Robert atkinson robertson mcquilkin biography

By Melissa McCutchan and Bob Holmes

In the last months of the life of Columbia International University President Emeritus Robertson McQuilkin, when his health was declining, his close friend and former CIU Vice President John Davidson would visit him and inquire how he was doing.

“He would say, ‘Terrible,’” Davidson recalled.

“I would say, terrible?

What’s wrong?”

“He’d say, ‘I’m still here. I want to be in heaven.’”

“Well now he is,” Davidson told those who gathered at a memorial service in CIU’s Shortess Chapel June 4. “And we rejoice.”  

J. Robertson McQuilkin, who served as CIU’s third president from 1968-1990, went to be with the Lord on June 2, 2016. The family welcomed hundreds of CIU alumni, faculty, students, and members of the community to celebrate McQuilkin’s life.

McQuilkin was eulogized by colleagues, friends, and children who shared about his worldwide influence among evangelicals, his deep love for his family, and his long Robertson McQuilkin - Focus on the Family KUKO