A legend among evangelicals, a gracious, loving and principled man, he will be greatly missed. All the same, in this time of tragedy after tragedy it's good to hear about the death of someone who lived and died well, after a long productive life, and has gone to be with the saviour he loved.
I have not read as many of his books as I would like to say I have, but what I have read of John Stott's work has stayed with me and been so thoroughly helpful. I particularly hold onto what he wrote in The Cross of Christ:
I could never myself believe in God, if it were not for the cross… In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? I have entered many Buddhist temples in different Asian countries and stood respectfully before the statue of Buddha, his legs crossed, arms folded, eyes closed, the ghost of a smile playing round his mouth, a remote look on his face, detached from the agonies of the world. But each time after a while I have to turn away. And in imagination I have turned instead to that lonely, twisted, tortured figure on the cross, nails through hands and feet, back lacerated, limbs wrenched, brow bleeding from thorn-pricks, mouth dry and intolerably thirsty, plunged in God-forsaken darkness. That is the God for me! He laid aside his immunity to pain. He entered our world of flesh and blood, tears and death. He suffered for us. Our sufferings become more manageable in the light of his. There is still a question mark against human suffering, but over it we boldly stamp another mark, the cross which symbolises divine suffering. ‘The cross of Christ … is God’s only self-justification in such a world’ as ours.
Rest in peace, John Stott.
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