Volunteers keep showing up. In the quiet moments and the chaotic ones. In hospitals, breakrooms, and crowded classrooms. They arrive with open hands. They arrive ready to help. They arrive because something inside them whispers, Go. Offer what you have in your own two hands.

You can hear that whisper in the ancient stories of people who showed up when the world needed them. When a boy handed Jesus five loaves and two fish. When Aaron and Hur helped lift the arms of Moses as an act of intercession.

Those stories shaped the foundation of MATTER. This organization began because two people believed something simple rooted in faith. That God placed worth inside every person. That faith becomes real when you act on it. That love matters when it moves. Dennis and Megan Doyle always believed that our role was to help lift up the arms of our partners when the work is heavy.

Volunteers still carry that belief forward today at MATTER. They always have.

People often think volunteering is about giving. About sacrifice. About pouring out. And sure, that’s part of it. But anyone who has ever stepped into a MATTER project knows there is another side to the story. There is something volunteers get back that no one can explain ahead of time. A connection, a moment that rearranges you.

The surprise is how often the giver becomes the one changed.

That is the real engine of this mission. Not equipment, boxes, or programs. People. Ordinary people who say yes, then find themselves lifted by the very communities they showed up to help.

International Volunteer Day is a reminder of that mystery. And a perfect moment to tell the story of a volunteer who lived it in real time.

His name is Josiah Ochoa.

A software engineer from Chicago. Soft spoken. A smile on his face. With music stitched throughout his life like a second language. “I’ve been making music since I was twelve,” he said. “Drums came even earlier. I grew up in church, around family who played in the band. Eventually I was the kid they threw onto the drums at twelve. It was daunting. But that’s how it started.”

He never stopped. Guitar. Bass. Production. Songs uploaded to Spotify and Apple Music. Hours shaping sound and recording while the world buzzed outside.

So when Dean Hager asked him to join an Insight Trip to Zimbabwe and lead a two-day music camp in the MATTER Innovation Hubs, the idea hit him hard. “I’ve always had a passion for helping out. And a passion for music,” he said. “To combine the two. To help in a way I’m actually passionate about. It felt like a dream.”

He started planning with Dean and Salty. They talked about building Music Kits that would let kids record full songs. “We knew we needed everything,” he said. “A guitar. Mic and stand. An audio interface to connect to the iPad. A mini keyboard. A drum pad. Thirteen pieces total.”

He had a picture in his mind of how the camp might go. He imagined teaching beginners. Walking them through basics, simple rhythms, and basic chords.

Then he stepped into the first hub, and that picture crashed in the first ten minutes.

“They already had song ideas in their heads,” he said. “They were way more skilled than I expected. As soon as they touched the piano or guitar, I heard the chords and thought, okay, they’re good.”

They opened the kits excitedly. Turning each piece over in their hands. “They even knew the technical names for the equipment,” he laughed. “Better than me.”

He told them to start with a drum line. No instructions. No guardrails. “I just said, this will be the first instrument of your song. Get a base going.” And then he watched something unfold he didn’t expect.

“They all went in different creative directions,” he said. “Stuff I wouldn’t have thought of. Seeing music from their perspective was super cool.”

Room after room, song after song. Every twenty steps he walked into a different universe. “I’d open a door and think, wow that’s cool. Then the next room was something completely different. All great.”

One student kept pulling his attention. A boy named Naishe. “He had an incredible voice,” Josiah said. “And he understood song structure. I saw him coaching other kids. That’s the production mind. That’s rare.”

By the second day, it came time to present their songs to the group, and something had shifted. “At first they were timid,” he said. “But once the music started, they opened up. Dancing. Singing along. The whole room lifted.”

After the session ended, the kids came up to him excitedly with questions, stories, hopes. “That’s when it hit me,” he said. “This is more than a camp. They want to connect. They’re passionate about this. Same as me.”

Volunteering does that sometimes. You show up ready to teach, and somewhere along the way the roles flip.

“It lit a fire in me,” he said. “Seeing how hard they try. Their hunger. It makes you look at your own life. I’ve been more thankful since coming back. And asking myself how I can help out.”

The connection continues. He and Naishe are now working on a track together. A cross-continental collaboration born in a classroom filled with dust, cables, and teens with big voices.

When Josiah talks about the future, he lights up. “Some of these kids have incredible voices,” he said. “Imagine one of them records a song. A big producer hears it. Suddenly they’re playing concerts. With music, you never know who might be listening. A kid in Victoria Falls could reach someone in Egypt or Brazil. That would be pretty loud.”

He wishes he had more time with them. More hours to create. More space for their ideas to run wild. “There’s no wrong way to make music,” he said. “They hear it differently than I do. That’s the beauty.”

Before he left, he told them what he tells himself. “Music is a journey and it never ends. Same with learning. Just keep going. No matter what anyone says.”

And that is the heart of volunteering. Not perfection. Not expertise. Just willingness.

You show up. You bring what you have. You offer it to someone who matters. In the giving, something comes back to you. Something you did not expect. Something that stays.

Josiah walked into Zimbabwe carrying Music Kits. He walked out carrying a fire.

This is the story of MATTER’s volunteers. People who say yes. People who trust that offering what they have in their two hands is enough. People who live out the kind of faith that moves from belief to action. Over and over, they remind us of the truth that launched this organization. You matter. Your gifts matter. What you place in God’s hands can ripple farther than you think.

On International Volunteer Day, we honor those people.

We honor you.