MacArthur’s courage to speak Scripture’s truth, no matter the audience, should be commended.
Pastor and Theologian, John MacArthur, died on July 14th, 2025. He leaves behind a wife of 62 years, four adult children, 15 grandchildren, and nine great-grandchildren. For 56 years, he served as Pastor of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California. However, his influence over American Christianity spread well beyond his congregation, as for the last 48 years, his sermons have been broadcast worldwide on his radio show, “Grace to You.” He was an author or editor of some 150 books and was a frequent guest on primetime television news. The list could go on of the man’s many accomplishments, but for now, let us pray for his family and the family of Christians who were impacted by his ministry.
I first became aware of John MacArthur in my mid-twenties (what feels like a lifetime ago). I was driving a truck for a living, but I was set on attending seminary to become a pastor myself.
Nearly every day, I’d tune into the local Christian radio station and listen to different sermons. Eager to learn the mechanics of how to preach effectively, I would listen to the witty and polished Chuck Swindoll, the fiery and passionate John Piper, the insightful and refined Reformed theologian R.C. Sproul, and, of course, there was the blunt and bold John MacArthur. I learned a lot from these men during that season of life and was grateful for various aspects of their ministries.
In particular, I’ve always appreciated MacArthur’s strong reliance on the Bible as the very word of God and his courage to call sin what the Scriptures called sin. Whether you listened to a sermon or saw him in an appearance on Larry King, the man simply could not go without constantly referencing the Scriptures to back his claims. YouTube and social media are replete with old MacArthur clips in which he doesn’t mince words in calling everyone in the audience to repent and believe in Jesus Christ. Preachers who aren’t mealy-mouthed and don’t apologize for what the Bible calls sin can sometimes be in scarce supply. MacArthur’s courage to speak Scripture’s truth, no matter the audience, should be commended.
Yet I didn’t always see eye to eye with how MacArthur interpreted those Scriptures, either. For example, I never agreed with his dispensational understanding of eschatology. I also found myself uncomfortable with what seemed to be his overemphasis on Christian obedience in the role of one’s salvation. I know many people who’ve attended his church, including close family members who struggled with assurance of their salvation. At his best, MacArthur would essentially preach the standard Protestant formula that man is justified by grace alone, through faith alone, on account of Christ alone. But, in my opinion, this was often overshadowed by too much focus on the believer’s own personal holiness. Sometimes this message would come off as “you are saved by grace…..if you are obedient enough.” When this happens, whether intentionally or unintentionally, it is easy for grace to be misunderstood as more of an infused power to live rightly than first and foremost a solid declaration of God’s disposition to those he has saved and now calls his children on account of Christ.
At his best, MacArthur would essentially preach the standard Protestant formula that man is justified by grace alone, through faith alone, on account of Christ alone.
And that truth reminds me of a couple of important points: First, no matter who the preacher is, we are all imperfect vessels for delivering God’s message to the world. I think all of us will find out when we arrive in glory, where we may have been off in our understanding of God and his word. Indeed, because of this, I often pray before I preach, “Lord, you know my heart. You know part of me wants the glory for what your word says. Repent me. Separate the wheat from the chaff in what I proclaim to those you’ve called here this day.”
Secondly, I’m reminded once again how much we all need to constantly hear and proclaim both law and gospel in their proper place. As Luther said:
The law is divine and holy. Let the law have his glory, but yet no law, be it ever so divine and holy, ought to teach me that I am justified, and shall live through it. I grant it may teach me that I ought to love God and my neighbour; also to live in chastity, soberness, patience, etc., but it ought not to show me how I should be delivered from sin, the devil, death, and hell.
Here I must take counsel of the gospel. I must hearken to the gospel, which teaches me, not what I ought to do (for that is the proper office of the law). but what Jesus Christ the Son of God has done for me: to wit, that He suffered and died to deliver me from sin and death. The gospel wills me to receive this, and to believe it. And this is the truth of the gospel. It is also the principal article of all Christian doctrine, wherein the knowledge of all godliness consists.
Most necessary it is, therefore, that we should know this article well, teach it unto others, and beat it into their heads continually.” [1]
Yes, we must have the gospel “beat into our heads continually” because we are prone to forgetting and reverting back to our works to sense if we’re justified. The fact is, we never get over our need for grace, no matter how obedient or disobedient we might feel we are (after all, Titus 2:11 makes clear that it is “the grace of God that trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives”). We never move past needing to confess our sins and to hear that we really are forgiven (1 John 1:8-9). We can never be so full of righteousness that we don’t hunger for the body and blood of Christ given at the altar (1 Cor. 11:23-26). True, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are given new desires for obedience to God’s word, but that message must not be the primary diet of the Christian church.
Yes, we need preachers to define sin clearly. But we also need preachers who clearly and boldly proclaim the only solution to that sin: the Son of God who became our sin on the cross so that he might finally say, “It is finished.”
The gospel must be what we feast on day to day. “The Law always accuses,” the Apology to the Augsburg Confession says, and that’s still true for the believer today. And because this is true, we must be bold to continually preach, “Though you are a great sinner, Christ is an even greater Savior.” I heard MacArthur proclaim that saving message, and as a result, he was used by God to usher many into his kingdom – the kingdom that he now and for eternity will reside in, bowing at the throne of his God in worship and thanksgiving for the salvation he was freely given.
For that, I give thanks and say “Rest in Peace.”
[1] Martin Luther, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians (Smith, English & Co. 1860), pg. 206.
