After a Samaritan’s Purse medical outreach event in the heart of Appalachia, a church takes a step of faith to reach its neighbors for Christ.
Karen Amaya cleans offices throughout the night while her two kids sleep. She returns home in the early hours of the morning, sends her children to school, and gets ready for her day job cleaning homes. Still, she makes time to come to the Bible study for a few hours Friday night before her shift begins.
“We find in here something that feels like home,” she said of the Spanish-language Bible study she attends at First Baptist Church (FBC) in Pikeville, Kentucky. “Because regardless of how beautiful things sound in another language, it’s never like hearing the truth in your own language. This is beautiful. The children are able to hear the Word of God, too, and participate in the fellowship.”
Recently, the single mother was one of hundreds of families who pulled into the parking lot at FBC Pikeville for the Samaritan’s Purse medical outreach held at the church. Now, every Friday night, it fills with the cars of the only Spanish-speaking Bible study in the region.
Several months ago, such a Spanish-speaking gathering did not exist.
Karen has finally found a Spanish-speaking community where she can learn more about God and raise her children in His Word.
The medical care that Karen received at the church was part of a recently launched Samaritan’s Purse Community Medical Outreach program. FBC’s students and missions pastor, Keenan Darby, said it was through this outreach event that he learned how few opportunities his Hispanic neighbors had to hear the Gospel in their heart language. As our teams of medical professionals provided free dental and vision care and general health screenings to hundreds of people, which included many Hispanic men and women, Pastor Darby was seeing a new ministry need in the area.
He was grateful that Spanish-speaking chaplains from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association were there to minister to the Hispanic attendees, sharing the Gospel in their heart language.
“Having chaplains that loved Jesus and spoke Spanish changed everything, and that’s something we would never have been able to offer,” Pastor Keenan said. “Samaritan’s Purse allowed us to gain traction. By them offering medical care and creating that trust and bond, we were then able to come in behind and take the next step with them.”
A Community Medical Outreach was hosted in the parking lot of FBC Pikeville from May 29-31. This new ministry of Samaritan’s Purse brings free medical treatment to underserved communities across the United States in Jesus’ Name.
Reaching the Unreached People Next Door
This sparked church leaders to rethink what it means to reach the world’s lost. In Pikeville, FBC was saddened to learn that a Spanish-speaking population in an American Bible Belt town had no one teaching them from the Word of God.
“No Bible study, no sermons, no small groups—nothing in a 2.5-hour radius for Spanish-speakers,” the students and missions pastor said after he and representatives from Samaritan’s Purse visited Hispanic restaurants and businesses around town before the event.
“Once we started to ask and it was affirmed, it was sad,” he continued. “We have a world map in the church, and we talk a lot about going to the nations and what we realized is what’s been missed for decades is right here in Pikeville. The Hispanic community is unreached.”
United by language and faith, Hispanic families in Pikeville find a spiritual home at FBC on Friday nights where they join in worship, prayer, and the reading of God’s Word in Spanish.
For mothers like Karen, the new Bible study at FBC Pikeville has opened her family again to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Nearly two years ago, when historic floods tore through Pikeville and surrounding communities, the storm ravaged her home. She remembers the orange-shirted Samaritan’s Purse volunteers who showed up to help in Jesus’ Name within days of the flooding.
Through the partnership between the church and Samaritan’s Purse, Karen returned for dental care when our medical outreach event was in town. Then she returned again because she hungered for Christian fellowship and Biblical teaching in her native language.
“When you see something as big as Samaritan’s Purse, you think that they have plenty to give—and that’s the only goal that people see. I got more than a hug, I got more than somebody who listened, and got more than a fixed tooth. I took home a lesson in grace and fellowship and the love of God through His children and through His ministry.”
Samaritan’s Purse responded to Pikeville after devastating floods in February 2025. Karen was one of nearly 300 homeowners our army of volunteers helped after the storm in Jesus’ Name.
In the meantime, as Karen and her two young boys have lived with her sister since the storm, First Baptist Church is helping rebuild her home piece by piece. Volunteers from the church and other churches in the area have replaced her walls, fixed the electrical wiring, and done much more.
“They did the work that my hands couldn’t do. They lifted a part of my life that has been broken in pieces since the flood. Things that I wasn’t able to do, they did. I didn’t have the strength to keep going, but they lifted that burden.”
A New Community with a Growing Hunger for God’s Word
Luis Jose Freitas dons and doffs his glasses as he shifts his attention from the Bible in his hands to the pastor in front of him.
For Luis, this isn’t just a Bible study under fluorescent lights in the back room of a church in Kentucky. This ministry has been a breakthrough moment for him, his wife, and other Hispanic families in the area. This is the first time in several years that they are reading the Word of God in Spanish and being discipled by a pastor who understands them.
“My wife and I feel so proud to be here,” Luis said about the Bible study. He, too, attended the Samaritan’s Purse medical event in May where he received free glasses and prescription medicine from a doctor after a health checkup. “Even though there are not many Hispanic people like me around here, in this group we feel like we are all part of a family.”
Luis’ glasses he received from Samaritan’s Purse led him to join the only Spanish-speaking Bible study in Pikeville. He and his family now attend First Baptist Church on Sundays where the sermon is translated live into Spanish for them and other Hispanics in attendance.
The group’s leader, Pastor Richard Perez, understands the importance of his calling to lead the study—making the three-hour drive each way worth every mile.
“I didn’t even know where Pikeville was, but I followed God’s calling,” Pastor Richard said. The Peru native has led a Spanish-speaking church in Somerset, Kentucky, for three years. Through mutual connections, he heard about the new Bible study and answered the call of God to lead it.
“The families come and get excited to get together,” he said. “I speak for a whole hour about the Word of God, but they always ask if I can keep talking. They are hungry for the Word.”
Pastor Richard’s heart to see his fellow Hispanic brothers and sisters hear the Gospel and for them to be discipled is all the motivation he needs to drive six hours roundtrip every Friday to lead the Bible study.
Since its inception, Luis and his wife have attended the study and their faith in Christ has been revitalized.
“When we were living in Venezuela, we used to go to a Christian church, but when we came here to Kentucky, we tried to look for a church that offered Spanish but there were none,” he said, “so having this group now is magnificent. It’s amazing.”
As the group grows and their relationships with each other and Christ deepen, pray that Spanish-speakers in the mountains of Kentucky would respond to the call of salvation. Pray that Hispanic Christ-followers in the region would boldly share their faith to reach the unreached in their neighborhoods.
