Wheaton Heroes: Just Joshing You

Josh is our "no apologetic needed" hero! Joslin "Josh" McDowell is a Christian apologist, evangelist, and writer. He is within the Evangelical tradition of Protestant Christianity, and is the author or co-author of over 120 books. Josh is best known for his many seminars, debates and books in Christian apologetics. He has addressed more than 10 million young people, giving over 24,000 talks in 118 countries. His website is simply Josh.org, and he was one of the first Christian leaders to turn into a one word brand. Although Josh Warren, (Rick Warren's heir apparent) has filed a law suit to gain the brand and his name back.

His most well known book is Evidence That Demands a Verdict, which was ranked 13th in Christianity Today's list of most influential evangelical books since 1945. Other well known titles are More Than a Carpenter, A Ready Defense and Right from Wrong.

Josh was born in Union City, Michigan in 1939 with the given name Joslin. He was one of five children. He enlisted in the Air National Guard, received basic training and assumed duties in mechanical maintenance of aircraft. After sustaining a head injury he was discharged from the service.

Josh was as an agnostic at Kellog College when he decided to prepare a paper that would examine the historical evidence of the Christian faith in order to disprove it. However, he converted to Christianity, after, as he says, he found evidence for it, not against it. He subsequently enrolled at Wheaton College, Illinois, where he was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree. He then studied at Talbot Theological Seminary. In 1982 Josh was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree by Simon Greenleaf School of Law, now Trinity Law School, in recognition of his ministry and writings.

Josh married Dottie Youd, with whom he has four children and three grandchildren; they live in Dana Point, CA.

In 1964, he became a traveling representative of Campus Crusade for Christ International. An organization who managed to take the mysteries of God and turn them into 4 laws and a cartoon that fits into a folded piece of paper.

In 2006, we wrote The Witness, a compelling suspense novel set in the cultural context of the Middle East. This gripping story presents answers to the barriers to Christianity that would not otherwise be available in the Arab-speaking world. This book presents an opportunity to share God’s love with the Arab people -- truth seekers. In just three years, over 1.5 million copies of The Witness are in distribution in 15 languages.

In 2009, Josh went in a microsynthesizing scanner to shrink down and enter the brains of two of Oprah's cult followers, who unwittingly placed their faith in the hodgepodge of spirituality embedded in Oprah's popular TV talk show. What came out of that experiment was book titled "O, God: A Dialogue on Truth and Oprah's Spirituality." "The danger is that while appearing to use Christian and inclusive language that at first seems similar to that of Christianity, Oprah teaches a message that is radically different and absolutely contrary to the true teaching of Scripture and historic Christianity," Josh warns. In January 2010, Oprah issued a fatwā against Josh.

Wheaton Heroes just finished a reading marathon of all 120 of Josh's books, we came across these 7 lesser known titles that the publisher's failed to promote: