Josh Cowan has spent his career thinking about power — how to move it, control it, and convert it into something useful. It took a long time for him to ask the same question about his life.
For almost 10 years, Josh worked as an electrical engineer for fast-growing, well-paying companies. But in 2023, he walked away from a successful career at a multinational semiconductor corporation to co-found NC Semiconductor, a worker-owned cooperative in Durham. He came to realize that how he made his money was pivotal to how he wanted to devote his life to Christ’s teachings.
He increasingly felt a tension between what he experienced during his workweek and what he came to know as true through his study of the Bible, worship on Sundays, and relationships with others at Blacknall. He could use his God-given skills to become wealthy, but that would, in turn, make the businesses he worked for even richer and feed systems he felt didn't uphold Christ's message of truly caring for one another — even strangers.
Josh Cowan
“We live in an economy that says those with lots of extra money get to decide how we allocate our shared natural resources and what we do next as a society,” Josh said. “I could not square that with ‘the earth and all that is in it belongs to the Lord’ (Psalm 24:1).”
By starting his own business with fellow Blacknall member Chad Kersey, the pair chose to lead a company that is ethical and consistent with their Scriptural view of the economy. As NC Semiconductor grows, full-time employees become owners. There are no outside investors or venture capital. Wealth can’t accumulate in ways that puts a love for money or power ahead of God and caring for one another. “Meaning this might be a fool’s errand apart from God, but I believe in God,” he said.
What led him to this decision had been building since eighth grade, when Josh started reading the Bible on his own and found Christ’s teachings challenged his point of view. He had grown up believing that smart, responsible, hardworking people became wealthy — and he wanted to be one of them.
“There was all of this about taming the tongue and loving your enemies and turning the other cheek, but worse was this idea of seeking God’s Kingdom first and that the greatest commandment was to love God,” he said. “I didn’t want to think about God all the time. I wanted to think about circuits and how respectable and rich I would be. But I believed in God, and this led to tension.”
He went to Georgia Tech for his undergraduate and graduate degrees, moved to Durham for work, and spent years building a career that would help him reach his financial goals. But the gap he kept experiencing — God’s call to seek His Kingdom first — created the question he needed to answer: “If I believe in God, how can I offer myself to God?”
He wasn’t a doctor or a lawyer to help those in need. He didn’t have the temperament to be a pastor and lead a congregation. And the church “doesn’t dabble in semiconductors,” he joked.
Leaving a comfortable life to start his own business — and pursuing a way to support the people he hires — has kept him clear-eyed about the costs of his decision. He earns a fraction of his former salary, sometimes doubts his choices, and can feel alone. But even on days when the risks feel exceedingly burdensome, he finds balance in the love of people around him and strength in Christ. To help, he keeps a collection of about 20 passages and chapters from throughout the Bible that reinforce goals for how he wants to run his company and let God guide his life, from Deuteronomy through to James. God can never be "in second place," he said.
“I have a house, my wife has good benefits, and I have old colleagues who would hire me if I got desperate,” he said. “Jesus did not have a wife with health insurance, and his friends did not turn out to be so helpful. When he faced far riskier situations — like being killed by the state — he had only a relationship with the Father.”
“The love of God was enough for Jesus,” he added. “Can it be enough for us?”
This story is part of our series that highlights how God impacts our lives: In the transformation we experience through Him and how He invites us into a deeper life of discipleship with Christ.
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