Pastor and author John MacArthur says he's feeling better and will be back in the pulpit soon after undergoing a heart procedure and being placed on medication earlier this year that sapped his energy.
The pastor of Grace Community Church in Southern California, MacArthur, gave an update on his health during the May 8 broadcast of his popular radio ministry, Grace to You.
"I feel great. I have no illness. I sleep well. I eat well," MacArthur said, adding that the prescribed medication made him "feel like I went from eight cylinders to four cylinders."
Told by Grace to You host Phil Johnson that he's missed at Grace Community, MacArthur said, "You're going to get me very soon."
MacArthur also revealed more details of his illness, saying it began on the first day of the year.
"I was preaching at Grace Church on Jan. 1. And as I got up to give the sermon in the first service … I just felt like I couldn't get my breath. That had never happened to me before. And I think I said to the congregation, 'Just give me a minute to catch my breath.' And that was kind of shocking. So at that point, I began to feel a little bit better and I went ahead and preached for 50 minutes."
After that sermon, though, the elders and "a couple of medical doctors" met him in his office and intervened.
"They took my blood pressure and determined that I had some kind of atrial fibrillation and they took me to the emergency hospital," he said. "And the upshot of it all was they put four stents in my arteries that were blocked 80 percent or 90 percent. And the good news is the doctors said, 'You didn't have a heart attack and you have a very strong heart. And your heart is now like the heart of a 16-year-old.' So I was thankful to the Lord that there was no damage done to my heart, and that they were able to remedy the situation."
The medication, he said, lowers his energy level. He was playing golf right until the medical scare.
"I had a measure of good health," he said. "And so I'm on the recovery end of it now and I haven't preached for a few months, trying to get my strength back."
Photo courtesy: Islandsend/Creative Commons/Public Domain, image cropped and resized.
Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.
