Carl Eugene Sadler
Pastor, Educator and Writer
By David PitmanBro. Sadler was born August 31, 1918 in Logan County, KY, the son of Eugene and Erna (Bodine) Sadler, Carl Sadler grew up attending the Green Ridge Baptist Church. During most of his boyhood, E.E. Spickard (a relative of Carl’s mother) was his pastor. He was saved at the age of fourteen, baptized at Green Ridge and there he surrendered to preach. After graduating from Gordonsville High School, he enrolled in Campbellsville College in 1938. He later said that during his time at Campbellsville they were using J. M. Carroll’s “Trail of Blood” as a textbook. In college he met Earline, whose mother, Prescova Hogg served in Sunday School missions in eastern Kentucky. Carl and Earline were married Aug. 22, 1939. They would serve together in ministry until her death May 13, 2003. He would serve in the U.S. Army, become skilled in the tool and die trade, and would welcome every technological advance that opened doors for the work of God.
He would serve as pastor to Home Acres (Maranatha) Baptist Church, Grand Rapids, MI; Dripping Springs Baptist Church, Olmstead, KY; Beech Grove Baptist Church, Crab Orchard, KY; Seventh Street Baptist Church, Cannelton, IN; (Associate Pastor) Ashland Avenue Baptist Church, Lexington, KY; Pastor of Pleasant View Baptist Church, Grant County, KY; and would begin a very successful church plant in 1985 (at the age most would retire) that would become Trinity Missionary Baptist Church, Richmond, KY.
Several generations of Bible students would profit from his teaching ministry: first in 1957, as Professor, Tri-State Baptist College, Evansville, IN; beginning in 1962, as Professor and Registrar, Lexington Baptist College, Lexington, KY; in 1967, as Professor and Dean, Cincinnati Baptist College and Schools, Cincinnati, OH; as Founder and President, Kentucky Mountain Baptist Schools (KMBS) in 1972. KMBS would become his signature ministry and through the main campus at Booneville, KY and through extension classes and correspondence, he would prepare many for the ministry. “The Bible as it is to Men as They Are” was his oft-used motto. His scholarship was noted for its breadth and depth in Biblical Theology. He modeled his teaching of the English Bible after B.H. Carroll. He demonstrated remarkable patience with young preachers and was a mentor to hundreds. He was a firm advocate of making the blessings of Bible study available to the lay person as well as the seminarian.
A prolific writer, he wrote 50 books and pamphlets. His “Ten Eventful Days” tract and chart is one of the best presentations of the argument for a Wednesday crucifixion. He had a special facility in teaching the Life and Letters of the Apostle Paul. He held a very strong Landmark view of ecclesiology and pneumatology and taught a dispensational eschatology. Strong in his convictions he is well-remembered as one who spoke the truth in love.
He died on March 9, 2006 and is buried in Shepherd Cemetery, Boonesville, Owsley County, Kentucky.
===================== [From David Pitman, Pastor of Addyston Baptist Church, Ohio; scanned and formatted by Jim Duvall.]
Among other things, Carl Sadler wrote the Introduction and published Baptist History and Succession, a small paperback book that was 'compiled and arranged' by Charles B. Stovall of Bowling Green, Kentucky. He also published Baptist Distinctives in 1981.
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