Morning Star in Asheville has taken all the steps but one to become a formally organized congregation of the Southern Province. It has not yet grown enough to reach church status.
Morning Star began with meetings in 1990 of Moravians transplanted to the Asheville area. They reached fellowship status, and beginning in October 1991 Br. Herbert Weber drove from Winston-Salem once a month to hold services.
The fellowship gained a more permanent footing in February 1993 when Douglas C. Rights was commissioned by the Province to work full-time in the Asheville area to bring it to full church status.
Morning Star took another step when on March 21, 1995, Provincial Elders Conference authorized it to have provisional church status. A church with a "beautiful mountain view" was purchased from the Methodists, and on April 9, 1995, Morning Star began worshiping there. The building was dedicated May 7 by Graham Rights.
During the next twelve years, morning star enjoyed many successes and unfortunate setbacks. Multiple pastoral changes in the span of a few years left members reeling yet produced strong leadership from within. It was during this time that our sister Willie Israel became ordained as a Moravian pastor (now serving at Rolling Hills in Florida) and our brother Hank Jackson received his Masters in Divinity from Gordon-Conwell in Charlotte. It was also during this time that Synod decided to change the required number of members to be a church from 35 to 50 and demoted Morning Star to fellowship status. This dealt another harsh blow to the self esteem of Morning Star from which they narrowly escaped demise.
In 2008, despite a recently growing number of attendees, the board of evangelism and homeland mission of the Southern Province decided to sell the church property to settle an unpaid debt that Morning Star owed the Southern Province for their mortgage. This difficult decision of the BEHM was in direct contrast to the desires and pleadings of the fellowship, and consequently dissolved nearly half of the membership, including the then current leadership.
Since 2008, Morning Star Moravian fellowship has sought shelter at St. Marks Lutheran of Asheville, NC and has combined in multiple ministries with St. Marks. The Moravian Church and the Lutheran church are in full communion with each other and Morning Star and St. Marks are one of the few churches taking advantage of this relationship. Through our combined ministries we continue to grow in faith and witness.
It is the desire of our fellowship that we maintain the Moravian presence in Asheville; continue to practice Moravian faith traditions, and Moravian hymnody and Liturgy. But foremost our desire is that we gather together as brothers and sisters of Christ for worship, outreach, learning, and fellowship. Christ and him crucified remains our confession of faith.