In the same year that Ulysses S. Grant became president of the United States and the Cincinnati Reds were getting started, there was a lesser-known — but potentially more impactful event — happening in Louisville, Ky. The year was 1869 when three ladies from Walnut Street Baptist Church in Kentucky’s largest city saw a need and acted on it. These ladies may not have memorized James 1:27 — but they decisively applied that verse to their lives.
The verse says, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”
These three followers of Jesus saw orphaned children living on the streets of Louisville and were compelled to act. They began a ministry that eventually became Kentucky Baptist Homes for Children, known today as Sunrise Children’s Services.
Sunrise Children’s Services has grown from a vision in the heart of these three compassion-driven leaders to one of the preeminent foster and adoption services in Kentucky.
Sunrise provides residential treatment programs at five locations, with 13 foster care offices across the state, with property valued at $14 million and a staff of more than 253 employees. Its mission is to provide care and hope for hurting families and children through Christ-centered ministries. It serves nearly 2000 of Kentucky’s most vulnerable children each year.
Sunrise’s ministry has not been without difficulty. Last year it completed a 25-year lawsuit that challenged its ability to hire employees according to its Christian convictions. It also survived a time when Kentucky’s governor challenged its freedom to minister according to its deeply-held religious convictions. Sunrise managed through COVID-19 and much more to arrive at the place where it is today — one of the top providers of foster, adoption, therapeutic and independent living services in the commonwealth.
The crowning achievement of Sunrise may be one that we do not often hear about. It is a service that reveals the heart of President Dale Suttles and the team of committed and hard-working men and women who daily roll up their sleeves and help children.
This great accomplishment is that, since 2006, Sunrise Children’s Services has helped 663 children find a permanent home through adoption. Sunrise knows that the very best service it can provide for vulnerable and abused children is to help them find a family that will love and care for them for the rest of their lives.
These adoptions are one more way that Kentucky Baptists are working together to advance the gospel. Let me explain. Sunrise does its primary recruiting through Kentucky Baptist churches. Not all foster care families come from our churches, but many of them do. When these families welcome a child into their home through foster care, and this relationship becomes permanent through adoption, then the chances are much increased that this child will be brought up in the fear and admonition of the Lord. When these children receive Jesus, grow as His disciples and one day marry and have children or adopt children, then the gospel is advancing.
Kentucky Baptists have a hand in every one of these adoptions. By giving financially to the work of the Kentucky Baptist Convention, you are helping support the work of Sunrise Children’s Services.
Kentucky Baptists are not only pro-life in the way we defend the rights of the unborn, but we are also pro-life in the way we care for the abused and neglected children of our commonwealth by partnering with Sunrise Children’s Services.
Dr. Todd Gray 