While he may be best known for his music career — which was launched as a top three finalist on season eight of American Idol — K-LOVE and Dove Award winning artist, Danny Gokey, is doing acts of kindness across the country to leave the world better than
he found it.
When he lost his first wife Sophia, he wanted to start an organization in memory of her to help those in need. “We had health benefits through her job,” shares Gokey. “We had medical and dental, but I didn't realize attached to it was a $39,000 death benefit.
And I took that little bit of money and when I got it, I felt compelled to start a legacy that would remember her.”
Living in Middle Tennessee, Gokey founded an organization that began helping with local needs, like creating a facility in an old Best Buy store to help distribute furniture, food, water, and cleaning supplies during the 2010 flooding in Nashville. When the organization had to move locations, they were gifted a hospital building in East Nashville that allowed them to house 200 families experiencing homelessness. “We did a lot of great work, but we were always in some kind of need of finances to keep the ministry going,” he says.
After helping those families, Gokey made the hard decision to close his organization. They sold their building and used the money to start Better Than I Found it in 2022, a nonprofit organization with a unique model that works as a catalyst to help existing nonprofits and charities further their work. “We help people who were in my position, who are doing a great thing, who are meeting the needs of the community,” says Gokey. “We wanted to make sure that they would never have to shut the doors like we did and so now we find the good. We shine the light; we leave it better. We tell other people’s stories. We resource them, in other words, to make sure that they are hitting the bullseye of their vision, and we wrap our arms around them. We tell the stories and it's been really rewarding.”
In addition to helping people across the country and even internationally, Gokey and his team do a lot of work in Middle Tennessee with organizations such as People Loving Nashville, Cul2vate, and The Bridge Ministry. A few years ago, Better Than I Found It put over $100,000 into renovating a new facility and kitchen for People Loving Nashville, a nonprofit that helps provide food, clothing,
and a sense of community every week for the unhoused in Nashville. Gokey and his team also purchased a 15-passenger van to help with transportation for local organization Cul2vate, which helps provide food and jobs to those in need of a second chance.
In addition to helping nonprofits in Nashville, Better Than I Found It has also spread kindness across the country in a multitude of ways, such as by granting wishes for senior citizens and providing a box truck to a nonprofit in New Jersey that refurbishes
furniture for those coming out of homelessness. “We started noticing that some of the big things are unsustainable, but yet we know our mission is to make sure that we get stories out there that are infiltrating the social media timelines and being a light on our social media feeds,” he says.
Knowing that small deeds can have a big impact, Gokey and his team have also partnered with several Domino’s Pizza locations to be a bright light by covering customers’ meals or giving them a cash surprise with their pizzas. “We went out and said, ‘Let's go find
people and let's just go make their day,’” he says. “‘Let's pay for their pizzas. Let’s surprise him with a cash gift.’ We just think it's such a such a nice touch to someone’s day and a nice story that's created to warm people's hearts.”
Nonprofits can apply to receive funding from Better Than I Found It, but Gokey and his team are also always on the lookout themselves to find needs to meet and to sharestories of hope and positivity. “It's not just us getting behind an organization or a ministry or a nonprofit,” says Gokey. “It's us trying to tell the story and change the narrative. There's such a negative news cycle in our culture that we are trying to bring some stories that will warm people's hearts. Stories that’ll encourage people, stories that’ll keep the faith alive and the love alive in our culture.”
The good work of the organization is funded by the initial seed money from selling their building and a small group of donors. Those looking to help can sign up to be monthly donors on their website. “We’re looking to build our monthly donor base,” Gokey says.
“Instead of a few people doing all the heavy lifting, getting the army of donors and everyone coming together little by little and doing the lifting together."
Gokey has a line of eyewear out, Danny Gokey Eyewear, and released his most recent album, Sound of Heaven, this summer and is touring throughout the rest of the year. “I hope people can take a deep breath and feel refreshed when they listen to it,” he says of the album. “That they can feel, you know, the weight of this world, the anxieties, the oppressions of this world that want to creep up on us, go and get a new perspective. Get a new perspective that life is meant to be beautiful. Life is meant to be enjoyed and under all the pressures that when you put this album on that there's hope that rises up in your heart. Joy that rises up and kind of refocuses people to go after their dreams, go after what they were put on this earth for.” BetterThanIFoundIt.org / DannyGokey.com