Atlanta, May 19, 2020: Ravi Zacharias, an India-born author who spent his life defending Christianity through books and lectures, has died. He was 74.

Zacharias had been battling sarcoma and died at his home in Atlanta on May 19, Zacharias International Ministries said.

He was a leading figure among Christian Apologists — a branch of Christian theology that defends Christian doctrines against objections.

Zacharias founded Zacharias International Ministries in 1984, and “launched a global team of nearly 100 Christian scholars and authors who continue to speak, resource, train and address the questions of millions around the world,” a news release said.

“(Ravi) saw the objections and questions of others not as something to be rebuffed, but as a cry of the heart that had to be answered,” said Michael Ramsden, president of Zacharias International Ministries.

“People weren’t logical problems waiting to be solved; they were people who needed the person of Christ. Those who knew him well will remember him first for his kindness, gentleness, and generosity of spirit. The love and kindness he had come to know in and through Jesus Christ was the same love he wanted to share with all he met.”

Zacharias is survived by his wife, Margie, daughters Sarah and Naomi, son, Nathan, and five grandchildren.

Zacharias died two months after he announced he had been diagnosed with cancer.

He preached in more than 70 countries and authored more than 30 books in his 48-year career, teaching Christians to engage with skeptics and arguing that the Christian worldview has robust answers to humanity’s existential questions.

Zacharias was born on March 26, 1946, in Chennai (then Madras). His family moved to Delhi when he was young and he grew up there. His family was Anglican, but he was an atheist until the age of 17 when he tried to commit suicide by swallowing poison. While he was in the hospital, a local Christian worker brought him a Bible and told his mother to read to him from John 14.

Zacharias said it was John 14:19 that touched him as the defining paradigm, “Because I live, you also will live,” and that he thought, “This may be my only hope: A new way of living. Life as defined by the Author of Life.” He committed his life to Christ praying, “Jesus if You are the one who gives life as it is meant to be, I want it. Please get me out of this hospital bed well, and I promise I will leave no stone unturned in my pursuit of truth.”

In 1966, Zacharias immigrated with his family to Canada, earning his undergraduate degree from the Ontario Bible College in 1972 (now Tyndale University) and his M.Div. from Trinity International University. In 1990, he spent a two to three-month sabbatical at Ridley Hall, a Church of England theological school in Cambridge.

Zacharias started his ministry with the Christian and Missionary Alliance (CMA). A graduate of Ontario Bible College (now Tyndale University) and Trinity International University, he was commissioned as a national evangelist for the United States in 1977 and ordained in the CMA in 1980.

He founded RZIM in 1984, and the organization has grown to about 200 employees in 16 offices around the world, with 20 traveling speakers.

His best-selling book, Can Man Live Without God?, sold about 500,000 copies in 1995. His most recent book, The Logic of God: 52 Christian Essentials for the Heart and Mind, won the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association’s 2020 Christian book award in the Bible study category.

Late in his ministry career, Zacharias faced claims that he overstated his academic background and implied he had earned a doctorate degree. Over the years, RZIM and Zacharias’s publishers revised his biographies to clarify that he has received honorary doctorates and removed references to “Dr. Zacharias.”

Zacharias was also involved in a legal dispute over “sexually explicit” communication with a woman he met through his speaking ministry. Her lawyer said Zacharias had groomed and exploited her. Zacharias sued, and the lawsuit was settled out of court with a non-disclosure agreement.

Sources: edition.cnn.com, christianitytoday.com