"The church didn't do me any favors.", he says. The people in the church turned him off about the church. "Church people can be mean. Don't get me wrong, there are those that are nice though." His dad was a pastor so he saw all sides of ministry and was sometimes turned off.
His parents paid for his college but never really got into a church until he was 21. There he got involved and began helping out there. It was then that Jesus really got in his life and changed it drastically.
Did not really know what to do with ministry he said, but knew he was called to it.
Likes the ministry but not the church or the people in the church. Started to go to Life church (now a massive online church; Craig Groetchel). He loved it all there. He said everything was professional and also not done the norm, but people were still responding.
He was about to write church off until his dad called him and asked him if he wanted to get involved with a young adult church they were thinking of starting. It was a Sunday night service for young adults and it first went horrible. After 6 months they changed to a Sunday morning and were there for a year and almost closed. But then, a Mennonite church was closing and wanted to sell the building. After a year of negotiations, their building was given to Steve and the young church plus 7 acres of land. It grew slowly a first but has since blown up and now has a satellite site of it's own in downtown Phoenixville, Pennsylvania.
"We exist for those not yet here." <-- What church is suppose to be about.
Donnie got saved 2 months after Journey started. He called himself a town drunk and dead-beat dad but it all fell apart and he challenged God to show him He is real. He got saved on a highway in Virginia and entered a recovery group. Steve's brother asked him to come to Journey. He says he felt like it fit. He even went back to his wife he divorced 2 years ago. God restored their marriage. He says that it wasn't a slow progression but a drastic move of God!
Donnie is the campus pastor of the Phoenixville satellite church. He oversees everything, minus preaching, which Steve does.
Phoenixville church started this past December on Christmas Eve at The Colonial in downtown Phoenixville.
Steve DeFrain and Donnie, truly seem to be running, not walking, after God. Jesus is real, authentic, transformational and they want all to know it!
