Love God First
“Never cut your bodies in mourning for the dead or mark your skin with tattoos, for I am the LORD.” -- Leviticus 19:28
A few years ago a wonderful young woman began attending a pretty conservative church. She, her husband and their two young children were a delightful family. This woman, unlike her husband, wasn’t raised in church. But she came to love Jesus with incredible passion.
The problem wasn’t the young woman. The problem was the people who surrounded her. They couldn’t get past the tattoos. They looked down on the multiple piercings. To them, the external meant the internal would never be good enough.
She felt their disapproval. She heard the comments. She saw the looks. Eventually she stopped coming to that church. Her marriage to the traditional man fell apart. She’s still a wonderful person and a devout Christian. Just not at that church, in that environment. They lost someone pretty special. I don’t know if they’ll ever open their eyes and their hearts enough to realize it.
All this resurfaced the other day when a another friend mentioned someone who had been blasted by his Christian “friends” because he got a tattoo. She has tattoos and couldn’t believe the outrage. Oh, did I mention that the tattoo was of Jesus?
Yeah, I know what Leviticus says about tattoos. Don’t do it. This same chapter also says not to trim the hair on your temples or the edges of your beards. It says not to wear clothing from two different types of fabric. And it says to stand in the presence of elderly people. Not too many people follow any of those rules but you don’t hear a lot of outrage about it.
I’ve always been amazed at how some Christians pick and choose Scripture to suit them. They take things out of context and ignore the heart of what it says. Just like they ignore the heart of the person they’re condemning.
In the book of Leviticus, God had Moses write down some pretty basic instructions for His people. It was important that God’s people distinguish themselves from the pagans who lived all around them.
We need to do the same today. Not by our judgments but by our love and compassion for others. For example, this same chapter in Leviticus tells us not to exploit foreigners but to treat them like everyone else and love them as yourself. It sure puts the illegal immigrant debate in a different context.
Sometimes it seems impossible to follow all of God’s rules. How do we know which ones He wants us to focus on? That’s easy. Just remember what Jesus said and everything else will fall into place.
“’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
-- Matthew 22:37-40
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