It was only a mere week after I had my 18th birthday. My best friend and I had been talking about getting tattoos for ages. We researched, asked around, budgeted, heck we even have a whole Pinterest board dedicated to tattoos! But we wanted our tattoos to have meaning, to have more of a reason behind them other than just simply thinking they were cute. We wanted people to ask about them, and, in turn, for us to be able to share something with others.
I decided to get “grace upon grace” on my arm.
So... what is my tattoo all about??
SO GLAD YOU ASKED!
Grace upon grace.
John 1:16 says that from His fullness we all receive unending grace. Think about the ocean surf- wave after wave comes crashing onto the shore one after the other in an unceasing procession of grace, every second of every day, we are washed, we are DRENCHED in God's grace, love, and mercy- a wave of grace constantly being replaced by a new one. There is no limit to the amount of grace God has for us.
It's like the clouds of Noah's day that kept pouring out rain; the granaries in Joseph's days that held endless reserves of grain; the rock in the wilderness that kept pouring out the water; the cruise in Elijah's time that kept issuing the oil; the cup in Psalm 23 that keeps overflowing; the water that filled those pots to the brim before being turned into wine at the wedding in Galilee; Christ's blood dripping down that rugged cross in scarlet progression to purify the masses, so is His abounding grace.
“O precious is the flow
That makes me white as snow
No other fount I know
Nothing but the blood of Jesus”
I am washed. I am washed.
I am drenched in love and grace.
He pours Himself out on these weakened, leaky earthen vessels, yet never, though much seeps out of these cracked pots of human clay, does God consider us worthless or His grace wasted.
2 Corinthians 4:7-9
He sets His treasures in jars of clay and He fills the cracks so they too may have an overflow of love, joy, peace, mercy, grace and so much more. He fills them to the brim so they can pour out into others.
"The seasons change and you change, but the Lord abides evermore the same, and the streams of His love are as deep, as broad, and as full as ever."
Charles Spurgeon
So when we abide in Him, in all of His abounding glory and majesty, we find our confidence, our constant, our hope, our joy, our rest, our comfort, our stronghold, our beauty, our value, our foundation, our faith; we find it all in Him. He lavishes us and wraps us up in perfect boundless grace and we get to draw nearer to Him and connect with Him because of it. Because of God's grace, we all can receive this beautiful gift none of us will ever deserve. Because of grace, we all will one day sing "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, The Founder and Perfecter of Our Faith" and stand in His presence. Because of grace we are no longer dead at the bottom of that ocean that the first Adam drowned in so long ago, but we are washed and cleansed by the same waves of grace that have always been a part of the vast, wondrous, radiating, glorious ocean beauty and depth that is our God.
This tattoo serves as a daily reminder to me that the unending grace that Christ poured into us is meant to also be poured out to those around us. I am not meant to keep it hidden. This grace upon grace that is lavished on me is something that Christ gave us to give to others. The same grace that washes over me can and will wash the dirtiest hearts; I know because He has washed mine. This tattoo reminds me that I need to be gracious in my everyday life and the Lord provides it all, for me and those around me.
I want more tattoos because I have been asked questions about this one and can only imagine what other beautiful, Gospel-centered conversations I can have with people with my other planned tattoos.
