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John James helped lead Newsboys to stardom — then lost everything. Decades on, he shares how God gave him a second chance.

Before Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) superstars Newsboys had singers Michael Tait and Peter Furler, there was Australian frontman John James.

James recorded six albums with the band, helping Newsboys go from Mooloolaba, Queensland, to the United States’ big tops and big arenas.

His shock exit in 1996 hit hard. Although the band’s seventh album Step Up to the Microphone weathered James’ departure well, his absence was still keenly felt.

While Take Me To Your Leader had catapulted the band into the CCM top ten, James was about to crash land.

Talking candidly about why he left Newsboys, the former frontman told The 700 Club that moral compromises in his life had become impossible to ignore.

In short, he had lost the plot.

“Success came like a Tsunami. It was more work than ever. Longer tours, Dove awards,” he explained. “We started seeing gold albums, and in the midst of all this, we were getting married, having families.”

There was also a flow of “incredible wealth, beautiful homes, beautiful cars — we were living the American dream,” he said.

The “lifestyle, success, fame, the ministry have the ability to expose defects in your character.”

“It’s easy to be great from a distance, behind closed doors, when you’re alone, the lifestyle exposes the defects in who you are in your foundation.”

This, the former Newsboys frontman recounted, “is what happened to me.”

“I was losing my grip, and that sense of humility, and staying connected to the vine [John 15:5]; connected to God.”

Leaving Newsboys

From there James explained, his marriage failed because he hadn’t “guarded the sacredness of marriage.” There were  “compromises. A little here and there. Eventually it took its toll on every area of my life.”

He added that he “had one lifestyle on stage, and [was] a completely different person off stage.”

Even though he never stopped believing in Christ, James said the anchors of his life were being cut.

After confiding in the band, he was forced to step down. This is when his life fell apart. The now-former Newsboys vocalist recalled realising that music had become his entire identity. Everything was wrapped up in being a Newsboy, and “that meant more to me than my marriage,” James lamented.

With his marriage on the rocks and no job, alcohol and drugs became an easy out, which only took things from bad to worse. At that point, he returned to Australia in order to save his marriage, but going back was more “important than his own salvation,” James explained.

So, “God shut the door on America,” he recalled. “I was being taken into the wilderness where that John James had to die.”

As “gut-wrenching dying to self, and allowing God to heal wounds such as abandonment, rejection, and unfaithfulness,” was for James, the process brought him to his knees.

How was “God ever going to fix someone like me?” he asked.

After serving time in the pews, God answered that prayer. He showed up, gave John James evidence of His mercy, and reminded this fallen Christian celebrity of the “way back to the foot of the cross.”

Life After Newsboys

James is now an evangelist. Sharing his life lessons with the Christian Music Guy podcast in January, James said he’s come to see that some people’s roads are mountain tops, some are valleys, and some are both.

Echoing a blunt 2007 Cross Rhythms interview when he went public about the depth of his depravity, James said, “We all want success, but we don’t always realise that it comes at a cost.”

“If success does come in whatever field and endeavour we’re in… what sort of pressure does the pursuit of success, the benefits of success put on your character?” he asked. “What kind of pressure is that putting on your faith, your marriage, on your ego, on your sexuality, on your children, on your family?”

“My life is a lesson in that,” James concluded.

Wrong choices brought on by the consequences of that pressure shipwrecked his career, life, marriage, and ministry.

Discussing repentance and restoration, James said, God did a miracle in his life. “I experienced the God of the second chance.”

Back in the United States, James works as a motivational speaker, sharing his testimony through iReachUSA, an outreach ministry he runs with his new wife, Tanya.

Almost three decades after laying his career in music at the foot of the cross, and “rolling up his mat,” the former Newsboys frontman is close to releasing an album.

In an April 2024 Kickstarter campaign, John James said he has distanced himself from the music scene for good reason. However, there’s a strong sense that God has reignited this gift, giving James the inspiration for an entire album called “God of the Second Chance.”

“It’s as if I’m like Lazarus,” he summarised. God “has called me back from the dead.”