Click "View entire message" at bottom of email

to see the full newsletter

#GCPCinthesanctuaryandonline

Worship Preview | Sunday, August 2, 2026

Communion Sunday

In-person and online service

Deacon of the Week:

The Deacon of the Week is available to talk, provide support, and coordinate care if needed. You are not alone. You are loved. Please reach out to our deacon of the week if you have any needs or concerns.

This week (7/26-8/1) Patty Thompson | email: pattyellisthompson@gmail.com

Next week (8/2-8/8) Abi Hölder | email: a.bee.holder.333@gmail.com

Deacon of the Week Prayer:

Guiding Spirit,

We ask you to be with us during these uncertain days. We thank you for those moments when we sense your presence and may we listen to your voice when you speak. 

Thank you for bringing Marcia back to us and we pray for our transition as we reunite and discern next steps.

Heal the broken in body, mind, and spirit. And may we step up to the call to pray without ceasing.

In your Holy Names. Amen.

~ Patty Thompson

Click here to read the "Envision the Possibilities" Stewardship Letter

How to Make Your 2026 Pledge

• Scan the QR code for a link to the online Pledge Card
• Click here: https://onrealm.org/gcpcusa/-/form/pledge/envision 
• Email your pledge and giving frequency to giving@gcpcusa.org
• Email Sue Kersbergen (sue@gcpcusa.org) or Denise Ochoa (denise@gcpcusa.org) in the Finance Office at GCPC to help you get set up. 

Parents' Night Out! | Friday, July 31 | 5:30 - 8:30 PM | Fellowship Hall

Parents' Night Out events will continue through 2026! Staff will be on hand to play with kids, do a craft, and enjoy some fellowship together.

ALL KIDS SHOULD PACK A SACK DINNER.  We will provide drinks and dessert. This event is free!

Summer Choir | Sundays | 9:15 AM | Sanctuary

Come Sing this Sunday! All ages welcome! (Childcare is provided for ages 0 - K)

Come with a curiosity and joy for making music in community! No previous singing experience is necessary. Meet in the Sanctuary by the piano at 9:15 am on Sunday. We will learn a simple song or two to share in worship. Some chime ringers are needed, too!

Hope to see you Sunday!

Blessings, Ray

Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) Group Mtg. | Wednesday, August 5 | 10:45 AM - 12:00 PM | Garden Room (Admin. Building) 

This support group introduces techniques for daily living with such issues, led by Paul Rogers, a retired physician in our congregation and supported by other pastors in the GCPC community. We meet on the first and third Wednesdays of the month. New participants welcome at any time.

Contact Anna Louise, annalouise@gcpcusa.org, with questions.

PART (Power & Race Team) | Thursday, August 6 | 6:00-7:30 PM | Zoom

Thank you Rev. Dr. Tami Forte Logan for sharing your doctoral thesis on our church’s work of eliminating white supremacy in our community and in ourselves at the June meeting.The discussion after the presentation had moments of sharing deep feelings, metabolizing hard things and healing. 

At the August Meeting we will continue our discussion and focus on what is next in our work for our church, ourselves, and PART.

Tami Forte Logan and/or Marcia Mount Shoop will join us.

Join Zoom Meeting

https://zoom.us/j/91314445389

Meeting ID: 913 1444 5389 Passcode: 789

Pride Collective: Bowling! | Saturday, August 8 |

6:00 PM | Sky Lanes Bowling

Let’s go Bowling Pride Collective. It doesn’t matter if this is your first time, or if you bowl on a league. We are about having some fun, laughs, and fellowship.

We will each pay our own rounds of bowling and the shoe rental. If you need some assistance no problem. Let Malachi, Bonnie or Liz H. know.

Food and beverages are available.

GCPC Community Garden

NEEDS VOLUNTEERS!

The 2026 garden season is just around the corner and we need more volunteers for the garden team. This is a wonderful way to commune in nature with GCPC members and neighbors alike, all while growing food to share with various communities around Asheville. All ages are welcome... come grow with us!

On Wednesday, July 22, Team 1 had thirteen garden volunteers who harvested the following produce that was shared with YTL families. They also weeded beds.

Grace Abounds Food Pantry | Thursday, August 13 |

11:00 AM - 1:00 PM | Sanctuary

We believe the pantry embodies the church’s commitment to service and compassion. We try to keep our shelves stocked with canned goods, rice, beans, crackers, granola bars, cereal and other items. We also provide diapers, baby wipes and feminine products. Our pantry is stocked completely with donations. This is where we need your support to keep our pantry open.

If everyone in the community can bring one item on Sunday we could restock the store!

Needs for next pantry:

• pasta sauce
• tuna
• chicken
• cheese crackers
• peanut butter crackers

GCPC Writing Collective | Thursday, August 13 | 5:00 PM | Indie Room

If you love to write and welcome a chance to be creative and supportive around writing in community, come to the GCPC Writing Collective! Come as you are and when you can. Bring a journal and something to write with or your laptop and any food you wish to have.

The group offers prompts and time to write together and share if desired. Leadership is shared each month by its participants. If you have any questions about the group, please text Margaret Belk at 8285062742.

Donate your car. Change a life.

Working Wheels accepts donated vehicles to help local working families access reliable transportation. Learn more or donate your vehicle at workingwheelswnc.org.  

‘The work is hard, and the work is possible’

~ by Mark Ferguson

At Synod School, Wednesday is a day for thinking about love in between the mundane and the dream. Convocation speaker the Rev. Dr. William Yoo shared with the 650 or so attendees sketches of members of the Cherokee Nation and their allies during the years leading up to the Cherokees’ forced removal from their land and the Trail of Tears that followed.

Yoo is Associate Professor of American Religious and Cultural History at Columbia Theological Seminary. Synod School is a ministry of the Synod of Lakes and Prairies.

Yoo opened with the story of Harriet Ruggles Gold, who married Elias Boudinot, a Cherokee man who was educated at the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut. They fell in love as teenagers. Boudinot concluded his studies in 1822, met his bride-to-be and corresponded with her for some years. “They must have been some letters, but they’re lost to history,” Yoo said.

His cousin, John Ridge, also married a white woman, Sarah Bird Northrup Ridge, in 1825. Not everyone celebrated the marriage. “To have her thus marry an Indian and taken into the wilderness among savages must indeed be a heart-rending pang which none can realize except those called to feel it,” wrote Isaiah Bunce, who blamed the school for enabling these marriages.

Ridge’s own brother burned pictures of the couple in the town square. The two married quietly, and the school closed soon after that. “It couldn’t continue after those two weddings,” Yoo said.

“How are the American people ever to atone for the injuries done the original inhabitants of this country?” Gold asked.

GCPC Nametags

If you are in need of a new nametag,

please email Anna Louise at annalouise@gcpcusa.org.