“A government of laws, and not of men.” — John Adams
Over the past few days I have been reading about the controversy surrounding several San Francisco Giants players during the team’s Pride Night. Some of the players chose to express their Christian convictions by displaying the Scripture reference Genesis 9:12-16 on their Pride hats. What caught my attention was not the hats or even the disagreement that followed. It was how quickly the conversation turned to rights, discrimination, equality, and the Constitution. Everyone seemed convinced they knew what the Constitution required, but I found myself asking a much simpler question.
What does it actually say?
So I put the articles aside and opened the Constitution for myself. I searched for the words homosexuality, sexual orientation, Pride, and same-sex marriage. They are not there. I searched again, thinking perhaps I had overlooked something. I had not. Those words simply do not appear anywhere in our Constitution.
That did not answer every question our nation faces, but it did lead me to another one. If those words are not found in the Constitution, then why do so many people speak as though they are? Why is there an expectation that every American, every school, every business, every sports team, and every public institution must recognize or celebrate something that is not written in the document itself? Whether someone agrees or disagrees with Pride is not the point I am making. My question is much simpler. If our highest law does not say it, where does that authority come from?
The issue before us is much larger than one baseball team or one social movement. It reaches to the very foundation of our Republic. The Constitution has authority because it is written. Every word was debated, agreed upon, and ratified by the people. If we begin replacing written words with personal opinions or changing their meaning to fit the desires of the day, then we are no longer governed by the Constitution. We are governed by those who claim the authority to tell us what they believe it now means.
Our Founding Fathers understood that future generations would face issues they could never imagine. That is why they gave us a constitutional process to change the Constitution. If the American people believed something belonged in our highest law, they could amend it. They did not leave us free to change the meaning of the words whenever culture changed. They understood that the strength of a constitution is not found in how often it changes, but in how faithfully it is preserved.
God established the very same principle in His Word. Truth does not change because society changes. It does not bend to culture, public opinion, or the desires of the moment. God warns us not to add to His Word because the moment we begin changing what has been written, we no longer submit to His authority—we replace it with our own.
“Every word of God proves true. He is a shield to all who come to him for protection. Do not add to his words, or he may rebuke you and expose you as a liar.” — Proverbs 30:5–6 (New Living Translation)
The Constitution was not written to be redefined by every generation. It was written to be upheld, defended, and obeyed according to the words placed upon its pages. The same is true of God’s Word. Neither derives its authority from public opinion, changing culture, or the approval of man. Their authority rests in what has been written. The moment we claim the right to change the meaning of those words, we have placed ourselves above the very authority they were given to establish. That is how nations lose their foundation and how truth becomes whatever those in power declare it to be.
A nation does not lose its freedom by obeying the law that is written. It loses its freedom when it replaces the written law with the law it wishes had been written.