Tribute to Mark K. Palmer

Pastor Mark K. Palmer of The Landing Place Community, Columbus, OH passed from this life into the immediate presence of the Lord at the young age of 31 on March 27, 2006, following more than a year of intense battle against cancer.

Mark was born May 5, 1974 into a Christian home and was involved in his family’s local church from infancy. With simple, childlike faith, he believed in Jesus as his Savior at six years of age. Following his graduation from Mansfield High School, PA, he enrolled in Baptist Bible College, Clarks Summit, PA, graduating in 1996. It was there that he sensed God’s calling to vocational ministry and made the decision to pursue church planting. His church-planting dream became a reality in 2001 with the Brethren in Christ’s launch of The Landing Place in the Short North District of Columbus, OH. Mark initiated an expanding network of churches meeting in homes, which has grown to three locations with the vision of expanding throughout the Short North and beyond.

Mark is remembered for his passion for God’s Kingdom as demonstrated by his life and teaching of radical commitment to Christ. He shared his vision of New Testament community living through speaking engagements across the country and in other nations.

Mark continued serving faithfully in spite of his first wife, Jennifer’s, illness and death in 2003 resulting from cancer, leaving him to parent their toddler son, Micah, alone. He married Amy in November of 2004 and she became a caring, adoptive mother to Micah and a loving support to Mark as he pursued his graduate degree at Ashland Theological Seminary even as the cancer advanced. Mark courageously fought the disease through modern medicine while holding tenaciously to his rock solid faith in Jesus, his Lord and Great Physician.

His faith lives on in his family, The Landing Place Community, and in those he has influenced to “…press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14).

To read his weblog, a vibrant testimony of his life in Christ, go to http://palmerlp.livejournal.com/.

WELCOME