Charles Page, a pastor whose battle with cancer drew prayer support from far beyond his North Carolina church, died Oct. 28 at his home in Charlotte, N.C. He was 66.
Page was pastor of First Baptist Church of Charlotte.
The Charlotte Observer recounted, “It was his nine-year struggle to hold off cancer that probably moved more people to prayer than any one sermon. Since being diagnosed in 1996 with multiple myeloma – cancer that develops in the blood – Page struggled to the pulpit for as many Sunday mornings as he could to share God’s word. Some Sundays he leaned on a cane and couldn’t shake hands afterward for fear of infection, his wife Sandra serving as his careful and loving bodyguard.”
Page had led the 3,500-member downtown congregation since 1991 and from 1982-85, punctuated by the pastorate of First Baptist Church in Nashville, Tenn. He also had been pastor of First Baptist Church, North Augusta, S.C., from May 1977 to February 1982.
In 2003, he was honored with the naming of the Charles Page Chair of Biblical Theology at Southeastern Baptist Seminary. He is a graduate of the seminary and his wife is a former trustee.
He also was a vice president of the trustee board of the former Christian Life Commission (now Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission).
Page learned of the cancer prior to a mission trip to Russia and subsequently underwent four bone marrow transplant operations, the latest earlier this year.
Page continued working and preaching when not sidelined by chemotherapy, at times making pastoral visits by telephone from his hospital room. Guest preachers filled in when needed; church members “stepped in to fill every gap,” as the website put it; and the congregation continued to grow.
“Through this entire process, pastor and people have fallen more deeply in love with God and one another,” the website stated prior to his death. “The example of Dr. Page’s faith in God is inspiring to thousands of people, in the church, in the area, and around the nation. We admire Dr. Page as a man of God who walks daily with God and is filled with the Holy Spirit.”