How a Former “Church Kid” Found Her Own Church Home

Becki Droege grew up going to a tiny church in Ohio. But when she was 15, her parents got divorced and her family stopped going to church.

“My mom was very disenchanted with church, and so I was too,” Becki said. “I didn’t go for over 20 years.”

In a way, her mom had divorced the church too. And Becki was happy to distance herself from her father’s brand of Christianity.

“My dad was an alcoholic, and when he quit drinking, he replaced that addiction with religion,” she said. “And he instilled a lot of fear. He would say things like, ‘You need to behave this way, so that you will not burn in hell.’”

Even though she had fond memories of her youth group, Becki believes her father’s “turn or burn” faith is a big part of the reason why she stopped going.

“Church reminded me of the fear I used to feel.”

FormerChurchKid-NewChurchHome_family

Returning to the Church

As an adult, Becki was skeptical of those who let their personal faith spill out into their ordinary conversations.

“I always thought that I still believed in God,” she said. “But when someone sneezed and someone else would say, ‘God bless you,’ I would roll my eyes and think ‘Oh, you are one of those people.’’’

Becki’s husband, Alan, was just as jaded with church as she was.

“Alan was raised Catholic, and he hated going to church because it was so boring,” said Becki. “But we always said, ‘When we have kids, we will go back to church.’”

The fear her father’s faith instilled in her could not overpower Becki’s memories from youth group, and God used those childhood experiences to draw their family back into His church.

“The church I went to growing up was super active, and I had the best memories of church camp and the things we did there,” she said. “And I thought, ‘My kids need to have that.’ I did not need it. I was fine. But my kids need it. And that is why we went back.”

But now Becki and Alan had a difficult choice to make: which church, which tradition would they call their own?

“I was pretty adamant that I would not go to a Catholic church,” Becki said. “That was what Alan wanted to do because that was all he had ever known, even though he would sit there and tell you that he hated it. So we tried to be Presbyterian for a while. Then one day we were really busy and decided to skip, and we never went back there.”

God used Becki's positive childhood experiences in youth group to draw her family back into His church.

Finding a Church Home

After the failed Presbyterian experiment, the Droeges easily found other ways to spend their time on weekends. Yet a desire still lingered in Becki’s heart: she wanted her three kids to experience what she did growing up.

“About a year later I said, ‘You don’t care where it is, and I still really want to take the kids.’ So we went to Bright Christian Church.”

Located in Bright, Indiana, not far from Cincinnati, Ohio, Bright Christian Church quickly began to feel like home.

But after a few years, the Droeges had to move.

“When we moved to Ross, 30 minutes away, I prayed, ‘Please don’t make me change churches. Please don’t make me change churches.’ And we didn’t, for six more years.”

Becki’s family stayed with Bright Christian Church right up until they moved again, about a year ago. In many ways, finding a new church this past year has felt like trying to find a new family. It didn’t matter how good that new church was—it was not the church home they had left behind.

“So it’s hard because the church we’re going to now still doesn’t feel like our church yet.”

Unlike when they started their journey to find a church home, the Droeges are not just going to church for the kids anymore. Faith has become a fixture in their family. And while a growing number of families find it hard to make it to church consistently for one service each weekend, the Droeges now go to two. Alan can only make the earlier service, so they all go to that one to be together, but the youth services are only during the second service, so Becki stays for the second one too.

The Droeges are not just going to church for the kids anymore. Faith has become a fixture in their family.

Investing in Other Christian Churches

Back when the Droeges lived in Bright, their house caught fire, and they received a good deal of money from insurance. About a year after the fire, they had mostly recovered and bought the things they needed—but they still had money leftover. So they started looking into investment opportunities.

Around this time, Jeff Stone, the lead minister at Bright Christian Church, brought in a representative from CDF Capital one Sunday. Jeff shared that he and his wife invested their kids’ college fund into CDF to help other Christian churches get the loans they needed to grow.

“When they came and passed around papers, Alan noticed that CDF’s interest rates were at least twice as good as the opportunities we’d been looking at before then,” Becki explained.

That plus their minister’s experience with his kids’ college fund gave Becki and Alan a lot of confidence in CDF.

“It was easy to get into because we’d already been looking.”

Since that first decision to invest, Becki has enjoyed the camaraderie of interacting with the CDF Capital team. She enjoyed stopping by the booth at the North American Christian Convention or being invited to regional gatherings. And it makes her feel good to read the stories CDF shares about churches across the country that are being helped because of her investment.

Even though both Becki and Alan once had negative associations with church, God was consistently calling them back to Himself. And now they continue to use the resources He has given them to help grow His Kingdom.

More Than Just Interest

When you invest with CDF Capital, you’re gaining more than just interest. You’re partnering with us to help other churches grow. Click below to see how you can play a part in the story of transformation.

SHARE: