DENVER – It’s easy to picture a church planter as the lone ranger – alone in a strange city, with little support structure, just a Bible and a dream. That’s not the case for Bryson and Sarah McGuire; there are over 15 churches in their corner.
Bryson McGuire was born and raised in Springfield, Mo. “I joke that, in Springfield, there’s a church and coffee shop on every corner,” he says. He soon discovered that Denver is quite the opposite. “There’s one church for every 30,000 people in Denver, compared to one dispensary for every 2,000 people.”
McGuire began ministry as a student pastor at First Baptist Church in O’Fallon, Ill. When he and his wife visited Seattle on vacation in 2019, they realized the rest of the world is much different from Springfield. “We were like, ‘Wow, where are the churches here?’” he reflects. “That began the process for me of exploring church planting.”
Eager to act, McGuire contacted NAMB. “I was 22 at the time, and they very politely said, ‘This is not ‘no,’ but it’s ‘not right now,’ for many different reasons,’” he remembers. So the McGuires stayed patient. First Baptist O’Fallon’s youth program flourished, growing from 30 students to 120 in one year. Finally, the Lord showed McGuire it was time to try church planting again. “In Hebrews 11, I read about Abraham living in a land he didn’t know,” McGuire remembers. “It was the closest thing to the audible words of God I’ve ever heard. The Lord said, “I’m ready to send you somewhere.’”
With a renewed vision, the McGuires visited Colorado in April 2021. “We fell in love with everything,” McGuire remembers. “Within three hours of being here, my wife was like, ‘This is our home.’ There was no doubt about it. This is where God was calling us.”
The McGuires spent several months thinking, praying, and consulting with mentors. Finally, in Aug. 2021, they decided to move forward. Bryson contacted NAMB again, and this time, the answer was yes.
Local churches got involved in the mission, and they remain today. “We currently have six church partners who are fully committed—that’s prayer, financial provision and everything in between,” McGuire says. These include Bryson’s home church from Springfield, Mo., Crossway Baptist, and FBC, O’Fallon, Ill., where he led student ministry.
It’s not just financial support, either. McGuire says there’s eight more churches that minister through prayer. There’s Sarah’s home church, Ava General Baptist, that prays for the McGuires every Wednesday night. Other churches send cards or reply to emails with a word of encouragement.
The McGuires aren’t alone in Colorado, either. Bryson is completing NAMB’s residency program with Journey Point Church in Denver, a four-year-old church plant. Rock City Church in Denver shows the McGuires’ picture on screen every week to remind members to pray. Other Colorado churches like The Local Church (yes, that’s its real name) took an offering for the McGuires and prayed for them during the service. City Church in Boulder knows Denver needs churches, so they’ve contributed financially and promised people and resources to launch the church.
The McGuires likely won’t be able to launch the church until 2024. Until then, Bryson is laying the groundwork. He’s building relationships with more churches and more people. He says there’s a surprising amount of people from Missouri that now live in Denver. “Denver is the city where young adults go to run away from God,” McGuire says. “They grew up in church; they have knowledge of God; but they want nothing to do with that now.”
It takes time to plant a church – from the McGuires’ original vision in 2019, to projected launch in 2024. Between calling and launch, relationships are most important. Relationships with established churches power the planting process, relationships with people form the church, and relationships with God sustain it. “We stand on the shoulders of faithful men and women who have come before us, and those who are praying for us,” McGuire says. “This takes multiple churches, and every single one of those churches are valuable and important.”