- Well Joshua Harrisis a well known pastor

and author of the 1997 best selling book,

I Kissed Dating Goodbye.

You probably remember it or even read it.

Well recently Harris and his wife Shannon

announced they're getting a divorce.

Perhaps most surprising though,

Josh Harris now says, he's walking away,

or has walked away fromhis Christian faith,

saying in a statement,"By all the measurements

"that I have for defining aChristian I am not a Christian."

Harris also apologizedto the LGBT community

saying he's sorry that he taught

against marriage equality as a pastor.

In with us now is Doctor Corne Bekker

dean of The School ofDivinity at Regent University.

Doctor Bekker when Ifound out about this today

I was literally shocked.

I read that book, I admired him

and what do you make of this?

- Right, Wendy thank you for having me.

Firstly let me say to you,

we don't have all the information yet.

- Of course.

- And so there's very littleactually that Joshua has said.

- It's an extraordinarily sad story,

but I do think there are many lessons

for us to learn from this.

- Yeah, well he apologizedalso to the LGBT community,

saying, for teaching against marriages

just between one man and one woman,

and asked for their forgiveness.

As a pastor what is your response to that?

- Well I think we have to goagain a little bit deeper here.

What's very sad for me is that Joshua

has not only given up on the faith,

but he's given up on all the principles

that he has stood for for so long.

The scripture says thatwhen we see somebody

fall in a trespass like this

that we should correct that them.

- [Wendy] Right.

- But do that in the spirit of gentleness

and then watch ourselves as well.

It's an extraordinarily sad thing,

but again, as I say lessons,

two lessons maybe that Ican quickly highlight here.

- [Wendy] Sure.

- Firstly, of course as an educator

I have to say one of thetroubling things for me

about watching Joshua's rise in ministry

is the fact that hedid not go for training

and wrote the book relatively young.

He was 21 years oldwhen he wrote this book.

- [Wendy] Oh yeah, very young, very young.

- And the scripture certainly warns us

to not lay hands on a man suddenly.

That simply means that we need to

wait til folks mature a little bit

before we put them on a platform.

There's something to be said for this.

- [Wendy] Absolutely.

- I'm not saying that's the sole reason

for why this indeed has gone south,

but it might be a goodlesson for us to learn

and the second troubling thing right here

is maybe the celebrity culture

that Joshua really, reallyleaned into very early on

and again, one has to worrya little bit about that.

It's deeply concerning to me.

Even when he makes this announcement,

the way that it was made on Instagram

with a mood picture of him contemplating

a beautiful pool in nature.

There's something troubling about this.

- Yeah there's so much we don't know,

but what would you say to the members

of his former congregationwhere he pastored,

I guess for over a decade?

- Right, I would say tothem to hold onto the faith.

The glorious thing aboutthe Christian faith

is that it's not locatedin the human person.

It's located in the faithfulness of God

and of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

So I would say to themhold onto the scriptures,

hold on to Christ.

Your foundation is firm.

- It's never in your pastor.

It's always in the person in Jesus Christ

and that's our hope.

Thank you so much forbeing on with us today.

We appreciate your insights as always.