'Ohana means family and we are happy to announce that God has placed a precious little boy from China named Josiah on our hearts and we are pursuing adoption of him!

Here is where our story begins…

In October of 2016 God opened the door for me (Jessica) to travel to China to participate in adoption advocacy for orphans through Storyteller Missions through America World Adoption Association.

During my trip God was gracious enough to surround me with a team of amazing women who served with me, laughed with me, wept with me, and prayed with me as we worked all week with 33 precious children desperately seeking a mother and a father.  

The Thursday before my team was supposed to leave China an additional group of eight young children were brought to our team to have medical and developmental assessments completed. Josiah was one of the eight our team worked with briefly but within minutes he immediately captured my heart and left me breathless. His face was covered in bug bites, his lips were slightly blue, his skin was discolored, and he was quiet. In those first few silent moments of laying eyes on him my heart broke as the heart of a Mother does when she sees her child suffering. Josiah has an untreated congenital heart defect and he needs surgery to fix the hole in his heart and to prevent further damage to his body.

After seeing him briefly, I could not help but to start to tear up every time my eyes met his gaze. I had to excuse myself from the assessment room and went to my room and wept. Through the tears I begged for God to help heal this child and prayed that if God wanted us to pursue adoption of this child that He would make it clear, and that we would be obedient.

A few days later, I was sitting on the flight home from China wrestling with the feeling that I had just left my son in China. All I could do was pray for him, pray the other children in his orphanage who also need families, and pray for the nannies that care for them daily.

Fast forward to the Monday after I returned from China, my husband, Chris, asked me to tell him about the child that God had laid on my heart and I told him about the little boy with the hole in his heart. In the middle of breakfast, Chris asked me the little boy's name but we got interrupted and I did not have the chance to tell him that from the moment I saw that little boy I knew his name was Josiah even though he didn't have an American name that our team knew of.

About four hours later and knee deep into a house project, I decided to look up the name Josiah because I was never drawn to biblical names when we knew we were expecting our son, Duke. The first thing that popped up on my Google search of the meaning of the name Josiah was "Jehovah has healed." And of course, I wept again and through snot and tears told Chris that the little boy's name is, Josiah. From that point on, we knew that God is already working on answering my first prayer for this sweet boy. Josiah will be healed. After that Chris and I agreed that we felt we were being called to pursue adoption of Josiah until God either brings him home to us or welcomes him into the home of another loving family.  

Needless to say, God is good and faithful and has provided us with amazingly supportive friends and family like you. We cannot thank each of you enough for your love and support throughout the years we have known you. We will continue to need your encouragement and prayers as we take this step of faith. We have absolutely NO guarantees that we will be matched with Josiah but we know we have to try.

Over the next 9 months to a year, Chris and I will be putting together fundraisers to help with the total cost of international adoption which totals $32,000.00-$40,000.00.

If you, your family members, friends, neighbors, or co-workers are interested in supporting us financially we have started this fundraiser on PureCharity.com to raise the funding that we need to make our adoption a success!

We have first goal of $2,700 just for our home Study and post adoptions expenses through Across the World Adoptions.  If you would like to make a donation through PureCharity.com your donation is tax deductible and will go directly to Across the World Adoptions for our specific home study process and post adoption services!

In addition, we will need to raise the rest of the funds that will go to pay the rest of our adoption expenses that will go to our placing agency America World Adoptions Association (which is our other Purecharity.com fundraiser-all donations tax deductible) while raising the other funds we will have to pay out of pocket such as the orphanage fees, background fees etc.

If you are interested in donating directly to our family instead of going through Purecharity.com please contact Chris or I by telephone or email for our contact information:

Chris Matthews: 805-415-3768  cmatt527@yahoo.com

Jessica Matthews: 805-901-2376 jmatt1230@gmail.com

Every donation (no matter how big or small) is so important and will help make this adoption a success. Also, we would appreciate your willingness to share our story and this link with others who may want to support us or who are interested in possibly adopting children who are orphaned internationally.

To learn more about our story follow our Facebook group: Miracles for Josiah (Matthews 'Ohana Adoption), call, text us, or ask to hear more when you see us!

If you are interested in going on a Storytellers Mission trip ask me how to get started or go to http://awaa.org/advocate/storyteller-missions/ and to learn more about orphaned children around the world follow the AWAA blog at http://adoptedbydesign.typepad.com/.

Thank you so much for being a part of our lives and helping accomplish something that's important to all of us and close to the heart of God!

“A father of the fatherless, a defender of widows, Is God in His holy habitation.”
Psalms 68:5