Gateway Church
The Beginning
On September 16, 1999, the Lord placed a desire in the heart of Pastor Robert Morris to start a Bible-based, evangelistic, Spirit-empowered church in Southlake, Texas. Pastor Robert dreamed that this church would impact Northeast Tarrant County, the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex and beyond. He began to build a leadership team and developed a working relationship with the pastors at Trinity Fellowship Church in Amarillo, Texas, asking them for wisdom and guidance. On Sunday, April 9, 2000, Pastor Jimmy Evans and the elders of Trinity Fellowship Church prayed for and released Pastor Robert and the founding elders of Gateway to start the new church.
Growing
Gateway’s first service was held on Easter morning, April 23, 2000, at the Hilton Hotel in Grapevine with approximately 180 people in attendance. Three weeks later, the church began meeting on Saturday nights at Christ Our King Church in Southlake. With a strong Saturday night congregation, the church continued to steadily grow. In July 2001, Gateway Church began meeting at “A World of Learning” training facility in Grapevine, during which time the church grew to five services with over 2,000 people attending weekly.
We broke ground for our current Southlake Campus during Gateway’s third year of ministry. As we constructed our building, the church continued to grow. In June 2003, we moved into our Southlake Campus. By Easter of 2004, attendance was around 5,000; And in 2009 attendance grew to over 11,000 people each week with over 20,000 attending one of our 18 Easter services.
Expanding Our Ministry
In November 2007, our new NRH Campus opened in North Richland Hills, a community in the center of the Dallas/Ft Worth Metroplex. Located in the heart of Gateway’s geographical demographic, this building is almost 50,000 square feet in size and sits on approximately nine acres. The weekend services at the NRH Campus are a mirror of those at the Southlake Campus with live worship and personal ministry but with a live video message from the Southlake Campus. Also, in 2010 Gateway Church opened a third campus in the heart of Frisco, Texas. One of the fastest growing cities in America. This campus has experienced tremendous growth and now is home to over 1,200 members each weekend.
Looking Forward
The future is bright for Gateway. We are now one church meeting in three locations and continue to be amazed as God’s plan for us unfolds. From this central campus, we intend to plant and oversee multiple campuses throughout the Metroplex and across the United States. Currently, Gateway has an active membership of over 21,000 people and an average attendance of 17,100. Our weekly television program is aired in millions of homes both in the US and around the world on the DayStar Christian television network. And, in November 2010 we moved into our beautiful new building in Southlake. This state-of-the-art facility includes a 4,000 seat auditorium that is located on 180 acres of land right on Highway 114. This past Easter we were excited to welcome 28,741 people to our 19 services and, most importantly, we rejoice with the 444 people who accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior! As we look to the future, we are excited about what God will do to expand His Kingdom work among us in the years ahead.
