Michele Bachmann Stirs Crowd in Rapid City

John Witherspoon College in Rapid City held its fourth annual ScholarShare event at the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center this evening, with keynote speaker former Congresswoman Michele Bachmann. Well over 200 people attended the event, including several elected officials, and legislative and other candidates.

Michele Bachmann speaking at the Fourth Annual John Witherspoon College ScholarShare.

Bachmann was introduced by John Witherspoon College President Richard Wells.

Bachmann commended the work of John Witherspoon College in raising up a new generation of young Christians for leadership that will be felt not only in the business community of Rapid City, but also in the capital of Pierre and throughout the state.

Speaking of her Christian faith, Bachmann talked about the importance of freedom to our society. She stated that the greatest freedom a person can know is the freedom from sin and death purchased for humanity by Jesus Christ.

Bachmann said she became a born again Christian when she was 16 years old after her friends prayed for her until she could understand the gospel message of the Bible.  She said that after God saved her, she began to see the world in full “technicolor” where she had been unable to do so before.

Growing up, Bachmann’s family didn’t have much money, but it was during those times that she learned the value of things like personal responsibility, education and hard work.

Biblical worldview is something she started to learn about in college when she was exposed to the work of Francis Schaeffer.  Having a Biblical worldview means you understand that God as creator of the universe is involved in every aspect of life, including education, law, criminal justice, politics and government.

Bachmann said that she attended a brand-new law school that didn’t have a long history or revered reputation, but that she and the other students there learned about many of our nation’s founding doctrines and treatises that people seldom learn about even in Ivy League universities today.

Having served for eight years in congress, Bachmann said she could testify that America is a people perishing for lack of vision.  Even most of our nation’s leaders, she said, lack the wisdom to ensure our country is on the right path.

Bachmann said that when the nation’s obligations for Social Security, Medicare and other social programs are considered, our nation’s debt is astronomically greater even than the $19 trillion in debt that is publicly discussed.  No nation has ever existed under that level of debt, she said.

Bachmann said that during her time on the House Intelligence Committee, she was often left shaken at the threats our nation faces, and the lack of grasp many of our leaders, including the president, has for those dangers.  Bachmann said there is a tremendous difference in worldview between the Christian heritage of America, and radical Islam. She pointed out that while we celebrated the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus Christ over Easter in the United States, Europe was mourning the slaughter of innocent civilians at the hands of Muslim terrorists.

Right now, Bachmann said, the United States is bringing in large numbers of people from countries rife with terrorists like Somalia.

Just looking at the effect of a religion on people’s lives indicates whether it is a positive influence or not, she said.  While the United States and Europe have enjoyed great wealth and technological advancement, the Islamic world has languished in poverty and extreme lack of innovation for centuries.

Bachmann said knowing who she was as a Christian helped her to stay true to her values, such as the complete repeal of ObamaCare, while most of her fellow Republicans were afraid to stand against it because of President Obama’s popularity.

In closing, Bachmann encouraged those present to obey God and trust God, and to support John Witherspoon College as a vital element in preparing a new generation of young people to do just that.

Wrapping up the evening, Dr. Wells spoke about the college. The purpose of John Witherspoon College, said Wells, is to produce a new and revolutionary generation that will know and stand for the truth. Wells said the qualifications of the faculty at John Witherspoon College puts the institution in the top 10 throughout the country. Yet the faculty and staff serve at financial sacrifice (Wells himself accepts no salary for his work at the college) to make it possible for students to attend the college and avoid the crippling debt so common in the academic world today.

John Witherspoon College, named after American founder John Witherpoon, is a new Christian college in Rapid City, offering a classics-based curricula, such as were standard at institutions of higher learning in Western Europe and America until modern times.  Classics education emphasizes comprehensive, contextualized bodies of knowledge over fragmented and over-specialized academic disciplines, analytical thinking over the mere acquisition of data, and cultural responsibility over the consumer or career mentality—emphases that correspond in general to the grammatic, logic, and rhetoric dimensions (phases) of classical learning.

John Witherspoon was a clergyman who taught several of the founders, including James Madison, at Princeton.  Witherspoon was a delegate to the Continental Congress and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. He was also a signer of the Articles of Confederation, and supported the ratification of the U.S. Constitution.

Michele Bachmann is a born-again Christian and former Republican congresswoman from Minnesota’s 6th District. Bachmann was a lawyer for the U.S. Treasury Department, a Minnesota state senator, and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006. During her time in the House, she was a favorite of Tea Party conservatives. Bachmann ran for president in 2012, and continued to serve in the U.S. House through 2014.

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Bob Ellis has been the owner of media company Dakota Voice, LLC since 2005. He is a 10-year U.S. Air Force veteran, a political reporter and commentator for the past decade, and has been involved in numerous election and public policy campaigns for over 20 years. He was a founding member and board member of the Tea Party groups Citizens for Liberty and the South Dakota Tea Party Alliance. He lives in Rapid City, South Dakota with his wife and two children.

Bob Ellis

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