As mentioned in related threads, please consider the following.
The only sex-related right that the states have amended the Constitution to expressly protect is voting rights as evidenced by the 19th Amendment. And since politically correct LGBT “rights” are clearly outside the scope of voting issues, such “rights” not expressly protected by the Constitution like the enumerated rights are.
In other words, LGBT “rights,” including gay “marriage,” are being legislated from bench using 10th Amendment-protected state powers that activist judges and justices are stealing from the states.
Also, note that when the states ratified the 14th Amendment (14A) they prohibited themselves from abridging constitutionally enumerated rights as evidenced by Section 1.
14th Amendment, Section 1: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States [emphasis added]; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
So low-information, pro-LGBT activist state officials and judges who are using constitutionally unprotected, pro-LGBT equality rights to trump constitutionally enumerated rights, the 1st Amendment-protected rights of religious expression and speech in such cases, are unthinkingly violating Section 1 of the 14A imo.
Also consider that when the Founding States drafted the Constitution, they had prohibited both themselves and the feds from establishing protected / privileged classes. This is evidenced by the following constitutional clauses.
Article I, Section 9, Clause 8: No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States [emphasis added]: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.
Article I, Section 10, Clause 1: No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility [emphasis added].
So by making laws and policies which promote constitutionally unrecognized LGBT “rights” and privileges, both the feds and pro-gay activist states are effectively violating these clauses imo.
On the other hand, what is worse, pro-gay activist federal and state officials who are abusing their government powers to make life miserable for Christians, or Christians who evidently don’t know their constitutional protections well enough to protect their lives and businesses from unconstitutional government interference?
In fact, citizens with religious convictions should note regarding exercising their 14th Amendment protections that Acts 22:23-30 shows that Paul claimed his rights as a Roman citizen to save himself from being flogged.
This is all kind of moot with the arrow of leftism in the Achilles’ heel of the constitution, i.e. the USSC.
As for the last remark I would caution that Paul continued to see his life as a ministry of the gospel. He shamed his persecutors in that instance, proving that the good Lord was still watching out for him. The suffering called for by Christ is not an indiscriminate, purposeless suffering, but a suffering that has moral consequences, and His plan has much mercy in it.
However, Christians need to rethink their lives as ministries of the gospel too if they aren’t already thinking in those terms. One doesn’t have to be a preacher to be a display of what God has done for one.