Category: Evangelism

Dabney and McAtee On Equality

“Again: we have all heard the famous maxim: ‘All men are created equal.’ There are two species of equality of British freedom, whose watchword is: ‘Every Englishman is equal before the law.’ It does not mean that the peasant is equal to the peer in the list of his particular franchises — these are different. But the peasant has the same right to his narrower franchises as the peer has to his wider. The same law protects both, on the same fundamental principles of justice. The maxim, in this sense, does not assert that nature has made men literally equal in strength, in sex, in capacity of mind, in virtue, in fortitude, in health. Hence it holds that a true and equitable equality must distribute different grades of franchise to these different beings, according to their capacities to use them. It does not hold that the child justly wields the same set of privileges as the father. It does not believe that the woman has, for instance, the same ‘inalienable’ right to sing bass and wear a beard with her husband. But this maxim, after leaving Providence to distribute to different classes of mankind the several allotments of privilege they have capacity to improve aright, claims for the protection of all the common sanction of justice and the golden rule.
 
Then, there is the equality of the Jacobin: a very different thing, which teaches that mechanical sameness of function, franchise, and privilege, in each detail, is a right, ‘inalienable,’ ‘natural,’ and ‘self-evident.’ That whatever particular franchise is enjoyed by the highest citizen, must also be attainable by the lowest: or these sacred institutions are outraged. The question between these is a question in philosophy: not a very easy one, if we may judge by the frequency which thinking men confuse the two together. Let us see what practical fruits this confusion to two abstract theories has borne.
 
One crop of those fruits might have been seen in Paris a century ago. ‘The Reign of Terror,’ was established. The guillotine stood before the Thuilleries ‘en permavence.’ The gutters ran daily with blood. The prisons, filled by vile delators with thousands of the noblest and best , were emptied by the ‘Septembrigans,’ through wholesale massacre. To have belonged to a privileged class was the sufficient crime. To assert the privilege of any class, in church or state, was treason. This was the logical result of the philosophy.
 
We pass over to America in 1865, and we see the second harvest of death from this same philosophy. If the Jacobin equality is that which intuition teaches to be ‘inalienable,’ then it was inconsistent that the Africans, though pagans, aliens, lately savage, and utterly unfit to wield the higher franchise of civic life without ruining society and themselves, should be ‘held to service or labor’ under other citizens. It was iniquity that they should be denied any franchise attainable by any other citizen. As this was ‘self-evident,’ and the equality ‘inalienable,’ no constitutions, laws, or covenants could be legitimate the difference between African and American. But they all became null and void in attempting to do so. Yea, God himself was quite roundly notified, that he had better not legitimate it, or he would be repudiated also! And when some eight millions were unable to see this Jacobin logic so, a quarter of a million of them were killed, their homes desolated, and half a continent clad in ruin!”
 
Robert L. Dabney — D.D.

Secular Discussions — pg. 291-293

Equality, per Dabney, in a Christian Worldview, is particular, applied to all people in their particularity wherein God has created and placed them, while in the Jacobin worldview equality is universal and so works to the end of denial God’s distinctions. In my estimation, the Jacobin variant of equality arises out of the conviction of the Jacobin that man and God are equal. From that premise blooms their conviction that all other distinctions must be eliminated in the name of and in pursuit of Jacobin equality.

One thing is certain that the flattening out of all distinctions and differences in the name of equality if it does not begin with man’s conviction that God and man are equal, will certainly end with God and man being seen as equal.  In a world where, in the name of equality, the distinctions between men and women are sacrificed, the distinctions between the disabled and the healthy are pretended not to be relevant, and the distinction between people groups denied it is inevitable that the distinction between God and man should be negated.

Dabney didn’t live to see what this doctrine of egalitarianism did to Russia and China. Where the 18th century French Revolution and the 19th century American Revolution murdered their hundred of thousands, the 20th-century egalitarian Revolutions murdered their ten’s of millions.

It is my conviction that the church’s errant embrace of some version of Jacobin egalitarianism is to our generation what the Church’s errant embrace of Justification by works was to the Magisterial Reformers. In 2016 the embrace of God ordained distinctions is the article by which the Church stands or falls. Just as in the 16th century the Church’s future depended upon following Scripture and getting Justification by faith alone correct, so in the 21st century the Church’s future depends upon following Scripture and getting the embrace of God ordained distinctions correct. Failure in getting this right will result in the amalgamation of Christianity with all other faith systems into a mono-religious faith system. Failure in getting this right means the destruction of the Biblical family. Failure in getting this right means the equalizing of God and man.

A great deal is at stake. May the Lord Christ grant us grace to fight.

 

The PCA and Resolution 43

“The first and fatal charm of national repentance, therefore, is the encouragement it gives us to turn from the bitter task of repenting our own sins to the congenial one of bewailing – but, first, of denouncing – the conduct of others.”

C. S. Lewis

In their 2016 General Assembly the Presbyterian Church of America passed resolution 43 by a overwhelming majority of 861 to 123. This resolution offered up corporate repentance for racial actions they were corporately involved in prior to their formation in 1972 and for racial actions they were corporately involved in after their formation.

The wonder of this document is the general assumption and declaration of sin with no corresponding detailed names of proofs that can be attached to the general assumption and declaration of sin. By making such a declaration of sin of one’s Fathers one doesn’t have to give due process to the dead. One doesn’t have to put together a court where the accused can face their accusers. One doesn’t have to convince a jury of their Father’s sins when one just assumes and declares their sins. One doesn’t have to come up with concrete proof for concrete cases against concrete Fathers. No, all one has to do is just give a general condemnation of one’s Fathers.

It strikes me that the the current PCA is condemning as “sin” those sins that the Founders of the PCA cited as reasons to leave the denomination they were previously associated with. If this is so the current PCA then can be regarded as the anti-PCA, at least as measured by their Father’s intent for the denomination they were creating. According to the current PCA it is hard to see how the current PCA doesn’t consider the Founding PCA as being in sin for leaving the PCUS given that the Founding PCA’s reasons for separation are now repudiated by the current PCA’s standards. As we will see in this post it is possible that the current PCA is most directly repudiating the particular founders John Edwards Richards and H. Morton Smith.

So what I’m going to do here is interweave the stated reasons that some of the Founders gave for leaving the PCUS with the most recent Resolution 43 as passed by the current PCA by a vote of 826 – 123. Finally, I will add some quotes from men and organizations from the past who have agreed with what the PCA is calling for here.

Now it may be the case that a reader may agree with the old PCA or it may be that they agree with the new PCA but regardless who is agreed with we can at least conclude that the denomination is on a different trajectory from when it was formed.

I.) Resolution 43 — PCA General Assembly 2016

A.) Therefore be it resolved, that the 44th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America does recognize, confess, condemn and repent of corporate and historical sins, including those committed during the Civil Rights era, and continuing racial sins of ourselves and our fathers such as the segregation of worshipers by race; the exclusion of persons from Church membership on the basis of race; the exclusion of churches, or elders, from membership in the Presbyteries on the basis of race; the teaching that the Bible sanctions racial segregation and discourages inter-racial marriage;

B.) Where PCA Founders Disagreed with the 2016 PCA

1.) Causes of Separation in 1973 (PCA separates from PCUS) by one of the PCA Founders, Dr. John Edwards Richards,

  • a.) The Socialist, who declares all men are equal.  Therefore there must be a great leveling of humanity and oneness of privilege and possession.
  • b.) The Racial Amalgamationist, who preaches that the various races should be merged into one race and differences erased in oneness.
  • c.) The Communist, who would have one mass of humanity coerced into oneness by a totalitarian state and guided exclusively by Marxist philosophy.
  • d.) The Internationalist, who insists on co-existence between all peoples and nations that they be as one regardless of ideology or history.

    And again from Richards,

    e.) “The vast majority of good thinking people prefer to associate with, and intermarry with, people of their respective race; this is part of the God-given inclination to honor and uphold the distinctiveness of separate races. But there are many false prophets of oneness, and many shallow stooges, who seek to force the amalgamation of the races.”

    2.) This time from Dr. H. Morton Smith — One of the Founders of the PCA

    “If from this we may conclude that ethnic pluriformity is the revealed will of God for the human race in its present situation, it is highly questionable whether the Christian can have part in any program that would seek to erase all ethnic distinctions. That such distinctions may be crossed over by individuals may be granted, but it is at least questionable whether a program designed to wipe out such differences on a mass scale should be endorsed by the Christian. It is this line of argument that the average Christian segregationist uses to back his view. He fears that the real goal of the integrationist is the intermarriage of the races, and therefore the breakdown of the distinctions between them. Many who would be willing to integrate at various lesser levels refuse to do so, simply because they feel that such will inevitably lead to intermarriage of the races, which they consider to be morally wrong.”

    H. Morton Smith — A Founder of the PCA
    Christianity Race & Segregation

    Comment

    Now one group that does agree with the PCA are those found among the Marxists. That they agree with the PCA’s insistence that the bible does not sanction racial segregation and that they agree with the PCA that inter-racial marriage is Biblical is seen by examining these quotes,

    C.) Writers or Organizations Who Agree With the 2016 PCA Resolution 43

    1.) Frederick Engles

    Question — ‎”What will be the attitude of communism to existing nationalities?

    The nationalities of the peoples associating themselves in accordance with the principle of community will be compelled to mingle with each other as a result of this association and hereby to dissolve themselves, just as the various estate and class distinctions must disappear through the abolition of their basis, private property.”

    ~ Frederick Engels in “The Principles of Communism”, 1847

    2.) Karl Marx

    And this time from Marx who agrees with the PCA

    “Even the natural differences within species, like racial differences…, can and must be done away with historically.”
     
    K. Marx’s Collected Works V:103,
     
    As cited in S.F. Bloom’s The World of Nations: A
    Study of the National Implications in the Work of Karl Marx, Columbia University Press, New York, 1941, pp. 11 & 15-19:

    3.) Nikita Krushchev

    “Full-scale Communist construction constitutes a new stage in the development of national relations in the U.S.S.R., in which the nations will draw still closer together until complete unity is achieved…. However, the obliteration of national distinctions and especially of language distinctions is a considerably longer process than the obliteration of class distinctions.”

     

    Comment

    Now if the current PCA is indeed going after Richards and Smith, one of whom is still living, then let these men have their day in court. Let charges be brought against them and let them be tried and face their accusers. In Richard’s case let any trial be done posthumously. Prove that what these Founders — Dr. Richards and Dr. Smith  held — was sin. Prove their statements in error. Don’t just make declarations. Offer up proof and as you offer up proof make sure you don’t take up league with the Marxists.

    II.) Resolution 43 — PCA General Assembly 2016

    A.) the participation in and defense of white supremacist organizations; and the failure to live out the gospel imperative that “love does no wrong to a neighbor” (Romans 13:10); and

    B.) Where PCA Founders Disagree with the Current PCA

1.) Dr. H. Morton Smith 

“it may be said that the principle of segregation as such is not necessarily sinful in and of itself.”

H. Morton Smith — A Founder of the PCA
Some thoughts by a Southern White Christian:  The Racial Problem Facing America

2.) This time from Dr. John Edwards Richards

“No human can measure the anguish of personality that goes on within the children of miscegenation… Let those who would erase the racial diversity of God’s creation beware lest the consequence of their evil be visited upon their children.”

John Edwards Richards
One of the founders of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA)

C.) Some writers that agree with the PCA’s interpretation that love means do no wrong to a neighbor are found among the Socialists,

1.) Vladimir Lenin

“The aim of socialism is not only to abolish the present division of mankind into small states and end all national isolation; not only to bring the nations closer together, but to merge them….”

Vladimir Lenin
The Rights of Nations to Self Determination — pg. 76

2.) Vladimir Lenin

“… Just as mankind can achieve the abolition of classes only by passing through the dictatorship of the proletariat, so mankind can achieve the inevitable merging of nations only by passing through the transition period of complete liberation of all oppressed nations, i.e., their right to secede. “

There are other “Resolveds” in Resolution 43 but they are more and less a repeat of the type that has already been quoted here.

In the end, how does the PCA and the Christian community in general deal with the fact that they seem to be advocating a policy that lines up rather nicely with the Marxist agenda from its beginning? Those of us who are concerned with the egalitarian revolutionary thrust found in Marxism and seemingly on display by the PCA and other denominations only want an answer on how they intend to stand against the great heresy of Marxism? How does the integrationist’s call to “love”  avoid being the Marxist call of hate that finds a bleeding of all things into a revolutionary egalitarian uniformity?

I close here by quoting Dr. H. Morton Smith. 

“The reason that so many see a Communist influence in the present movement is that the goal seems to be the same as that of the Marxist philosophy, namely, the leveling of all to a common uniformity. Even if the American Negro movement has not been started or backed by the Communist Party at first, it certainly plays into the hands of the Communists, especially when civil disobedience (Black Lives Matter — BLMc) can be encouraged, and the law and order of a city, state, or nation threatened. Enough of this disorder, and the Communists or some other tyrants may be able to step into the situation and seize control of our nation”

Certainly if there is a danger in a philosophy that demands too much segregation so there is a danger in a philosophy that demands too much integration. Yet, all we seem to hear from the modern denominations is siren calls about “racism,” “xenophobia,” “homophobia,” “bigotry” and “sexism,” and the siren calls seem to have the collected effect of pushing us ever further towards the socialist dream of a New World Order where we can imagine that there are no countries, and no religion too. A New World Order where there are no races, no genders, and no distinctions.

From Dr. Abraham Kuyper, to Dr. Francis Nigel Lee, to Dr. Geerhardus Vos and countless others there have been warnings against an amalgamation that would be destructive to all peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations and yet the Church seemingly keeps pushing that agenda, taking no heed to those of us who are pointing at and screaming about the original intent of the Christ haters named Engels, Marx, Stalin, Lenin, Khrushchev, and countless other Revolutionaries who have always imagined there is no heaven.

Will anyone ever listen to our warnings or answer our concerns that are born out of love for Christ and His Church and not out of hatred for anybody except for those who would pull down Christ or assault His Bride?

Baptist Refusal to Baptize Their Children & Postmodern Refusal to Assign Gender to Their Children

Baptists are forever insisting that only those who can articulate their confession of Christ are to be Baptized.  John MacArthur gives us one such example,

“The significance of Baptism is unmistakably clear. In our day, an open solemn confession of the crucified risen Lord is necessary. All who experience the reality of the power of the risen Savior should give this public testimony to His glory as an act of obedience. In biblical Baptism in the New Testament manner, believers not only give testimony to their union with Christ…listen to this…they give testimony to their thoughtful, careful, submissive obedience to the holy Scripture in which nothing could be treated as unimportant.”

Since infants can’t give what MacArthur’s requires therefore infants are not to be recipients of Baptism as a means of Grace. Indeed, the genuine Baptist doesn’t even like calling Baptism a “means of Grace” since to speak like that is putting the emphasis on what God is doing in Baptism as opposed to the Baptist emphasis that Baptism is about what we are doing by being Baptized.

This is Baptist thinking. Children of Christians are not to be Baptized until they can name for themselves their own religious identity as Christian.

This thinking of the sovereign child, who can only be Christian in the context of their own self understanding is now bleeding off into other areas that make perfect sense given the Baptist premise of, “a child cannot choose their religious identity until they are epistemoligcally self conscious about what identity they want to choose.”

Think about it.

What is the difference between Baptist parents insisting that their children have to be epistemoligcally self conscious about what religious identity they want to choose and Modern parents now who are insisting that their children have to be epistemologically self conscious about what sexual identity those children want to choose? What we are saying here is that there is a harmony found in Baptist parents refusing to baptize their children and many modern parents today refusing to “baptize” their children into a predetermined gender believing, just as the Baptists believe, that their children should be able to have a say in the matter of what gender they will have.

Modern parents insisting that children must choose their own sexual identity is just the logical extension of Baptist parents insisting that children must choose their own religious identity.

The point here isn’t that there is an exact one to one correspondence on this matter. The point here is that when you start with the sovereign individual who must be consulted before covenantal realities are determined apart from his or her approval the end result, naturally enough, is sovereign individuals who must be consulted before any number of realities are determined apart from zhis or zhers approval.

Consistent Baptist thinking lends itself to the atomized individual and once the individual is atomized then he or she is free to be self determinate in every area of life from religion to sexuality to who knows where else.

Some will protest that this isn’t a fair analogy since baptism signifies a supernatural event whereas sex is a natural given. But to protest such as this is to miss the point of the analogy. The point of the analogy is not supernatural vs. natural. The point of the analogy is the sovereign individual choosing all. When it is realized that this is the point of the analogy then all protestations of my creating a “straw man” here lose their power.

Let me also add here that both in God’s covenantal ordering and in sexuality both Baptism and gender are objective categories. When one is birthed to Christian parents one is, objectively speaking, a member of the covenant and so is Baptized just as one is, objectively speaking, either male or female. There is a givenness in both being a member of the covenant and in our gender that is objective. That givenness may be twisted but it can never be changed.

McAtee Contra Dr. Russell Moore… Christianity or State-olatry?

This was a question and answer exchange from the floor of the recent meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention.

How in the world can someone in the Southern Baptist Convention support the defending of the rights of Muslims to construct Mosques in the United States when these people threaten our very way of existence as Christians and Americans. They are murdering Christians, beheading Christians, imprisoning Christians all over the world. Do you actually believe that if Jesus Christ were here today that he would support this and he would stand up and say let us protect the rights of those Baal worshipers to erect temples to Baal?  Do you believe that Dr. Moore?

John Wofford
Pastor – Armorel Baptist church

Dr. Russell Moore, Chairman of the Southern Baptist “Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission”  responds to the question,

You know sometimes we have to deal with questions that are really complicated. We have to spend a lot of time thinking them through, and we’re not sure what exactly the final result is going to be. Sometimes we have really hard decisions to make. This isn’t one of those things (delegate applause). What it means to be a Baptist is to support soul freedom for everybody (delegate applause). And Brothers and sisters when you have a government that says “we can decide whether or not a house of worship can be constructed based upon the beliefs of that house of worship” then there are going to be Southern Baptists Churches in San Francisco and New York and throughout this country are not going to be able to build. The bigger issue though is not one of self interest. The bigger issue is that we have been called to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. A government that has the power to outlaw people assembling together and saying what they believe that does not turn people into Christians. That turns people into pretend Christians and it sends them straight to hell. The answer to Islam is not Government power. The answer is the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the new birth that comes from that (heavy delegate applause).

_______________

I wish I could say this was satire. You know, something from the Babylon Bee. Unfortunately Dr. Russell Moore was dead serious. Honestly, it is difficult to consider any “Christian” who actually sincerely believes this to be Christian. Can one be Christian and suggest that other Christians should support the ability of anti-Christian religions to flourish? If there is no God but God how can Christians support the proliferation of false gods? Before I get ahead of myself let’s take this in order.

I’m going to be exhaustive here so there will likely be overlapping in some of these observations.

1.) Note, first of all that Moore doesn’t directly answer the question asked of him. Moore’s indirect answer seems to be that if Baptist expect to build Churches in San Francisco and New York then they have to abide Muslims killing,  beheading, and imprisoning Christians throughout the world.

2.) Don’t miss that Moore’s answer is “yes” to the question as to whether or not Jesus would support the erecting of Baal Temples. According to Dr. Moore, Jesus would indeed support the building of Temples to Baal in a pluralist social order.

3.) Note Moore’s mocking of Rev. Wofford’s question. Moore offers that it’s really an easy question to answer. This is contemptuous arrogance on Moore’s part. This is difficult to swallow when it is Moore who is the one offering a simpleton and disastrous answer.

4.) Notice what Moore offers here as the first part of his answer is “soul freedom.”  “Soul Freedom is techno-speak for Baptists. “Soul Freedom” or “Soul Liberty,”  comes to Baptists from Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island Plantation. Williams absolutized the liberty of conscience in terms of choice in matters of faith. Williams wrote on this matter that,

“It is the will and command of God, that a permission of the most paganish, Jewish, Turkish, or anti-Christian consciences and worships, be granted to all men in all nations and countries; and they are only to be fought against with that sword which is only (in soul matters) able to conquer, to wit, the sword of God’s spirit, the Word of God.”

Now this sounds enlightened until one realizes that Williams (and now Moore) are advocating the Baptist religious principle  that the  sword supported statute  of the state be used to insure that no one religion be allowed to be the one unique religion of a people. The Baptist state, enforcing “Soul Freedom,” must use the statute supported sword of the state to make sure that all religions proliferate. Of course this has the effect of making the State the god of the competing gods making sure that each god only goes so far in the public square. Baptists “Soul Freedom” is institutionalized idolatry (State-olatry). Williams and Moore’s “Soul Freedom” coerces people to accept the Baptist version of religion for the public square. Baptist “Soul Freedom” is not Freedom at all but is bondage to idolatry. Baptist thinking on this matter is thus “anti-Christ.”

5.) When we consider “Soul Freedom” in this light we see that “Soul Freedom” is actually an absolutizing of unbiblical notions of freedom. Moore’s freedom is religious anarchy. Freedom is never absolute but always operates in the context of some ordered religious framework. Moore’s “ordered framework,” is the framework of religious pluralism, a synonym for the monotheism of State-olatry.

6.) Moore misses the fact that the State is God’s State and is responsible to the God of the Bible. As the 1958 revised Belgic Confession Article 36 teaches,

“…And being called in this manner to contribute to the advancement of a society that is pleasing to God, while completely refraining from every tendency towards exercising absolute authority, and while functioning in the sphere entrusted to them and with the means belonging to them to remove every obstacle to the preaching of the gospel and to every aspect of divine worship, in order that the Word of God may have free course, the kingdom of Jesus Christ may make progress, and every anti-Christian power may be resisted.”

Now of course a Baptist would disagree with this but even the Baptist London Confession of Faith does not support Moore speaking of the necessity of the Magistrate to be, “encouragement of them that do good, and for the punishment of evil doers.”

7.) Moore seems to think that it is possible to have a a-religious neutral State. In point of fact all states are theocracies including this one and Moore is advocating for a pagan God (the State) to remain the the god enforcing “Soul Freedom” as its humanist religion. Moore’s religion is the ancient Roman religion which allowed any religion to prosper in Rome as long as all adherents of all religions pinch incense to Rome. When Moore insists that the State should remain un-attached to any God or god concept Moore, at that very moment is pinching incense to the God State.

8.) As we have noted, in advocating for “Soul Freedom,” where the State, by sword supported statute, protects all religions as equal and so supports the presence and proliferation of all religions, makes all the social order slaves of a State that is in control of the competing gods. It turns the social order into an Egyptian Mahat system where all are slaves to the State. Because of Baptist “Soul Freedom,” we live and move and have our being in the State.

9.) Note, that Moore suggests that the Gospel of Jesus Christ has nothing to do with whether or not idolatry is allowed to flourish. In order to be faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ  we must support the building of pagan temples. If that makes sense to anybody they are hopeless to reach.

10.) Is Moore really suggesting that any “house of worship” of any variety should be allowed to be built? Would Moore support a building that housed the Santeria cult?  By what standard would Moore cut off supporting building worship centers that housed the vilest of cults? I know for a fact that Moore would oppose supporting any worship center which had the Confederate flag as a religious symbol, and that even if that worship center was Christian.

11.) Honestly, if this is Moore’s understanding of Christianity I would praise God with all my being if Baptists churches were not built in San Francisco, New York, Bombay, India, or anywhere on the planet.

12.) Moore gives us a false dichotomy when he offers that Government is not the answer to Islam but rather the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer to Islam.  Can not the Gospel of Jesus Christ convert Magistrates in Government so that they desire to protect Christianity from the inroads of pagan faiths?

13.) Moore is worried about pretend Christians going to hell  but he does not seem concerned about real Muslims going to hell. Indeed, Moore wants to help them go to hell by supporting their institutional infrastructures.

What Russell Moore is advocating is nothing but Cultural Marxism and anti-Christianity. While, I have no reason to doubt Moore’s good intentions it is simply the case that Moore is doing the Devil’s work by intellectually paving the highway to Hell.

For another good piece on this issue see Adi Schlebush’s work at Faith and Heritage. Adi brings out some points that I do not cover.

http://faithandheritage.com/2016/06/russell-moore-endorses-idolatry/

 

God’s Call For Virgin Skin … Baptism and Tattoos (#4)

Titus 3:5 He saved us, not by the righteous deeds we had done, but according to His mercy, through the washing of new birth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.

I Corinthians 12:13 For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body–whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free–and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

In teaching the covenant children on Baptism I often times will us the illustration that Baptism is like God’s branding us with His mark of ownership. I will tell them just as a Rancher might brand his cattle, so God brands us with the mark of Baptism that is indelible to His eyes. When He looks at us He sees that we are marked with His mark and so treats us as His own.

In Baptism we are marked with God’s mark. It is the mark wherein we find our identity. It is the only mark that we need have placed upon us. Indeed, by marking ourselves with other permanent marks it could be easily argued that we are putting marks on ourselves that are in identity competition with God’s mark of Baptism.

In this vein it is interesting that historically tattoos have been used as an identifying mark that one belongs to this or that god. The gods were thought to have required that their people be marked with their mark. Of course, today no one in the modern West would, upon receiving a tattoo, think that they were doing so as a mark of belonging to some ancient tribal deity but perhaps worse yet what being tatted today demonstrates and signals is the god-like power one seizes over one’s own body.  If one views themselves as autonomous beings then they will mark themselves with their own marks. This is understandable but the Christian who has been marked with God’s mark of Baptism should not want to be marked with any other mark.

Not only should they not want to be marked with any other mark they are forbidden to be marked out with any other mark. The Priest class in the Old Testament was not allowed to be tattooed, like the pagans around them,

Leviticus 21:5 They (the Priests) shall not make bald patches on their heads, nor shave off the edges of their beards, nor make any cuts on their body.

This is relevant to those who profess Christ today who resolve to be tattooed because in the New Testament it is the Church and Christians who are identified as God’s Priest class.

I Peter 2:9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

All God’s people today are prophets, priests, and kings under sovereign God, and so all God’s people today, as God’s Priests, are proscribed by God from making any cuts on their body. And why should they want any other marks on their bodies since they’ve been marked by their God in Baptism?

Why this desire, by professing Christians, for a further marking besides God’s mark of Baptism? One wonders if the increase of tattooing isn’t due to God’s people not understanding their identity in Christ. In so many ways Westerners have been separated and stripped from, and of, their Christian history — and so their identity — that perhaps, at some level, the reason body modification is being pursued by Christians so intently is because they are trying to find a meaning that has eluded them. The modern Western man has been deracinated to the point that he no longer is even sure about gender, and is now treated as a interchangeable cog in a vast impersonal machine culture. Given that, it is not a wonder that the modern Western man, be he Christian or non Christian, is exploring all avenues, including tattooing, to imbue his life with some possible meaning.

Of course modern Western man does not speak to himself in such terms. He probably couldn’t and wouldn’t articulate his thinking (if he even thinks about it at all) in such a way. For modern man tattooing one’s self is just what people do. Modern man would insist that tattooing doesn’t mean anything except, “it’s cool and it’s pretty and my peers are doing it and I want to fit in.”

However, if Christians who are also Moderns, had explained to them what God’s mark of Baptism means then just possibly they would see that pursuing any other mark, besides the mark of Baptism, would be a pursuing of a counter claim by a different god.