Portrait of Randall Sledge. IMB Photo
Randall Dothan Sledge, an International Mission Board missionary emeritus who shared the gospel in Peru and Colombia, died April 17, 2024, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He was 99.
Randall was born December 21, 1924, in Coushatta, Red River Parish, Louisiana, to the late William Dothan Sledge and Ada Dixon Sledge. He graduated from Martin High School in Coushatta, Louisiana, and received the Bachelor of Arts from Louisiana College (now Louisiana Christian University), Pineville, Louisiana, and the Bachelor of Divinity and Doctor of Theology from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, New Orleans, Louisiana.
After graduating from high school, Randall worked for an attorney as a law clerk and legal stenographer while going to night school to study law. His obituary reports that when the U.S. entered World War II, it changed the trajectory of Randall’s life. He enlisted in the Navy soon after his 18th birthday.
While stationed at Norfolk, Randall requested a three-day leave to attend a Navigators conference. It was there he felt God’s call to missions. “I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that He wanted me to be a foreign missionary. For the first time in my life (and I thank the Lord that it was not the last), my heart was broken over lost men and I shed tears for them,” Randall wrote when seeking missionary appointment. “Here at home, men hear the gospel over and over again, and yet refuse to accept the Saviour. Out in the mission fields men are born; they live; they die and go to hell without ever hearing about the Saviour. Therefore, I feel that the Lord would have me to go and carry to them the message of salvation, forgiveness, redemption, and hope.”
After his discharge from the Navy in 1946, Randall worked as a pastor and completed his education. He met Dorothy Sewall, and they married on August 12, 1949.
In 1954, the International Mission Board appointed Randall and Dorothy missionaries to Peru. They served as church planters for several years before returning to Louisiana to pastor a church. In 1979, Randall and Dorothy were reappointed for a second term in Colombia, where Randall served as Professor of New Testament and Theology at the Seminario Internacional Teologico Bautista (International Baptist Theological Seminary) in Cali, Colombia, for more than 10 years. They retired in 1990.
Randall was preceded in death by Dorothy, his wife of 74 years, and an infant son, Timothy Randall Sledge.
He is survived by three children, Jonathan Edward Sledge (Deborah Norton) of Raleigh, North Carolina; Richard William Sledge (Molly Sledge) of Fort Collins, Colorado, and Martha Lee Sledge (Steven Hornsby) of New York, New York; nine grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren.
A service was held April 26, 2024, at Clear Springs Cemetery in the Martin community of Red River Parish, with burial following.
Donations in his memory may be made to the Lottie Moon Offering, IMB, 3806 Monument Avenue, Richmond, VA 23230, or online at Generosity Resource Center – IMB Generosity.
Read an obituary here.