When John MacArthur (1939–2025) became the pastor of Grace Community Church in 1969, he had two goals: to preach through the entire New Testament verse by verse and to train men for pastoral ministry.
John MacArthur would often say God honored those goals more abundantly than he could have asked or thought.
During his 56 years as the pastor of Grace Community Church, his teaching appealed to Christians because it was utterly clear, entirely compelling, and always biblical. He was tenacious about explaining the meaning of the text.
Under John’s leadership, Grace Community Church’s two morning worship services filled the three-thousand-seat auditorium to capacity. Through the decades, John patiently marched through the entire New Testament, completing his journey and accomplishing his first goal in May of 2011.
Not long after John MacArthur became the pastor of Grace Church, his second goal started to be realized when a busload of men began driving from the San Fernando Valley to Talbot Seminary in Orange County (where John had graduated) to train for ministry. As this group of men grew, Grace Church became a Talbot extension campus in 1977.
In 1985, John became president of The Master’s College (formerly Los Angeles Baptist College; since 2016, The Master’s University). Located in Santa Clarita, California, it is a distinctly Christian, accredited, liberal arts institution offering undergraduate and graduate degree programs. In 1986, the Talbot extension campus became The Master’s Seminary, a graduate school dedicated to training men for full-time pastoral and missionary work. John served as its first president for 32 years. In 2018, John became the chancellor of the university and seminary, serving in that role for seven years.
For his entire ministry, John was the featured teacher with Grace to You. Founded in 1969, Grace to You is the nonprofit organization responsible for developing, producing, and distributing John’s books, audio resources, and the Grace to You radio and television programs. Grace to You radio airs more than a thousand times daily throughout the English-speaking world, reaching major population centers with biblical truth. It also airs over a thousand times a day in Spanish, reaching twenty-seven countries across Europe and Latin America. Grace to You television airs weekly on DirecTV in the United States and is available for free on the internet worldwide. John’s 3,300-plus sermons, spanning more than five decades of ministry, are available for free download on this website.
John wrote hundreds of study guides and books, including The Gospel According to Jesus, Our Sufficiency in Christ, Strange Fire, Ashamed of the Gospel, The Murder of Jesus, The Prodigal Son, Twelve Ordinary Men, The Truth War, The Jesus You Can’t Ignore, Slave, One Perfect Life, The Gospel According to Paul, Parables, and One Faithful Life. John’s books have been translated into more than two dozen languages. The MacArthur Study Bible, the cornerstone resource of his ministry, is available in English (NKJ, NAS, and ESV), Spanish, Russian, German, French, Portuguese, Italian, Arabic, and Chinese. In 2015, The MacArthur New Testament Commentary was completed. In thirty-four volumes, John takes readers detail by detail, verse by verse, through the entire New Testament.
John didn’t know it at the time, but he preached his final sermon on November 24, 2024. It was titled “The Unfailing Promises of God.” Nearly nine months later, John would meet his Savior face-to-face on July 14th, 2025. He is survived by his wife, Patricia, and his four married children: Matt, Marcy, Mark, and Melinda, along with his fifteen grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.
