When I actually made the transition from work to career way back in 1998 I never thought I would end up in Church IT. I made the move from grocery store to security company and thought that would be direction I would continue on. My first official hacking took place as an alarm operator, we had to log certain events to keep accurate records (translate-cover our butts for the lawyers). This hacking involved setting up macros that logged the events and included generic comments, my alarm handling was triple that of the closest person. Of course this got the attention of people who said I was cheating the system, but soon I was setting up the entire call center to do the macros (and secure it from anyone else creating macros). This continued on for 4 1/2 more years until I automated myself out of a job and soon our center closed down because they consolidated the centers. After 9 months of searching for similar call center/ data management position (translate-salary) God had a different idea. I then began my work at our church doing everything from Music and Youth and Communications but always Computers. This is where I’ve come to realize I really like church IT and look forward to learning more, reading more, and networking more with others that have this same passsion to take the church of of the dark ages and begin using technology to make ministry happen better.
So how did you get into Church IT?
Sidenote: Really looking forward to Church IT Roundtable, hope they let me come 
My story is similar to yours. I have a business degree and worked my way into IT by doing the kind of stuff you are describing, automating tasks etc. Being laid off after 9/11 gave me almost a year to contemplate my life and goals before getting a job that would support my family. My last Sunday at church before moving away for this new job, my pastor told me he thought I should consider going into ministry. That blew me away, I had never considered anything like that and I also wondered why he mentioned it on that day and not 6 months earlier.
But that is honestly what started me in the process of considering a role in a church that I had never really seen, using my IT/technical skills and expertise in the church.
That was over 4 years ago, and at the moment, I’m still working in corporate IT, but my heart is in the church. I volunteered at my church for a couple of years as the sole IT guy and for the last 8 or 9 months, I have been doing contract work for a mega church in Kansas City, primarily working with Shelby data and creating a user friendly interface to run reports. Also, as a result of my blog, I am networking with all kinds of people in ministry all over the world, which is pretty amazing and exciting.
Things are always progressing, I see God leading me more into ministry all the time, but it’s in His timing and it’s not coming about in a conventional way(i.e. the way I would do it).
As much as I didn’t want to be in fulltime ministry 4 years ago, I want that more than I can explain these days. I’m learning more all the time about how to trust the Lord and seek His will and He will lead me where He wants me to go.
RE: Church IT
I spent a lot of years trying to figure how to mix IT and Church and couldn’t make it work. Finally, in late 1996, I gave up. A few weeks later I got a call from a church looking for an IT person. I was so “out of it” at that point, I agreed to help find someone. Well, I did, it was me! I’m still doing it (and still loving it)
RE: Roundtable
Registration info will be posted soon. Price will be cheap. (well, except for that travel stuff)