Influenced: Al Mohler

Well, I have to start rather selfishly at the  personal level because of John's impact on my   life. I can just say that the friendship that came  into my life through John MacArthur is just an   amazing gift. Having him as a model, encourager,  friend. That was just unbelievably rich. I was a 15-year-old boy in South Florida and I  had never really heard the kind of expositional   preaching that John MacArthur delivered Sunday  after Sunday. And so it came to me on a cassette   tape. This is really the heart of the gospel. It  is a living thing. The Word of God is alive and   powerful. It is productive, divine. And so many  good things in life when I was that age back in   the the early 1970s came as a cassette tape. I  had no access to John MacArthur other than these   sermons that were delivered to me by friends and  we shared them. It was kind of like in the old   Soviet Union sat, you know, you had these things  and you just passed them along. So John MacArthur   tapes were in there and I was absolutely  fascinated, drawn to what John MacArthur   was doing. I didn't know who he was, but the way  he walked through a text, the way he preached the   Word of God, it was absolutely infectious. I  wanted more. But it all goes back to what was   a rather squeaky cassette tape because the way we  passed them around they got old fast. But what a   blessing and I think of the fact that you know  a generation prior to that even that technology  

wouldn't have been possible. Nowadays you know  it's a click away. It wasn't always that way.   And so I can still remember hearing John MacArthur  preach as a 15-year-old boy and it changing the   categories in my mind of what preaching was  all about. And I desperately wanted more of   it and thankfully the Lord gave me far more of  it. There are reasons there is enough evidence   so that we can actualize into present reality  an unseen thing. And that's precisely what we   have with faith in God. That's one of the amazing  things about John's ministry is he would take a   text just say Matthew chapter 1 and by the time  he had walked you through the text you actually   pretty much assume the text was written to be  preached just like this. I don't think there's   anything that is the equivalent of hearing the  preacher preach the Word of God. Just listen. But   don't just listen to a sermon. Start there. Listen  to the exposition of an entire book of Scripture   for every right reason. That creates an appetite  for the continued hearing of God's Word preached.   John putting himself and his ministry on the  line in the Gospel According to Jesus was,   I think, a very critical moment in the evangelical  world. You know his commentaries, his preaching,   all the different books and and I mean just  unprecedented productivity from him. Charismatic   Chaos was very important. All all these kinds  of issues that really are the extension of his  

preaching ministry. But the Gospel According  to Jesus, as a book, I think landed at just   the right time. And I think you can see the the  fruit from that book in the evangelical world   today. He's had a determinative impact on a vast  segment of American evangelicalism. You could even   define it as that section segment of American  evangelical Christianity that's influenced   by John MacArthur. That's massive. And that's  where you're going to find doctrinal clarity.   That's where you're going to find expositional  preaching. That's where you're going to find a   real boldness and Christian conviction uh and a  passion for the gospel. And I think John's impact,   especially even in his latter years, was even  broader in terms of speaking into some of the   issues in the culture. And I don't think that's  where John really saw his role earlier in his   ministry. But in those final years of his  ministry, I think the Lord opened a door and   John again was faithful in walking through that  door. I don't know what incredible loss would be   experienced by that movement if God had not given  John MacArthur. And not only that, John MacArthur   at full strength in full fidelity and full energy  for so many decades. Just an incredible gift.

"What I would love to see happen, that's why I  love being with my friends here, is I would just   love for us to produce enough all together we  can overpower what's going on. Well, if we keep   growing and they keep dying, that's the idea.  That's, you know, grandpa's near-death's door.   We're praying the Lord will pull him through."  You know, there's a debate about John MacArthur   among his friends. And, that debate comes down  to, you know, was John the same and obviously   theologically, ethically, morally, he was the same  everywhere. But, you know, did he ever, to use the   hackneyed expression, did he ever let his hair  down? And the answer is, no. My answer is no.   Not really. It is because John MacArthur was the  same in the pulpit and in person where John was   the weight of what John believed and the weight of  who John was and the role he played in the church   and in the larger world. It was always there. But  I can just tell you not only was it always there,   it was always there faithfully. So, one of the  things I want to say is that yes, he spent I   spent so many hours alone with John. John spent so  many hours in our home in association with other   preachers and in different events and movements. I  thank God for him. I think his consistency in life   is one of the great tributes to the man and the  ministry. And it was just a joy to be with him.