My name is Vince Marotte and I am the new Internet Campus Pastor at Gateway Church in Austin Texas, and I have no idea what I’m doing.
Or at least not yet.
You see, I’m starting a journey, one that has a definite beginning and an extremely ambiguous end. I’d put a link to our internet campus, but it doesn’t exist yet.
In fact, nothing exists quite yet, and that’s why they decided to bring me on.
This is the primary reason I’m introducing myself to the ChurchCrunch community. You see, over the next six months or so, I will be posting about the development of the Gateway Church web presence as it happens.
Line by line, piece by piece.
In addition, I’m going to be moving my entire family from Murrieta California. It’s not just about the “internet,” it’s also about my life with my family in this entirely new role.
I want others to learn from what we are doing as well as provide a platform for you to give us feedback during the process. The concept of internet campus is still so new, that we thought it would be a good opportunity to document one coming together.
Before I start posting, let me tell you a bit about myself and my role at Gateway Church.
I started my ministry career like many did, working as a youth pastor. I started at a large church while I was still in Bible college. Our youth ministry needed a web presence so I cornered one of the IT guys and he showed me a few things and I ran with it.
Fast forward a few years and now I’m church planting and as a way to pay the bills I do web stuff on the side and at one point work for a development firm before launching my own project. At the time I was thinking this was a temporary situation until the church plant got to a point that it could pay the staff a real salary. Little did I know that this was preparation for the next part of my life.
I planned on planting my own church this year and I was looking at options and talking to people about being on my team and doing assessments, when someone told me gateway was looking to launch a web campus.
Long story short; I checked it out and 10 days later I was in Austin hanging out with the team. It was an easy offer to except two weeks later, Gateway is an amazing church that is touching and impacting a lot of lives and I am excited to bring that same energy to the Internet.
We are going to be tackling the project of redeveloping the Gateway Church website as well is the incorporation of an internet campus and I will be checking in at ChurchCrunch every two weeks to give the inside details and get some feedback from you.
I can’t wait to get started. Care to join me? I hope you will.
This is great! Looking forward to seeing the updates.
Congratulations! Looking forward to sharing the journey!
Very cool Vince. I'm looking forward to following along on this journey. This is a perfect example of living your life with intention and living an exciting life. Good luck!
exciting…for sure!
Exciting stuff Vince. Definitely going to join in as you share the journey.
Dude, this is awesome.
Excited to follow the journey! I think this will be an awesome thing for everyone involved, to go through the whole journey with you! Thanks for doing it!
welcome to the land of the ambiguous end! we'll be praying for you.
I'm not even sure there is an end. like the poet Shelley said 'poems are never completed, just abandoned'
Vince I am stoked to come along with you for the journey!
I was just hired at a church as their web designer. I am embarking on a similar path of my own. Mainly a website redesign, and a live streaming strategy.
My worship pastor just got back from a visit to the gateway campus.
Hopefully we can connect somewhere along the way.
-CM
for sure Chris. I think I just followed you on twitter look for me @locustfist
Very nice. This will be interesting. Thanks.
That's really exciting. Good luck man I can't wait.
You know I'll be along for the journey!
I would expect nothing less
Right on. Keep me posted on the developments. Let me know when you're in town (Austin), and we can do coffee or something.
Wow, I am seriously on the edge of my seat for this guy. Go Vince!
I hope I don't let you down…
Too bad you couldn't score @vince on twitter…
I'm excited for your shortterm future, and praying it will grow into something enormous!
I'm still trying to get it…time will tell
Really looking forward to this …….. and hopefully connecting with you someday!! I am trying to learn as much as possible about internet campus churches and internet pastors since I might also be taking on that role! Will be praying for you and tracking with you!!
God Bless!
Started this process myself just a few months ago, but now we're live, and I love what I'm doing.
sweet! would you like to share your experiences here sometime?
I'll be watching this from a really close vantage point. I go to Gateway and talked to John Burke (our senior pastor) about the need for an internet campus about a year ago. I'm excited to see how this unfolds with Vince at the helm, and I can't wait to meet him in person!
SWEET! this series should be awesome. so glad he decided to do it…!