Ephesians 1-3

In God's grace and divine providence, I have been tasked to blog about Ephesians 1-3, which un-coincidentally contains my favorite passage of scripture (3:14-21) that has been forever (maybe not forever- unsure about how these things transfer to heaven...) tattooed on my foot. Interestingly enough, I previously (maybe a year ago?) wrote a blog post about why and how I got my tattoo for the Women and Hope blog. However, (and I'm now suspecting grace and divine providence) it was unpublished. I don't quite know why... maybe this means it's a terrible story that is poorly written, in which case, who better to tell than people that already love and/or tolerate me! Here you go:

If we’re being honest about the origin of my tattoo, I should admit that, like all excellent decisions made by teenagers, it was born out rebellion. I had been toying with the idea of getting a tattoo for a while, but had been told by most people, including my parents, “Katie, you would never get a tattoo.” If you know me well, you know that telling me I won’t do something is essentially triple-dog-daring me to actually do it. So, out of indignation, spite, and a little bit of pride, I resolved to get an ichthys (or Jesus fish). Unholy motivations aside, I picked the ichthys because the symbol itself has a lot of significance in the early church (I love history) and the spelling of ichthys in the original Greek is an acronym for “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior,” a theological statement I wholeheartedly agreed with (also, the Jesus fish turned out to be WAY more popular than teenaged Katie assumed... Sooo.... whoops?).

After several months of debating the design and location of my fishy, I finally made the call to get this tattoo that everyone was daring me to get. Like all tough, rebellious teenagers, my mom came with me to the tattoo parlor. Never one for rash decisions, I shocked both myself and my mom when I told the tattoo guy (who was, by the way, not impressed that I brought my mom) that I wanted to add a verse to it. Just the night before I found Paul’s prayer to the Ephesians (3:14-21), while I was reading through my Bible, and I drew the strangely impulsive conclusion that it needed to be added to my Jesus fish. So, it happened. I got the tattoo, didn’t cry, and did not hold my mom’s hand (the 3 goals I had for that day). To be honest, at the time, I still had no idea why I added the passage from Ephesians.

Flash forward to today, and I can confidently tell you that God one sneaky Deity. I think he had me add Ephesians 3:14-21 to my tattoo because the Lord knew that I would need to have a permanent reminder of some essential things that I tend to forget. For instance, I tend to forget that I am “rooted and established in love.” As I have consistently struggled with my identity, wanting to place it in things like my own intellect, relationships, and outward beauty, I need to be reminded that my foundation is in the steady, consistent love of Christ. My roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love, and from that base alone, my identity is formed. I tend to forget what a huge deal God’s love actually is. I love how Paul gives it weight and dimension by asking the Ephesians to grasp how wide, long, high, and deep God’s love is all while knowing that they can never fully comprehend it! I also tend to forget I’m complete in Christ, instead believing that I am missing things, or that God is holding out on me. But in fact, I am “filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”

There is so much more symbolism and stories associated with my tattoo (including using it to share the gospel in the Middle East!) that I just don’t have room for. So, instead, I leave you with the moral of my tattoo story: Don’t bring your mom with you to get a tattoo, and don’t think that Jesus won’t use rebellion and impulsive decisions to sneakily change your life.