The late Pastor John MacArthur expressed assurance of his salvation in some of his final words, according to one of the pastors at his Grace Community Church in Southern California.
“I hope it’s OK to share,” Mike Riccardi, who serves as the GCC’s pastor of local outreach ministries, told the congregation at the end of an hour-long reflection on MacArthur’s legacy with Grace To You Executive Director Phil Johnson.
Reflecting on John MacArthur’s legacy. What a testimony!
As he lay dying, John MacArthur said, “I feel no sting. I feel no fear.” pic.twitter.com/P3VuzglAP9
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— Terri Green (@TerriGreenUSA) July 22, 2025
“It was reported to me by some of those who were with John in the hours that he was ready to go to Heaven,” Riccardi said.
“One of the verses that [was] on his mind, some of his last words [were] 1 Corinthians 15:55: ‘O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?’ And he was speaking about how the resurrection of Christ is the conquest of all of that.”
“And it was reported to me that in between gasps for air, he said, ‘I feel no sting. I feel no fear,'” he added, prompting applause.
“And why? Because Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. Because the Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid; and, really, because he was saying, ‘It is well with my soul.'”
MacArthur died July 14 at age 86 after being hospitalized with pneumonia. He had been struggling with his health for two years and was hospitalized in 2023 after struggling to breathe as he delivered an hour-long sermon. He had four stints put in his heart and eventually had to have his aorta replaced. He also required lung surgery.
He described his health problems as “a long siege” that made the waning years of his ministry difficult, and that he bristled at the doctors’ order to rest.
During his final sermon at GCC on Nov. 24, 2024, MacArthur expressed gratitude to God despite his physical afflictions and noted that God uses suffering to accomplish His purposes.
“Sometimes our trials are blessings in disguise, and God has purposes that we would never have been able to fulfill if we weren’t put into some kind of stress,” he said. “I can tell you I’ve had three heart surgeries and a surgery on my lungs in those last few months, and I’m still here.”
“I have so much to be thankful for. In fact, when people ask me how I feel, I say I’m thankful. I see the good and gracious and kind and providential hand of God in every vicissitude in my life, every hard experience, every challenge, whatever that challenge may be. I see the good hand of divine providence operating in ways that would never have been possible were it not for the trial.”
“So I’m genuinely and truly am grateful,” he added.
Jon Brown is a reporter for The Christian Post. Send news tips to jon.brown@christianpost.com
