45. Legalism w/ Tattoos

I do not mean to be mean, I do mean to be mad. You obey your pastor. If you ain't got the King James, you ain't got, hey, you don't have a King James, you don't have a Bible. I still believe if you have gold today in hell before I get my talents from a woman, I'm a preacher. The young preachers have two love God getting pulled off in the Calvinist and I'll fight it, I'll fight it. I'll fight you in the parking lot over and I'll get personal with you. When you got dressed today, you dressed deity. This is the For Freedom Podcast. A podcast that is part of the RFP network that seeks to bring freedom in Christ from the spiritual abuse of legalism in the independent fundamental Baptist movement. Now here are your hosts, John Hollifield and James Saifert. And so fundamentalism is designed to unpack the idea of authority from scripture. The problem with that is that that's not the defining principle in scripture. It is a part of scripture, but the defining principle in scripture is love. And now I'm not saying that all men who sit under that teaching will become abusive, but what I'm saying is the ones who are abusive will be drawn to that sort of teaching. I don't want to give people just a list of things they can start doing differently until they have a heart out of which they're going to be doing those things differently. Bitterness is different from hurt. I would say that hurt or even abuse does not have to result in bitterness. If anybody should have been lockstep with him, it's those disciples. If anybody, and please don't tell me after the service, oh Dr. Hamlin, if I lived in that day, I'd be right there. No, you wouldn't. No, you wouldn't. No, you wouldn't. You'd be down at the tattoo parlor getting a tattoo. That's where you'd be. Come on. Come on. Come on. Well. That's good. Right there. Mr. C, I was preaching the other night at a great conference and I said, if ever backslide and get a tattoo. Yeah. Come on. Yeah. Amen. Good place for you to say amen. Come on. I said, if ever backslide and get a tattoo. Yeah. Uh-oh. You know, for a Christian to get a tattoo, it's like somebody taking a Sharpie marker and giving the Mona Lisa a mustache. Amen. Come on. Amen. I said the other night preaching at a great conference, I said, if ever backslide and get a tattoo. Because that's the only way a Christian could get a tattoo is if they backslide. I said, I'm going to get one on my bicep, a heart, and it's going to say mom on it. If ever backslide. Come on. Went out to eat with the preacher. His family. Got back to the motel. Mrs. Hamlin was with me. I closed the door. I turned around and she was standing there with her fist on her hip. And every married man under the tent knows the power of that move. And she looked at me and she said, if you ever backslide and get a tattoo, it better not say mom. It better say carry on it. Oh. Oh. Uh-oh. To which I replied, yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. James, we are back. Ford Freedom Podcast is back after almost a month and a half hiatus. And as you heard, we got that new intro. You just heard a clip coming in. We're going to get to that in just a little bit. But James, man, how have you been? Man, I've been doing good. It's good to be back. I told you, John, when we recorded that episode for the RFP guys, man, it was just so refreshing to get back talking again and being able to react back and forth and bounce ideas off each other. It was just great to do that. And so I'm looking forward to being back. I'm looking forward to what we've got going on. You heard our new intro. You've seen our new logo. And hopefully we've got some people that have went and bought some merch from our merch store. We are merging it up. The 26 Letter Podcast inspired us. And I asked where they use theirs from. And so we've got three different designs out right now. We've got the new logo. We've got the old logo. And then we went ahead and designed a slogan shirt to God, not the pastor, be the glory. And so we hope you'll pick those up. The story is a little confusing if you go to it. All those logos can be put on different things. Stickers, mugs, shirts, hoodies, baby clothes. So you just pick it and you do it. And it'll be great. And so I've got a mug coming and I've got a shirt coming. It's going to be great. Yeah, I got two shirts coming and excited about that. So, yeah, we're excited. James has done some good work. He's worked on the logo and he's worked on the store, getting that up. And I worked on that new intro. Man, James, I just hope we can have content that is as epic as the intro. I think I might have gone too far with it, but I was having fun. But we hope you guys like it. And it has been a month and a half. We actually had intended to do a couple more episodes, but just scheduling and thing worked out. We were just like, let's just take a break. Let's just be done. And then the RFP guys were like, hey, can you guys cover for us while we're breaking? I was like, sure. And so we loved doing that and enjoy that. And let me say this. Welcome new listeners. Because I know we got some new listeners from doing that episode. So I want to say welcome, guys, over to the For Freedom podcast. And before we jump into our topic, I do want to say, James, what have you been doing with your time off? How's it been? Well, John, I don't really have any time out. I've been off from the show. But we've been full steam ahead with summer camp for our youth, vacation Bible school for our kids. We did an event called Alexander Impact for our county. And we partnered with 13 other churches. And we just impacted our community. We went and did backyard VBSs. We went and did just some community service projects. We cut some wood, delivered wood to some shut-ins. And not only people that go to our church, but just people in the community. And then we leave this week for kids camp, which is where I'm at right now. As of the time of this recording, we'll be at kids camp. And so it's been busy. We took a family vacation. We went to Texas. And we went to Arkansas. And then I think we may be taking a small beach trip in a couple of days. And so we're just trying to figure that out. So, yeah, it's been crazy busy. But it's been a great time. Great time of relaxation for the family when we were away. And just doing ministry, doing life, man. It's been great. Yeah, I hear you. How about you? It's been the same way. It's like, okay, we've had some time off from this. But it's been full steam ahead in other areas. We, at the beginning of July, or at the end of June, beginning of July, we did our family vacation. Went down to the Lakeland area around Orlando, in between Tampa and Orlando. And had some fun. Went to the beach one day. And I got lobstered. I mean, burnt to a crisp. Let's go. And, yeah, not fun. And then we went and did a... The kids did not want to go to Disney World or Universal or any of those things. They wanted to go to Gatorland. So, we went and saw some gators. Really cool place. I mean, we got to see some animals. And they sat on an alligator. And I said, heck to the gnaw. I'm not sitting on no alligator. And so, my wife stepped in and held the family banner. And went in there and sat with my three-year-old son on the alligator. And then... But I did try some gator. I ordered some gator meat. And I had a good time with that. So, we had a fun time. Not really restful vacation, but a lot of fun. And then we've been going at it with the church. We've been preaching through the book of Judges at our church. And then just took a break in that and started a new series on what does the Bible say about... And we're going to be talking about different issues like anxiety and self-image and contentment. And then we've been doing this Bible Bee thing, this National Bible Bee. And we've been doing that at our church on Tuesday nights. And just been counseling full-time ahead. I've been picking up some other cases. And so, just growing in that. So, yeah. It's been wild. It's been crazy. And one of the cool things... And this is going to... I guess we'll introduce sort of our subject as you heard the clip. The opening clip coming in. Well, before we start our topic, John. Tell our guests, three weeks from today, where are we going to be at? Oh. We are going to be in Bourbon, Missouri. Let's go. Bourbon, Missouri. For the RFP meetup. Got to be there. We've got to be there. We're going to be there. Me and John, I'm flying in. John is driving in. And... If I can find my truck keys. Well, hopefully, son. We've got to get there. Man, I lost my truck keys. Oh, my goodness. So, we're going to be there. We're going to... I think from what I've heard from the RFP guys, we're going to be actually hosting a session or a breakout session or a talk of some sort. And so... We're going to be recording a live episode. Okay. Recording a live episode. We've already got the episode picked out. And we're going to... It's going to be great. We may have some audience impact or some audience involvement there. It's going to be a great time. And so, I know the worship would be great. It was great at the last one that we got to listen to. And the one in Georgia. And so, hopefully, you've marked your calendars to be there. You went to the RFPNetwork.org. And you've went to and signed up at the Meetup tab. Because it's going to be great. Hopefully, you can join us there. We'd love to see your faces. And so, we'd love to meet you guys. We've actually... John, we've actually had a couple people reach out to us. And they want to do a sort of a 10-minute testimony of their life of coming out of legalism. And so, we're going to try to hook up with a couple of those. And we'll do that as well on an episode in the near future. And so, if that's you. If you've got a story you want to tell, let us know. We want you to be a part of it. And we'd love to meet you there. Get to know you. And have you on the show. That's a great idea. James has a way of being able to record those. And we can insert those. So, we're excited about doing that. And so, yeah. It's going to be an awesome, awesome time. And we're going to be there. Nathan, Brian, and JC are going to be there. Lois and Emily of the RFWP are going to be there. And who knows? Maybe some others. But we're definitely looking forward to it. So, we hope to see you there on August the 26th, 27th, and 28th in Bourbon, Missouri for the RFP meetup. So, you know, one of the last things I did before we came back was we have a guy who's been coming to our church. And I had the opportunity of doing something that I never would have dreamed I would have been doing in my years in the IFB. And that was he was saved five years ago, came to Christ five years ago, almost six years ago. And he had been in a rough, rough life. But the man has got a talent for art. And he's been working and providing for his family in a tattoo shop. And when he first started coming to our church, he said, I have just a desire to open up a Christian tattoo shop where I can, you know, give tattoos. You know, people can do tattoos, give tattoos, and then also use it to tell my story and give the gospel and use it to honor Christ. And I said, yeah, man, that sounds great. And then, you know, here we are last weekend. And we're able to go over there. And he's opening it up and asked us to come and pray for God's blessing over that and that God would use the business to. This is a cruel part of it, James. We were sitting there talking around. And he's got his little room there. He's got his bed that people would lay on, his chair. And one of the people that were there looked up in the door. There was a door frame that leads into a storage room. And there's a little razor blade. A little razor blade that was tucked in the corner. He's like, why you got a razor blade tucked in the corner? He said, well, that's for a reason. I did that on purpose. He said, because when you're sitting over there on the chair and you're sitting over there and I'm tattooing you, your line of eyesight is sitting right there at that door. And he said, when you look at the door, somebody's going to notice that razor blade. They're going to ask me what that razor blade's for. And I'm going to say, well, that was the razor blade. That was the last razor blade I used to fix up a line of cocaine and drugs before God saved me. Let me tell you about what happened and how my life changed. And just a lead into being able to share the gospel. I'm like, man, that is awesome. His name is Josh Small. And I opened up Underdog Art there in Shelbyville, Tennessee. And so if you're around the area, you go hit him up. But he's got another cool thing that he's doing called Erase the Hate. And so he's offering this. And you can look up more information on him on social media. But if you have like a gang tattoo or like an inappropriate racial tattoo or something like that, and you've changed or you're deciding to make a change in your life, he has some stipulations to do. And you have to fill out some paperwork. But he will cover it up for free. He will help you get that covered and take care of that. And he calls it Erase the Hate. And I thought that was just really cool. So he's praying that that opens up doors to be able to share the gospel with people and just reach some of those in society that probably are not going to come through the doors of a church right away. And so we're excited about that. That led us into sort of me and James having some – me having some thoughts and throwing this topic out to James. And we had a little bit of an interesting conversation before we jumped on here. So we're excited. And so on the For Freedom podcast today, we're going to cover the idea and the topic of legalism with tattoos. Legalism with tattoos. So this is going to be interesting. Let's see where we go here. First of all, James, have you ever heard it talked about or presented or maybe even preached that tattoos are wrong for a Christian? Yes. In about at least once a year while we were in college, at least. I mean, I'm just spitballing here. Maybe more than this. You know, the thought of tattoos, the thought of marking your body is devilish. It is something that is for Satan and his demons. And if you mark your body, you're part of Satan and his demons. And, you know, Satan has a beast that's got 666 tattooed on his forehead. So if you get a tattoo, you're just like the beast and the Antichrist with this number on his forehead. And so this thought of tattoos and legalism inside of this has definitely been a prevailing topic. You heard we've already played the clip of Mr. Hamlin, the premier evangelist of America. And he gave us his thought of a tattoo and how his wife responded to that. And so that is what we have heard in our life. Yeah. I mean, that was a good example. His basic didn't really go into why, but he was basically throwing out there as almost understood that a sign of backsliding is that you're going to get a tattoo. Yeah. James, listen, here's another clip of somebody sort of doing that. Leviticus 19, verse 28. Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the what, church? The dead. Now watch me. The Bible's pretty explicit in the Old Testament. It says, look, you don't need to mutilate your body for the dead. Do you know how many young people today are cutting their flesh? And they're cutting their flesh because they want to consider dying or maybe they're trying to get somebody's attention. Or they're just cutting for whatever reason. The Bible forbids the cutting of the flesh for the dead. Let's go a little bit further in verse number 28 again. It says, you shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you. I am the Lord. That's pretty self-explicit. Am I right on that? That's a pretty good explanation of what we would call tattoos. So God is forgetting the placing of marks on our body in the Old Testament. And people say, well, preacher, that was because they were worshiping the dead. That's true. But God's not saying you have permission to cut your flesh for the living. God's not saying you have permission to print marks on your body for the living. God is explicitly saying you can't cut, you can't alter, you can't print on your body. Can I tell you why? Because your body belongs to God. Amen. And so that's really sort of the, what that clip sort of laid out was really the argument. And the passage that is the quick go-to is Leviticus 19. So why don't we jump in and sort of look at that and see is that, you know, are we going to come to that conclusion that that's what it actually means and that's what it's saying. So, James, you got any comments while I'm pulling it up? Well, as we get through it, I'll just read a little bit here. I'll read the verse and we'll just go through it. It says, you shall not make any cuts on your body for the dead or tattoo yourselves. I am the Lord. And so the ultimate first, when you think of this, is, okay, if I cut myself or if I put a tattoo on myself, I am apostating myself from the Lord. I am taking myself away from the Lord because I am doing this for myself. And so we're going to mark through this and we're going to jump through this a little bit. There is one, there is a New Testament passage that we're going to get to as well. And that's 1 Corinthians 6, 19 through 20, which many people have heard and know, you know, your body's a temple of the Holy Ghost. We'll go to that in a little bit. But let's find out if, let me say this, let's find out if the using proper Bible interpretation methods, if this is what this is teaching us. If Leviticus 19, 28 is actually teaching us that God's people should not have tattoos. I think the first thing that you do, and this is what I tell everybody when you're looking at Scripture to determine the meaning is context, context, context, context. So what is the context of this verse here? Well, there's a cultural context and there's a positional context. Positional context meaning there's a context of it in the chapter in Leviticus and what's going on. So what's the context of it in the chapter? Well, if you look at chapter 19, and we're going to take 19, verse 28 to say that that's what God tells us. Well, there's some other things that Leviticus 19 tells us. It says that you shall keep my statues. You shall not let your cattle, this is verse 19, breed with a different kind. You shall sow your field with two kinds of seed, or you shall wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material. What? Nor shall you wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material. Amen. Amen, John. So, I guess my first question is... Pure polyester. I know! Polyester, I think it's a blend. I was telling somebody today, I said, I wonder how many of those guys that will preach that from the pulpit and say, you're not supposed to do that based on Leviticus 19.28, have already double-checked the suit they're wearing and making sure that it's not two kinds of material. That's right. So, we might have some issues there. So, you're railing on somebody by like, if that's what it says, then you shouldn't be doing that. You need to be checking your clothing. Another one, moving on down, verse 26, you should not eat any flesh with the blood in it. You should not interpret omens or tell fortunes. James, you should not round off the hair on your temples or mar the edges of your beard. James, I'm looking at you right now through this FaceTime video and I have to say, I think if that's what that means, you're in sin, brother. Yeah. John, you've already cut off all the hairs of your face, so I think you're in sin, too. Oh, crap. We're both in sin. Because you're pretty slick-faced over there, so. I know. I know. Yeah, so. See, that's why we really should be like J.C. Groves, because he's got that great beard and he doesn't mar the edges of it. He's got that orthodox Jew beard. And he's got that beardle from the Free Life Soap, which this episode has not been sponsored by Free Life Soap. But he gets that and it makes his beard look really cool. Well, I think one of the ways to understand what this verse is teaching is if you've ever seen Hasidic. Ow. I just bit my tongue. Try saying Hasidic and don't bite your tongue. Hasidic. Did you bite your tongue? No. I know how to talk, John. Coming from the guy who lives in North Carolina who's a country redneck. Shots fired right there. Okay. Come on. You said it would be a divisive episode. Yeah. Hasidic. Oh, it's getting spicy. Hasidic Jews where they have the hats and the clothing and they have the ringlets that sort of come down. That's what they get that from right there in that passage. I don't see us holding our hair. What I'm saying is if you're looking at that verse in context, either you're going to uphold to that and all the rest of the text in there. But let's go a little bit deeper. What about the cultural context? James, do you have anything to add about the cultural context of that verse? Well, it was written primarily because of the, this was most likely because of the Egyptians that were around them were doing these things. They were making, cutting themselves. You saw when you look at the life of Elijah, when he called down fire from heaven, the other prophets were cutting and yelling and screaming and doing these things to their body so that Baal would see them. And so that's a prime example of why they would be cutting themselves, why they would be doing these things in honor of their God or even their dead. So when we see just this, this could be most likely interpreted that the Egyptians were doing this. And so you're set apart from the Egyptians. So we want you to look different. We want you to act different than the Egyptians because God has called you to be holy. And if God is holy, the Egyptians are not holy. So we want you to live like God. We want you to live and be different. Exactly. So this is, this is the cultural context is they, God is giving them the law. They, he's called them out of Egypt and he says, I'm going to give you things that I want to separate you as my people, godly people, and not like the rest of the nations. And he says that the rest of the nations will cut themselves in, in worshiping their God and cut themselves in, in the way that they mourn for the dead and, in tattoo themselves and put markings on their skin with the way that they treat the dead. And he says, I don't want you to do that. I want you to be different from those nations. Now somebody says, and then takes that and then says, well, there you go. That's pretty plain and simple, right? But wait a second. Are we supposed to take, and here's an important question to ask whenever you're in anywhere in the Bible. Is it being descriptive or prescriptive? Now, we also have to look at a couple things when it has to do with dealing with the law. Because this is what he's been given here. This is the law. And we're going to get to the New Testament verse in just a little bit. But let's go to where we are in the New Testament. But I'm turning to Romans chapter 7 to look at how we view the law today. Give me just a second. We're doing a little bit of Bible study here, folks. Doing a little bit of Bible study. Let's go. Yes, sir. Got some Bible study. Hi, man. Bible study. Yes, yes, it's Bible study. I remember when we were in college working at the – did you ever work at the call center while you were out there? Which one? The Boost Mobile call center? No, I worked at the – not Accent, but the one that was – No, I worked at the one beside the old education building with – Oh, the one that the church tried to do? Yeah. Okay. The insurance. Shout out to any champion alumni that work at the Boost Mobile call center. I was there. I feel you. Well, we would find times sometimes we would bring a deck of cards and we would do different games. That's where I learned a couple of magic tricks and that kind of thing. And we play this game that we called BS. Oh, yeah. All right? And so it's basically you put the cards face down and you try to get rid of the cards as many. And sometimes you're trying to pull one over on the opponent and you say when you don't have it. And they either call you out on it. And if you were telling the truth, they take all the cards. If they call you out and caught you in your BS, then you take all the cards. I remember doing that one time and some lady – John, you learned that in college? I learned that in college, man. Like five years old, I learned that, son. Oh. All right. Sorry. Go ahead. Anyways, we were sitting there doing that and this lady who didn't even go to the church or the college, she saw us doing that. But she knew that we were champion students. And she said, I can't believe you Bible college students are playing a game and continually saying BS. Do you even know what that stands for? Just like that. And my buddy, he just looked up without skipping a beat. He goes, Bible study. Yes. And I died laughing. I was like, dude, you're killing me. Okay. So, Romans chapter 7, if you look at verse number 4, it says, Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. The thing is, and you can go through Galatians, you can go through this, there is an understanding of the law. The law is not something that we say we're completely done with the law. No, the law is beneficial for us today. In fact, I think the guys at the Young Baptist podcast dealt with this on a previous episode, and they talked a little bit about this. And I think Clay did a fantastic job of breaking down how the law is still relevant for the believers today. But we're not bound by that law. The law reveals to us where our sinfulness is, because we cannot keep it in our own flesh. So how do we look at the law that's laid out for us in specifics in the Old Testament? And this is where, I know that there's some that disagree with this, but I think that the understanding of seeing this as the triumvirate division of the Old Testament law is what has helped me. And James, you read a little bit about that. I did. Yeah, you're talking about the threefold division of the law, John? Yeah. Yeah, we'll just use the simple term there, the threefold division of the law. It's divided into three parts. You've got the moral law, you've got the civil law, and then you've got the ceremonial law. This argument usually goes along the lines of saying that Christ fulfilled the civil and the ceremonial aspect of the law, but the moral law still remains in effect continually. So Christ has went away from the civil and ceremonial laws, but we still have this moral aspect of the law that we have to abide by, such as, to give a quick example, the Ten Commandments. Okay, ceremonial, civic-wise, they're there, but we know morally we shouldn't steal, we shouldn't kill, we shouldn't lie, we shouldn't bear false witness, we shouldn't covet our neighbor's wife, we know that those are moral laws that we could abide by, and they're going to help us guide our life morally the right way. Yeah. So the civil law was really what, you know, it actually says. This is civil law specific to the Jewish nation. Such as eating specific foods. Or how they dealt with outsiders coming in. Now, we can gain wisdom from that and how we think we should handle it, but it's really not something that, you know, it's national-type laws. It's sort of like our nation has a constitution. The civil law was like their constitution. It was a Jewish law set up for their nation that God was establishing. So the ceremonial law is a little bit more difficult, and we can take some wisdom from some of those things, but still, Christ, in Christ's name, he fulfilled the civil and ceremonial law. The moral law, I believe, is often repeated even in the New Testament, and so the moral law, I think, still holds standing for us today. But when you look at Leviticus 19, that's ceremonial. That's ceremonial law. That's talking about, hey, this is what I don't want you to do as you practice, because what did it have to do with? It had to do with their interactions with other nations. So I think the proper way to understand Leviticus 19, 28 was it was descriptive of how they were supposed to handle themselves of that time and not prescriptive for us today. It's not what it's talking about, especially when we look at what tattoos are today. And so to rip an application straight from that without understanding its context or anything like that is what we would classify as terrible exegesis and probably a little bit of eisegesis. But we may find a little bit of room for disagreement when we come to 1 Corinthians 6, 19 and 20. James, you have 1 Corinthians 6, 19 and 20 pull up? I do. All right, so he's going to read 1 Corinthians 6, 19 through 20. And this is a verse often used for many things of saying that Christians should and should not do. And so what about applying this to the area of tattoos? Why don't you read it, James? It says, Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your own body. Okay, two major things from that verse that would be relevant to this topic. Major thing number one is that it says that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit. We understand that doctrinally, that whenever we are converted, we are saved, we come to Christ. The Holy Spirit takes residence within the believer. And the other thing is the admonition at the end of that last verse that, therefore, glorify God in your body. What say you, James? Well, we're talking about tattoos, correct, John? Correct. Correct. All right. So my personal preference is, and this is personally preferences here, is that you can't. It is extremely hard in our day and age to have a tattoo and glorify God in that tattoo. I understand where John gave the illustration of his friend, Mr. Small, I believe his name was, where he's using that as an avenue to direct people towards Christ, because people are going to come in, they're going to want that, they're going to ask that question. But typically, in our day and age, and especially in our day and age right now, we are not asking people questions on the street. Because of COVID, because of things that are going on, people aren't talking to each other anymore. So when you see someone with a tattoo, typically, in our culture, in our society, in my mind, someone with a tattoo is someone who wouldn't know Jesus because of the way I've been raised. Okay? This is my context of me. And so for me personally, I would never, in my mind, get a tattoo. Now, am I saying that if you get a tattoo, you're going to hell and you're going to split hell wide open? I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that for me personally, I view glorifying God in my own body as not having that tattoo. So that's sort of where I'm at. Me and John are going to talk back and forth with this a little bit. So what James is basically saying is that in his conscience, and based on what he receives from that verse there, glorifying God in your body, his conscience is bound that he doesn't believe he should. Now, let me say this as a strictly Bible study interpretive idea from this verse. I look at 1 Corinthians 6, 19, and 20, and it says, Your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost. I think that is a doctrinal statement letting us know that our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost. We are housing places. That's where the Holy Ghost resides in us, and we look at that as a temple. And he says, glorify God in your body. This is a verse we've been working on with our three-year-old. Whether, therefore, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Our lives are supposed to be lived sola deo gloria, to the glory of God alone. Everything we do, right? But I think that whenever we—one of the things the verse does not do is give us specificity of where that glorifying is. And let me explain. It does not tell us what is and is not glorifying to God in our body. It says, therefore, do it. And therefore, where James raised in his context is just still bound by his conscience of saying, I just see that, like, when you put a tattoo on your body, you're not glorifying. That's not glorifying to God. Whereas somebody that may not have been raised in North Carolina in the Bible Belt and heard those things may come to Christ and say, you know what? I'm around people that have tattoos all the time. My family's big into it. I got family members that do this. I'm going to get a tattoo of a Bible or maybe a Bible verse or maybe a Scripture reference. And then they'll come and they'll say, hey, what is that tattoo? What does that mean? And they can then begin to explain what that means and then, say, lead into the gospel and share the gospel with them. And therefore, I believe that, therefore, they're glorifying God in their body to share the gospel. Now, let me say this. Can there be tattoos given or someone receive a tattoo putting print on their body in a permanent nature that can be wildly inappropriate? Yes. Absolutely. Yes, and I think that is something. Sort of like maybe like a 1611 KJV. I'm just messing. You said Bible, and when you said Bible, my mind thought of 1611. Could you imagine people walking around with just 1611 on their wrist? Come on. What if somebody got a picture of Peter Ruttman right there on their forearm? Hey, I know some people that would probably do that just to honor him. They were in Salisbury this last week. So, yeah, go ahead. What I'm saying is I think that if we take 1 Corinthians 6, 19 through 20, and then we start saying, well, there you go. That settles it, too, because that teaches that you can't have tattoos because you can't glorify God. I think that if we set that across the board for everybody, I think we're practicing eisegesis, meaning we're reading something into it that's not there. Now. And I think it's a big thing, John, and you said it earlier. Look at the context and the culture that you're in. You've got to look at where you're at, who you're ministering to, and the people that you personally are going to reach. We're all going to reach different demographics of people based on where we're at and what we're doing and who we're talking to. For instance, the man in your church, Mr. Small, he's around people that are doing this on a daily basis. So for him, it's natural for him to be around this and use that as an example and to influence the people he's around and who he's going to come in contact with. But you go into an Amish community where no one has a tattoo. They don't believe in tattoos, to my knowledge. Maybe I'm wrong on that. And you come in and you're all tatted up. They're automatically going to dis—everything you say is discredited because of the people and the context that you're in. And so when we think of this, we have to understand the context that we're in and how we reach people and how we talk to them and how we perceive the gospel to them. Okay, well, I may not line up exactly with you the way that you said it, but I think I see your point, and I do line up with that. And that is, I think there needs to be wisdom. And let me say this. Me personally, James has already expressed to me off air that, you know, hey, I'm not getting a tattoo. Probably never going to get a tattoo. My sort of personal thing is, don't have a problem with one. Wouldn't have a problem getting one, but I'm not going to get one unless it's like the right thing. And I know, you know, that's exactly it. That's it. So, and it may never happen. I'm just saying that. But I do think—and let me—this is what I would say. I think we'll bring this to a conclusion. All right, so here's the conclusion. Biblically, I don't think that you can prove biblically that tattoos are wrong. I think that in your Christian liberty, in your freedom for freedom, in your freedom, yeah, you can feel, you know, if you're not bound by your conscience, then by all means get one. And so in that, I would say exercise wisdom. Exercise wisdom. Because as we do things—and this is across the board, not just with tattoos—we need to seek to glorify God in what we're doing. And so I think James would agree with that, that, you know, if you're going to do this, if this is something you want to do, you have zero problem with it in your context, do it with wisdom. Do it with—say, you know what? I'm going to glorify God with this. I'm going to do something that glorifies God. I'm going to do something that's meaningful to me. And I'm not saying that, oh, are you saying that I should get—it's okay for me to get a tattoo of something scriptural or biblical, but I can't get a tattoo of something about my family. I'm not saying that at all. Listen, I'm trying to get us away from throwing these absolutes of this is and this is right, this is wrong. No, we have—that's not what God gave us. God said, glorify God in your body. He didn't say, glorify God in your body. And here's the list of 987 things that you are to glorify God in your body. And here's a list of 73 million things that do not glorify God in your body. He didn't do that because you have the Holy Spirit residing in you. Okay, so, James, you have any final comments to add on that? No, man, I think we've covered it pretty well, and I think it's good for people to know that you can disagree and have a good, gracious community conversation. And it doesn't have to be this crazy—sometimes even on—maybe not necessarily on the RFP fan page, but on some other pages that I'm on, people will bring up comments and bring up things, and they just—they attack people with zero brotherly love. Like, we can agree to disagree and walk away and say, hey, you're a brother in Christ, you're a sister in Christ. We'll love each other, and we'll just agree to disagree, and that's fine. I think that's more important than trying to be right or browbeating someone into only conforming to the way you think. Like, we've got to get this mindset out of our mind that—and I struggle with this—that we're always right. You know, we've talked about that, and if I think it, I'm right, and if you think it, and it's not the way I think it, then you're wrong. We've got to get that out of our mind. We've got to get to the point where we can have cordial conversations and edify one another. If we can't sit down and talk and edify one another, then what are we even doing with our conversation? So that's sort of what I wanted to add at the very end. I love it. I love it. I think that is a huge thing because we're all coming from different—even theological perspectives. And so, you know, we can still love each other and be there in the gospel and then have disagreements on—oh, man. And I tell people, when it comes to theology, I'm one of the most narrow-mounted people you can find. And let me say this. This is not the only area where a little bit of disagreement is with me and James. I mean, there are some other areas. Maybe we'll get into those. And I like this. I like to be able to sort of—like, it's not just me and you on the same page, too. Maybe we can dive into some things that we are on different sides of and deal with. But we have some— We shall do that. Yeah. We have some interviews coming up. This was—we wanted to get an episode out this week. And we got some interviews scheduled coming up. And then we are looking forward to our episode that we are going to be recording live in Bourbon, Missouri. Can't wait to see you guys at the RFP meetup out there at the end of the month. But, James, any final thoughts, comments? I think I'm good, man. I appreciate it. All right. It's been good talking with you. I know. Excited to be back, guys. And we will have a fresh new episode next Thursday. And until then, to God— Not the pastor. —be the glory. Thanks for listening to the For Freedom podcast. To find more content like this, please visit RFPNetwork.org. To find more podcasts like this one, resources, and meetups to encourage you on your journey. And we'll see you next time. We will see you next time.

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