Lighthouse Trails Research Journal
Josh Harris—continued from page 1
to attend college (Regent College in Van-
couver, BC). 2 His announcement that he
was stepping down and going to college
came amid a scandal at Covenant Life
wherein Harris and other Covenant Life
pastors and leaders admitted to covering
up a number of sexual abuses that had
occurred in their church. 3
A DEVASTATING COMBINATION
ased on the information that Joshua
Harris has given in his recent an-
nouncements and information he has
provided in his books, we cannot know
for sure how his recantation of his mar-
riage and his faith came about. But one
thing is for sure, Josh Harris was a Calvin-
ist who attended an emergent college—
and with regard to his Christian faith, it
proved to be a devastating combination.
During Harris’ efforts to find spiritual
meaning in his life, he landed in Calvin-
ism, a belief system that does not present
the picture of a God of love who loved
the whole world so much that He sent
His only Son to die for all. Rather, it
presents a God who wants most people
to go to Hell and who predestined a
relatively small number of people to be
the “elect” who would be saved; and as
Calvinist figure A.W. Pink stated in his
book, The Sovereignty of God, in describ-
ing Calvinism, no one can resist God’s
will 4 (meaning even Hitler must have
done God’s will), which creates a God
who wants evil things to happen, giving
followers a fatalistic view of life and death.
In short, God is portrayed as the author
of sin, who predestinates most people to
live sinful lives (of which they have no
choice), and then punishes them eternally
in Hell for His “good pleasure.”
Calvinism is growing in popularity by
huge measures today. Many young people
come into Calvinism because they see
what they perceive as a highly scholarly
belief system and a supposed security for
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Volume 7—No. 5
3
their salvation. And whether they admit
it or not, it offers the elite elect something
more than the rest of the world can ever
have (let’s face it, it makes them feel spe-
cial). However, once these young Calvin-
ists discover the dark dismal truth about
this Calvinistic “God” (thinking this is
the God of the Bible), disillusionment
and depression set in which results in a
spiritual crisis. When this happens, they
often choose (as we are witnessing today)
one of two paths: some of them head
into the Calvinist emergent camp (or as
Calvinists call it, neo-Calvinism), and
some of them walk away from the church
altogether. Eventually, both groups end
up in the same place—departed from
the faith. Does such a tragedy happen to
those in other unbiblical camps (such as
a legalistic holiness system)? Absolutely.
Extreme unbiblical doctrines lead follow-
ers away from truth, not to it.
Being Calvinist is dangerous enough,
but when Josh Harris decided to attend
Regent College, he picked one of the
most emergent Christian schools out
there. There, students become indoctri-
nated with the social-justice “Gospel,”
contemplative spirituality (i.e., a mysti-
cal spiritual formation), and emergent
ideology. If Joshua Harris had not already
gone in this direction, attending Regent
would accomplish this easily, and as we
have learned at Lighthouse Trails from
seventeen years of research and study,
the “fruit” of these unbiblical teachings
is departure from biblical faith to believ-
ing in the god of this world and what he
has to offer.
We realize that Josh Harris’ renouncing
of the Christian faith is most likely multi-
faceted, both in the personal and spiritual
realms, but his Calvinist and emergent
indoctrination left him defenseless in
standing firm in (or maybe even finding
to begin with) biblical truth.
No doubt, there will be many commen-
taries over the next several months (and
even years) discussing the renouncement
of faith by Joshua Harris. Let us pray that
he and others like him will someday find
the true simple Gospel that Jesus Christ
offers. Christ died for the sins of the
world, and whosoever believes on Him
will not perish but have everlasting life.
It’s a free gift, offered to all who put their
trust in Him:
But as many as received him, to
them gave he power to become
the sons of God, even to them that
believe on his name. (John 1:12)
ENDNOTES:
1. https://www.instagram.com/harrisjosh/,
July 26th entry.
2. https://www.covlife.org/blog/joshua_har-
ris_sunday_remarks.
3. https://thouarttheman.org/2015/01/31/
bad-news-for-c-j-mahaney-joshua-harris-is-
coming-clean.
4. A.W. Pink, The Sovereignty of God
(Blacksburg, VA: Wilder Publications, LLC,
2008 edition), p. 15.
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2019