John McArthur, the de facto leader of one of American Protestantism’s major contemporary wings, died on July 14, 2026, at the age of 86. The son and grandson of preachers, MacArthur was the author of more than 150 books and pamphlets; was still active in the pulpit of his church, Grace Community Church of Sun Valley, California, and head of his Master’s University and Master’s Seminary; and hosted a daily radio program/media ministry, Grace To You.
For all of MacArthur’s religious activity, including recent “road show” appearances with fellow Fundamentalist and Reform figures, he broke into prominence in the mainstream culture during the panic-ridden COVID days. He steadfastly refused to obey the commands of county and state to close his church, halt services, and institute a mandatory mask-wearing policy. He said that if he were arrested, he would begin a prison ministry when incarcerated. Grace Community eventually was compensated by Gavin Newsom’s California and the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to the tune of $800,000.
This action represented MacArthur’s evolving involvement in politics, which included a statement that all “real Christians” should vote for Donald Trump. Ben Shapiro, on his podcast following MacArthur’s death, paid tribute to a sincere friend and sincere believer in his spiritual foundations. Shapiro recalled how, in one interview, MacArthur spent a full 30 minutes lovingly explaining the Gospel to him, attempting religious conversion. Shapiro, a Jew, was not convinced, but acknowledged MacArthur’s clear respect and concern for the condition of people’s souls.
In his role as a Bible scholar, he produced a Study Bible, the Legacy Standard Bible, basically an update of the New American Standard version. It has sold more than 2 million copies and has been translated into two dozen languages.
Through such activities, John MacArthur became prominent beyond his spiritual base, which could roughly be characterized as Reformed. His influence indeed bled far, with his books, appearances, and pulpit activity; assiduously, he taught in weekly sermons the entire Bible, verse by verse, totaling decades of methodical messages. Otherwise, MacArthur’s theology was difficult to label: He was born Baptist; attended Bob Jones University and Biola University; adopted elements of Calvinism, even hyper-Calvinism, including predestinarianism and a pre-millennial eschatology. If a distinction must be drawn, John MacArthur was more a teacher than a preacher.
Christianity in America has been acknowledged, invoked, and with decreasing frequency has been an essential element of the nation’s self-regard. To the extent that there have been divisions or debates based on theology, they only occasionally have been disagreements between Protestants and Catholics. Strains of Protestantism have defined, if not divided, groups; and, through history, have informed public policy on issues like the structure of the Constitution and role of the courts, slavery, Prohibition, privacy, and war and peace.
Intra-denominational distinctions have inspired more intense debates and divisions than secular squabbles. The American church, whose major concerns once were focused on the place of the Social Gospel, has in many venues split into disagreements — often laden with bitter judgmentalism — over matters of the Rapture (when believers will be taken to Heaven and avoid, or not, the End-Times Tribulation); whether the New Testament’s Gifts of the Spirit (prophecy, healing, tongues, etc) given to the First-Century church are valid today; and Modernism (whether, as MacArthur held, the Bible is literal, grammatical, and historically unassailable).
There are new and shifting alliances in the church, according to issues — such as the Catholics and some Protestants agreeing on abortion and public schools — but for the most part, there is a bit of Holy Anarchy in the American church. The umbrella-term “evangelical” has become almost meaningless to everyone except sloppy pollsters. And there are disagreements and sometimes latter-day anathemas exchanged between mainstream denominations, Fundamentalists, Charismatics and Pentecostals, Seeker-Sensitive churches, the emergent movement, Reformed traditions, the Metro movement, accommodationists and relativists, Holiness churches, Christian Zionists, Orthodox Protestants, High-Church schismatics, “New Covenant” believers, Lordship salvationists, Christian Nationalism, and Dispensationalists holding to Pre-, Mid-, and Post-Millennial Tribulation beliefs, holders of the Prosperity Gospel; etc.
It is interesting to note that, despite his public persona and speaking style — which seemed, and frequently was, stern and judgmental — John MacArthur reflected several shifting theological strains through his spiritual evolution, and sometimes would bridge various traditions. He was rather a strict Calvinist but never became a Presbyterian (for a time, he called himself a Baptist Calvinist, not as an oxymoron). He called himself at one time a “Leaky” Dispensationalist, allowing wiggle-room in discussions about God’s role in history and the coming Tribulation. He fanned the issue of “intersectionality,” maintaining that women had no role in church leadership, especially behind the pulpit (he also called his stance “Complementarianism”).
For years, he was dogmatic in defense of a doctrine he called “Incarnational Sonship,” basically maintaining that Christ became separate and holy only upon his earthly birth — a fair description of his singular belief — but he later recanted and admitted that the Old Testament clearly portrayed and illustrated incidents of the pre-Incarnate Jesus. MacArthur eventually identified with St Augustine’s self-corrective Retractations, however, writing that “I doubt I’ll ever have the time or energy to undertake” such work.
To many Christians, MacArthur’s major theological battles were with Pentecostals, and many saw great confusion, even harm, to the church. He championed what he called “Cessationism,” the argument that the Gifts of the Spirit — ministry blessings conferred to Christian converts in the Age of the Apostles, nine in number, including gifts of healing, wisdom, prophecy, ecstatic prayer, knowledge — were obsolete after the first century. Pentecostals asked for a Biblical citation about their expiration, but none exists. MacArthur would ask whether Pentecostals and Charismatics (virtual exchangeable labels) have ever witnessed miracles like healings in our days… to which millions (and spreading rapidly in the contemporary church) answered “Yes” to the dare. Nevertheless, MacArthur held a “Strange Fire” conference that savaged the Gifts of the Spirit, and wrote three books condemning Pentecostals.
So MacArthur and his Reform roundtable scholars (including John Stott, R. C. Sproul, Albert Mohler, and the recently disgraced Steven Lawson) decried the rising Holy Ghost wing of the church, yet influenced many. MacArthur was so critical of Pentecostals that he averred that they were demon-possessed. If Protestants could exercise excommunication, John MacArthur would have cast out Pentecostals and other Christians from fellowship. Some Christians, on the other hand, viewed some of his positions as redolent of heresies (like Arianism) that had been addressed by church councils and creeds many centuries ago.
In non-doctrinal controversies, as with many contemporary ministries, John MacArthur was not immune. He insisted that Martin Luther King was a “non-believer” who “misrepresented everything about Christ and the Gospel.”
Capturing as many headlines as his COVID stances, he resisted public sympathy for a woman in his congregation, Eileen Gray, over sexual abuse, including of her daughter Wendy, by a Grace Community employee. MacArthur criticised her but invited prayers for her abuser husband, David, even after he was sentenced to serve 21 years to life in prison for aggravated child molestation, corporal injury to a child, and child abuse. According to an eyewitness, Gray had confessed to MacArthur years earlier that he had molested his daughter. Many publishers, after this controversy became public, rejected a new MacArthur book about the War on Children, and MacArthur ultimately self-published the book.
Answering random questions from their audiences, MacArthur’s group of scholars, whose discussions and Q&As are still on the Internet, displayed a vice-grip knowledge of Scripture verses and theological wisdom. For viewers with mature filters or wise discernment, much can be gained by chats between major contemporary theologians.
Returning to the observation that Christianity in America has always been discussed and defined by different schools of Protestant thought, there is an absence felt by the passing of Billy Graham. However, he was “America’s Pastor,” a mantle inherited by his son Franklin, and a leader largely above the fray of doctrinal disputes. Even when Christians thought that we occasionally need to count the angels dancing on the heads of pins, the Grahams declined the exercise. Beneath them, so to speak, it is reasonable to generalize and regard Protestantism in 2025 as falling into two loose camps.
And leaders of those camps have died within a month of each other. Jimmy Swaggart was the most prominent Pentecostal preacher, with a widespread ministry whose influence touched Charismatics, open-worship Fundamentalists, “seeker” churches, etc. Swaggart died on July 1, 2025.
Two weeks later, John MacArthur died. Once again, very generally speaking, he can be seen as representative of another major group of Christians and traditions — mainstream and traditional denominations, Reformed churches, liturgical worshipers, etc.
The passing of these two very influential leaders, and so close in time, does not portend a vacuum in American Christianity, but it easily might allow different factions to draw closer. President Trump, who reached out to Swaggart’s next-generation preachers and who occasionally called both Swaggart and MacArthur (evidently a follower of the former’s worship services), already enjoys a fellowship with America’s faith community.
Having bequeathed a huge body of scholarship and Biblical exegesis to his subsequent generations, John MacArthur can now count for himself the angels on the heads of pins.
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Rick Marschall is a historian, critic, and commentator, and the author of 75 books, including Christian and apologetic books published by Thomas Nelson, FaithWords, etc. He was a member of the editorial team for the revision of the 1599 Geneva Bible. His weekly Christian/music blog has been published for 15 years: MondayMinstry.com/blog
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