm” was the response to grief that Scripture took off the table as being an unlawful way to grieve.

No Tats for Abraham’s Kids

The larger immediate context here in Leviticus addresses pagan ways of life. These practices aren’t allowed for God’s covenant people, practices such as eating meat with blood, witchcraft, pagan hairstyles (likely addressing the practice of honoring some deity by shaving their signs/symbols into your hair). The Hebrews’ grief over the dead was not to be excessive or inconsolable. They served the God who had revealed Himself to be “I AM,” and thus the resurrection from the dead was baked into Israel’s religious understanding (Cf. Mk. 12:26-27).

A few chapters later, God makes a similar prohibition; this time His directions are aimed towards the Levitical priests:

They shall not make baldness upon their head, neither shall they shave off the corner of their beard, nor make any cuttings in their flesh.
Leviticus 21:5

The priests were not to adopt the practices of pagan priests, whether it be in shaving pagan symbols into their hair, cutting their flesh, or prostituting their daughters. The priests of Yahweh were to act in accordance with His covenant, not according to synchronistic pragmatism.

Deuteronomy Weighs in

In Moses’ covenant renewal sermons of Deuteronomy he reiterates this prohibition:

Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Deuteronomy 14:1

In view here are practices common amongst the Baal worshippers of Canaan. These rituals are exhibited later on in Scripture, in Elijah’s contest with Baal’s priests (1 Kng. 18:28). “Cuttings of the flesh” constituted a part of Canaanite fertility rituals to appease Baal. They thought the ground would be renewed through spilling their own blood upon it. Israel was not allowed to participate in either the grieving practices of the Canaanites, nor in such fertility rituals.

In Canaanite religion there were also “professional” lamenters. These were usually women who would be hired to weep, wail, and cut themselves in order to express their grief. Their purpose in this was to show the deceased that they were held in honor. This was thought to keep the spirits from haunting the community. Regardless, God prohibits this sort of marring of our bodies as a means of grieving the dead.

Tattoos Abounding

So, what are we to do with the fact that, even amongst Christians, we not only have no aversion to tattoos, we embrace & welcome tattooing. It shouldn’t surprise us to find an abundance of tattoos in the broader culture, as it is increasingly paganized. But the frequency of the practice should also draw our attention to why it is being done. What’s the most common type of tattoo? Is it not some tribute to a deceased relative or friend? A heart with mom’s name in it. Angel wings with Grandpa Bill’s name inscribed. And after all, why is it that skulls are the go-to tattoo? I’d hazard a guess that the amount of tattoos a woman gets, corresponds closely to her number of abortions.

It’s striking that in pagan cultures of old, the tendency was to grieve the dead through marring one’s own flesh, and marking it to honor the departed. This ritual was off limits to Israel. Now, as Western Civilization abandons the worship of the Triune God, we find ourselves returning to ancient pagan means of grieving the dead. The cults of the dead would mark themselves, an attempt to keep a sort of contact with the dead. It was a vain hope that the marks upon their flesh would enable the living to communicate with the dead. We see this sort of sentimentalism in the common expressions about deceased family “looking down” on us and “watching over us.”

Grief over death leads unbelievers to mark their flesh with proof of their grief. Those without the hope of the resurrection reach to vain measures to cling to the hope of seeing their departed loved ones again. The Word of God forbids us from attempting this. Instead it comforts us with the knowledge that those in Christ Jesus shall rise again, and are, even now, in Christ’s blessed presence.

Are Other Sorts of Tattoos Lawful?

The inevitable objection is that not every tattoo is drawn as a means of grieving. Are other sorts of tattoos lawful? What if you just want to have permanent artwork, or the symbol of some group you’re a part of? We must remember that Israel was given a sign with which their body was to be marked: circumcision. And now in the New Covenant, our body is marked with a sign of water. To be marked with some other sign is to allow a kind of covenantal claim on your body.

One irony is that many Christians argue that they are getting their tattoo to be a witness to their Christian faith. So they ink a Hebrew or Greek word on their wrist. Here’s the problem. At the very least adopting a “cool” cultural practice in order to witness to their faith should raise the question, as to whether this practice is the best medium for Gospel communication. Making a Christian porn film to show how intense Song of Solomon’s view of marriage is would not only be unwise, it would be an unlawful way of communicating the Word.

A Rival Sign

But there’s a deeper problem than just mindless cultural conformity. When a Christian gets a tattoo to mark themselves as a “person of faith” in some way, they introduce a rival covenant sign to their baptism. Of course, our baptism itself isn’t perpetually visible to the physical eye. But this is why the Christian is admonished to let their manner of life adorn & display the Gospel (1 Thes. 1:5, 2 Pt. 3:11). This is precisely the point of the Levitical law before us, your body is not to be marked because it already has been marked out for the Lord’s service.

A small cross tattoo on your forearm raises the question as to why you would need a permanent bodily sign when God has already sealed you as a son or daughter of promise through your baptism. Other marks are not only unnecessary, they purport to replace the sign of your baptism. This, of course, isn’t the expressed rationale for most Christians who get a tattoo. But it should be asked, “how is such a mark not a rival token to your baptism?”

If a tattoo is merely a permanent adornment for stylistic purposes, we’re confronted with the need to explain how these “cuttings/pricks” are not what Leviticus prohibits. If the tattoo is a mark of your devotion to Christ, you must be challenged to defend how it isn’t a rival baptism. Some justify tattoos by citing Paul. In Galatians 6:17, Paul calls the scars he received by being beaten for his witness of Christ, his stigma (or tattoo). These were marks he unwillingly received, but gloried in later due to the witness they bore to his sufferings for Christ. It should be evident to us that willingly placing a rival token on yourself is quite a different thing than unwillingly receiving persecution for testifying to Christ.

Furthermore, God promises to mark out all who are His (Ez. 9:1-4), and the Lamb has marked all the elect with His Father’s name upon our foreheads (Rev. 14:1). It would seem that the sort of tattoos which Christians defend are an attempt to walk by sight and not by faith in God’s promise to write His name on their forehead.

One Other Thing (Okay a Few Other Things)

Thus, tattoos or markings which commemorate a deceased person are unlawful. Marking oneself with the emblem of loyalty to some earthly community (however “harmless”) is also unlawful. Both of these are resurrecting the vain practices of paganism. But closer to home, Christians should not reify their baptism through appropriating the practice of godless superstition. If you have a tattoo, you should refrain from getting any more. Remove them as you’re able, or else keep them as discretely as possible.

And in this matter, as in all others, repenting of past follies begets future wisdom. The commands to ancient Israel were not capricious, nor should we think they’ve simply sputtered out. There were clear dangers from which God was guarding His people (both then and now). We are set apart as God’s people, through the sign & seal of baptism. The water which washed you at your baptism is a sign which was good enough in God’s sight to mark you as His, so don’t try to outdo God.