When They Came for Others… Was It for Me?

This morning, as I was reading the news, I found myself pausing longer than usual.

The first article described a statement from the Department of Homeland Security. It emphasized that federal officers were carrying out laws passed by Congress, and that while people are free to oppose those laws, physically attacking, obstructing, or demonizing officers for doing their duty does not make the law illegitimate. What struck me most was how vehemently those opposed to immigration enforcement were not merely criticizing the policy, but portraying the officers themselves as criminals simply for enforcing the law—as though lawful action had become unlawful by virtue of being unpopular.

Not long after, I read a second article. This one quoted a state attorney general responding to a fatal ICE-involved shooting, emphasizing that there is no statute of limitations on murder and suggesting that prosecution of the officers involved could be postponed until a future administration more favorable to that outcome was in place.

Reading the two back to back, I felt a quiet unease. Not because I had reached a conclusion about the policy itself, but because I recognized a familiar pattern. It reminded me of a quote I first encountered many years ago—long before today’s headlines—and I wondered whether it still had something to teach us.

Not as a political analogy.
Not as a claim of moral equivalence.
But as a warning about something more subtle and more dangerous: what happens when principle bends with convenience instead of standing firm on its own terms.

Learning to Ask the Right Question

When we see unrest in the country—whether over immigration, abortion, gun laws, or any other deeply emotional issue—it is easy to ask the wrong question first.

We tend to ask:

Do I agree with this law?
Does this policy reflect my values?
Are the people enforcing it people I trust?

Those are important questions. But they are not the first question a healthy society must ask.

The first question is this:

Do we believe that laws—once passed—are to be enforced unless and until they are changed through lawful means?

That question is quieter. It does not stir crowds or fuel outrage. But it is the foundation beneath everything else.

When Enforcement Becomes Personal

Here is something I want you—my children and grandchildren—to understand clearly.

Many of the strongest reactions we see today are not really about how a law is enforced. They are about whether people believe the law ought to exist at all.

When someone believes a law is unjust, enforcement itself can begin to feel immoral. Officers stop being seen as public servants doing a job and start being seen as villains. Their actions are not merely criticized—they are declared illegal, even when carried out under lawful authority.

At that point, interference begins to feel justified.

That feeling is understandable.
But it is also dangerous.

Because once we decide that enforcement is optional when we disagree, we quietly move from living under law to living under preference.

And preferences change.

A Lesson from an Earlier Debate

Let me share something from my own lifetime.

When I was a child, abortion was illegal in most of the country. Those who supported it were often criticized, sometimes harshly, and portrayed as challenging moral boundaries many believed were settled.

Then the law changed.

With Roe v. Wade, abortion became legal nationwide. And almost immediately, the moral pressure reversed direction. Those who opposed abortion—including many peaceful, elderly individuals, clergy, and small prayer groups—were increasingly portrayed as obstacles, threats, or people whose presence itself was unacceptable.

When some of those opponents crossed the line into physical obstruction, enforcement followed. Arrests and prosecutions occurred. And many who supported abortion defended that enforcement by appealing to an important and, on its face, valid principle—one we still hear often today:

“No one is above the law.”

The argument was straightforward.
The law had been settled.
Courts had ruled.
Personal conviction, however sincere, did not give anyone the authority to physically prevent the law from being carried out. No one, it was said, is above the law.

That principle was widely accepted then.

And it still is—at least in words.

Protest, Conscience, and Where the Line Is

A free society must protect protest. It must protect speech. It must even make room for civil disobedience.

But there is a line—and it matters.

Civil disobedience, at its best, appeals to conscience and accepts consequences. It says, “This law is wrong, and I am willing to bear the cost of saying so.”

Physically stopping others from enforcing the law says something different:
“This law does not apply—because I refuse to allow it.”

That is not persuasion.
That is substitution of will for legal authority.

And once that becomes normal, the lesson passed down to the next generation is not courage—it is power.

A Principle Tested Again

This brings us back to what I read this morning.

On the one hand, officers enforcing immigration law are denounced as criminals for doing their duty. On the other, the possibility is raised that prosecution of those same officers could be delayed until a more favorable political moment.

Both reactions strain the same principle.

If officers are criminals simply for enforcing an unpopular law, then no law is enforceable once it loses public favor.

If prosecution depends on who holds power at the moment, then justice begins to look political rather than principled.

And here, too, the same phrase appears—sometimes quietly, sometimes loudly:

“No one is above the law.”

The question is whether we mean it consistently, or only when it applies to people we already oppose.

The Warning That Lingers

The theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was not writing about modern policy debates. He was warning about something timeless: what happens when people defend principles only when it suits them—and remain silent when the same principles are violated elsewhere.

One portion of his reflection is often shortened, but it is worth hearing at least once in full:

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Bonhoeffer’s point was not agreement with those who were targeted. It was about what happens when the defense of principle becomes conditional.

A Grandfather’s Hope

Let me close with something deeper than politics, and older than any law written by men.

As Christians, we should be the first to acknowledge that human beings are fallible—and so are the laws we create. Our laws reflect our understanding at a particular moment in time. As cultures change, as knowledge grows, and as moral insight deepens—or sometimes fades—human laws are often revisited, revised, or overturned. That is not, by itself, a weakness of self-government; it is a recognition of our limits as creatures.

But it is also important to recognize what increasingly shapes those limits.

As our society continues down a secular path—one that is not merely neutral toward God, but often dismissive of His existence and resistant to His sovereignty—our laws will inevitably begin to mirror that worldview. When God is removed from the moral horizon, law is no longer understood as something discovered or received, but as something constructed, negotiated, and enforced solely by human will.

Scripture teaches us something profoundly different.

God is not fallible.
God is not learning.
God is not adjusting to cultural shifts.

God is perfect, unchanging, and righteous in all His ways.

Because of that, His law does not evolve to fit us. It does not bend to public opinion. It does not need correction. God’s law is already perfect—not because we obey it well, but because it reflects who He is.

And here is the heart of the Christian distinction:
When God’s law confronts us, the problem is never that the law needs to change.
The problem is that we do.

That truth should cultivate humility in us—not only before God, but before one another. It reminds us that while we debate, revise, and enforce human laws with care and restraint, we must never confuse them with ultimate authority. And it reminds us that abandoning consistency, justice, or principle in human law does not bring us closer to righteousness—it only accelerates moral drift.

So my hope for you—my children and my children’s children—is this:

That you will take human laws seriously, but never worship them.
That you will challenge unjust laws through lawful means, not coercion.
That you will defend principle even when it costs you.
And that above all, you will measure every cause, every certainty, and every conviction against the unchanging character and law of God.

And I would add this gently, but honestly: we must also be open-eyed and prayerful for courage. History teaches us that the labels society uses to exclude and vilify often change with the times. The day may come when faithfulness to God is not merely misunderstood, but treated as something suspect—or even unlawful. We should not be surprised if believers are someday spoken of as “outsiders,” or worse, for holding fast to truths that no longer align with prevailing opinion.

If that day comes, the question will not simply be what do we believe?
It will be how will we respond?

With fear—or with faith.
With bitterness—or with grace.
With coercion—or with quiet obedience and trust in God.

The world will continue to shift.
Power will change hands.
Public opinion will reverse itself again and again.

But God does not change.

And when our lives are oriented toward His truth, the change that is most needed will not be demanded of others first—but undertaken humbly, faithfully, within ourselves.

That is where wisdom begins.
That is where courage is formed.
And that is where lasting freedom endures.

And so I leave you not with my words, but with the blessing God instructed His people to speak over one another—a blessing that has endured longer than any nation, law, or controversy:

“The LORD bless you and keep you;
the LORD make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
the LORD lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.”
(Numbers 6:24–26)

May you walk in His truth.
May you stand with courage.
And may His peace guard your hearts in every generation to come.

Iam Kerr

Things I Wish My Family Knew