Pierced

As Gary snapped pink gloves onto his hands, I tried to find pictures in the blur of tattoo ink all over his arms and legs. His ear lobes, empty of their gauges, hung floppy against his cheeks. Jessie, Julia and I joked around with Gary as he cleaned my nose and prepared the needle; all of us had been there before, for other piercings. Finally everything was ready. He stuck a metal tube up my nose and I squeezed my eyes shut as he pulled a thick, hollow needle through my nostril. The needle hung there for a minute, stretching. Then he pushed a hoop ring in and pulled the needle out.

After three years of begging my parents to let me pierce my nose, I finally got it done! Even though my mom gave her permission, she is not happy about it. She thinks I look like a bull. But that was actually why I wanted a hoop: it’s symbolic. A bull’s nose is pierced so that it can be controlled by its master. I pierced my own nose as a sign that I want to be controlled by my master, the Lord Jesus Christ.

One of the first things that made me want a nose ring were these Bible verses:

"And I put a ring on your nose and earrings in your ears and a beautiful crown on your head. Thus you were adorned with gold and silver…And your renown went forth among the nations because of your beauty, for it was perfect through the splendor that I had bestowed on you, declares the Lord GOD." (Ezekiel 16:12, 14)

"Then I asked her, 'Whose daughter are you?' She said, 'The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor’s son, whom Milcah bore to him.' So I put the ring on her nose and the bracelets on her arms. Then I bowed my head and worshiped the LORD and blessed the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who had led me by the right way to take the daughter of my master’s kinsman for his son." (Genesis 24:47-48)

The first verses are from a passage in Ezekiel that is an analogy of God’s unwavering love and faithfulness to Israel, even when they are whoring after other gods. The second passage is from the story of Isaac and Rebekah, when Abraham sends his servant to find a wife for Isaac. In both of these passages, the nose ring seems to signify a sense of ownership, but loving ownership.

My Savior shed his blood to make me his own. I am his, just like Israel was God’s, just like Rebekah was Isaac’s, just like a bull is his master’s. I am Christ’s slave, and the silver ring in my nose is a symbol that I serve him willingly, with all the love I have.