There was a time that little Wheaton College, located in a sleepy town just 30 miles west of Chicago, Illinois, had a dynamic reputation for excellence in Christian scholarship. While I can't fairly speak to whether the scholarship remains, the administration of the small liberal arts school signaled to the world last Saturday that the "Christian conviction" part may be negotiable.
It's quite a fall from grace for a school that has produced some of the most recognizable names associated with moral courage within American Christendom. Alumnus Todd M. Beamer was a heroic passenger of United Flight 93 who recited the Lord's Prayer while on the phone with Verizon supervisor Lisa Jefferson that morning, just before commanding his fellow passengers to take the plane back from the hijackers.
Just three years after he offered his last full measure of devotion to the values he learned there, the school named their student commons and dining hall after him.
Beamer is not alone. Jim Elliot, the martyred missionary who died attempting to evangelize the reclusive Huaorani people of Ecuador, was also a graduate of Wheaton. Elliot's story, which inspired the emotional movie "End of the Spear," stands as a testament to the courage of Christian conviction - permitting himself to be gored to death by a band of Huaorani warriors rather than shoot them, because he believed spreading the Gospel was more important than his own life.
For decades, I and many of my fellow Christians have always associated Wheaton with those two names, along with other famous evangelists and theologians like Billy Graham and John Piper.
That's why it was so depressing to watch as the school's current administration thought better of their established reputation and chose to publicly refashion it for the modern world.
The character of Wheaton will no longer be known as Christians who storm terrorists with drink carts to protect innocents, or believers who face certain death to advance the gospel of Jesus. It will now be associated with spiritual self-castration and capitulation to the spirit of the age.
That much was made clear over the weekend when the school collapsed in the face of harsh responses and manufactured social media rage after having appropriately congratulated Russ Vought, an outspoken Wheaton alum who President Trump just named to direct his Office of Management and Budget.
'Wheaton College congratulations and prays for 1998 graduate Russell Vought to serve as the White House Director of Management and Budget!' read a Friday Facebook post from the school.
What ensued from that point was a predictable procession of incensed progressive overreaction, generating (according to Wheaton) "over 1,000 mean-spirited" remarks about Vought, Trump, and the school's explicit and implicit call to pray for both.
Apparently, a significant number of the disapproving commenters were some of Wheaton's own disgruntled progressive alumni, whose rage-tweeting, it should be noted, exhibited none of the biblical or Christian values Wheaton claims to embrace, embody, and promote. There was no love of neighbor, no grace, no Christian charity in their words, just slander, judgmentalism, and maliciousness. But that was too much for the new Wheaton to withstand.
Rather than remove the comments, condemn the profane conduct of respondents, rebuke the unchristian rage of their alums, they actually deleted their own call to prayer for Vought and offered whatever this is in its place:
On Friday, Wheaton College posted a congratulations and a call to prayer for an alumnus who received confirmation to a White House post. The recognition and prayer is something we would typically do for any graduate who reached that level of government. However, the political situation surrounding the appointment led to a significant concern expressed online. It was not our intention to embroil the College in a political discussion or dispute. Our institutional and theological commitments are clear that the College, as a non-profit institution, does not make political endorsements.
Wheaton College's focus is on Christ and His Kingdom.
All evidence is to the contrary.
Christ and His Kingdom call on Christians to pray and intercede for government leaders (1 Timothy 2:1-2), that they should be kept from wickedness and corruption (Proverbs 16:12), that they would be just and righteous defenders of the vulnerable (Psalm 72:1-4), that they would be wise and judicious (Proverbs 24:5-6). And we are also to place ourselves in submission to the rule of the governing authorities (Romans 13:1), offering yet another reason why Wheaton and all of American Christendom should be ecstatic to see a fellow believer appointed to a position of trust and influence.
Even if one regards Donald Trump as evil as Nebuchadnezzar (he's not), remember that God's prophet Daniel served the Babylonian king faithfully, nobly, and did it all for God's glory.
But rather than point that out and use the unfortunate public tantrum of their progressive alumni to champion Christ and His Kingdom, Wheaton's administration chose to reward the petulance, and hide behind a poorly crafted word salad that was as daft as it was cowardly.
There wasn't "concern" raised online, there was a temper tantrum thrown by grown adults who lack self-control.
Nothing about the original statement "embroiled the College in a political discussion or dispute."
There was no "political endorsement" given in the original announcement, just congratulations and a promise of prayer.
Had Wheaton never issued the original statement, that would have been one thing. But to post it, and then unceremoniously delete it in shame, displays a lack of moral integrity and a reckless disregard for the school's own public witness.
Like Pontius Pilate, Wheaton tried futilely washing their hands to appear sophisticated in the eyes of the world.
Reputation in tatters, it worked about as well for them as it did for him.
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Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Not the Bee or any of its affiliates.
