Tattoo your Faith....Being Inked

For the past three weeks, I have been teaching a Simply Youth Series called Inked.  As I stated in my previous post, Be who you are Part II, I adapt series and teaching aids to who I am and who my students are.  I have used the series main scriptures, the idea, and some of the main points and made it my own.
For the first week I talked about being INKED in Love.

Temporary Tattoos

It is cool to have a temporary tattoo, anybody who has a quarter or two can pick one, two, or a whole sheet. It takes a couple seconds, some water, and the application is complete.   Depending on what you do during the next couple minutes, hour, or day determines how your tattoo looks.   Most don't last more than a couple hours or a day at most.  As Christians, we often have the same love for God.  We show up for church, Sunday School, Small Groups, Bible Study, Youth Group, and even Retreats and only give enough for a temporary tattoo for God.  Some of us cover it up. Others wash or rub it off within minutes of leaving.  Others it takes until the next day.  There sometimes residual signs that we were a part of the love of God for a couple days, but most never see it.

Henna Tattoos

Henna Tattoos cost a little more than temporary tattoos.  Most people get them when they go to the beach and you can pay $10-50 for one.  They last anywhere from 1 to 4 weeks depending on your body temperature level, where the henna is applied, and how often you wash the hennaed area. The more you wash your henna tattoo the faster it will fade away.  I compare them to us going on Retreats, Mission Trips, or being involved in a bible study or small group.   We take the time, the energy, our resources, a little cost to be part of God's love.  But the problem is that we do fully commit to God.  We do not fully let go and let him be a part of our lives.   So after a few weeks, no one even knows that we went on Retreat, mission trip, or that we even go to church.  Or people see it as a season.  They see that we get God's love only at this moments in life, kinda like we only see Henna Tattoos during the summer after coming back from the beach.  

Real Tattoos
A tattoo is a marking made by inserting indelible ink into the dermis layer of the skin to change the pigment.   IT is there for life! We need to have a life marked in Christ.  We need to live it daily and allow everyone to see it.  We need to make the commitment and stick with it.