Along with his three brothers and two sisters, Marc was raised as the son of a Presbyterian minister at various locations in North and South Carolina. Marc’s family now has roots in Sanford, North Carolina where his two sisters and their families live along with his parents. His father is currently a retired member of Coastal Carolina Presbytery, the same Presbytery where two of Marc’s brothers are members, one as pastor of a church and the other as Presbytery Associate for Camping Ministries. His other brother is an elder in the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, and his mother is an elder and Commissioned Lay Pastor of Coastal Carolina Presbytery where she is a minister at the Wayside Presbyterian Church.
In 1982 Marc married Melanie, then a member of the Green Spring Presbyterian Church in Abingdon, VA. She is a pediatric physical therapist. Marc and Melanie have four children. Eden, the youngest, enjoys playing tennis, the flute and making new friends. Jordan is their next daughter. She also loves tennis, the high school band color guard and enjoys making her family laugh. Hannah, their next eldest, enjoys all sports, is an avid reader, musician, and loves to interact with children. Caleb is the oldest. He plays the clarinet and tenor saxophone, and is a student at the School of Music at Indiana University. As a family the Sherrods like to sit around the dinner table talking. They hope to have more opportunities for family camping trips and visits with family in Abingdon and Sanford. Since the children were very young, they have been able to go on winter ski vacations, always a highlight of the year.
Marc is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia. He completed his Master of Divinity at Columbia Theological Seminary, where he and Melanie spent the first two years of their married life. He served as the pastor of the Newland Presbyterian Church in Newland, North Carolina for six years where he also completed a Master of Arts in Appalachian Studies at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. While there he led an ecumenical effort to start a ministry of used clothing, food, and fuel assistance for those in need, eventually hiring a full-time director for that program. In 1990 the Sherrods moved to Buena Vista, Virginia where Marc was pastor of a church. Many close relationships ensued during their four-year stay as the church grew and prospered.
In 1994, Marc accepted the call to do further graduate study enrolling as a Doctor of Theology student at the Divinity School of Harvard University in the study of American religious history. In June 2004, he graduated with the Doctor of Theology degree. His thesis is entitled: That Great and Awful Change: Death and Protestant Practical Theology in the American Northeast, 1700 – 1900.
While in the greater Boston area, he served as parish associate and then as interim pastor/head of staff at the Newton Presbyterian Church.
Marc was called to preach the word of God and minister to Bethel’s family and friends in October 2001.
