Tattoos and the Christian
"Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord” (Lev. 19:28).
The resurrected body will be the real you if you are a true believer. It’s the same body God made, raises by His almighty power, transformed completely. Nothing is lost to the grave, fire, sea, decay, animals, or dust. Mortality will be swallowed up by immortality (2 Cor. 5:4; 1 Cor. 15:53-54). Corruption by incorruption (15:42, 53). Weakness by power (15:43). Dishonor by glory (15:43). You will rise in the prime of perfect maturity, probably around 30. There will be no babies or children in heaven. No senior center either. Each person will be full of strength, perfect in proportion, and true in beauty. Every defect will be gone: pimples, moles, hair loss, disease, pain, belly fat, deformity, missing parts, extra parts, crookedness, disproportion, the need for food, or rest from exhaustion. The whole person stands complete. The body becomes spiritual. It is perfectly subject to the spirit, and the spirit perfectly subject to God (1 Cor. 15:44). You will rise absolutely recognizable as yourself, yet perfectly conformed to the glorious body of the risen Christ (Phil. 3:21). [Read The City of God by Augustine, Book XXII for deeper insight]
Therefore, your glorified body will not have tattoos. Tattoos are ink we painfully drive into our skin for apparent cosmetic purposes. Even if the message is just “MOM” with a heart and arrow through it. It’s not part of the body’s original substance. God restores and transforms your true body and removes whatever is not fit for glory. The resurrection keeps your personal identity, but not your earthly alterations.
Believers should not get tattoos because the body is a gift. It was made by God, redeemed by Christ, and is currently indwelt by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6:19). God will raise that same true body, and no body modifications will remain. If God will remove what does not belong, then the Christian has no business putting it there in the first place. The rule is simple: do not purposely mark the body in ways that glory will remove. They are of the flesh, therefore, fleshly. Your body has a higher calling. “You were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies” (1 Cor. 6:20).
And, of course, the prideful, look-at-me, glorifying-in-the-flesh, aspect.
Amen! been saying largely the same thing for man years. It hurts when you see worship teams standing in front of their congregation all covered with tattoos that weren't there before they were on a worship team. For whose glory do they do that ?