An announcement in a church bulletin found Carole Motycka the perfect match.

After a strenuous hike with unexplained pain and a trip to a doctor, Motycka was diagnosed with colon cancer that had spread to her liver.

"This is probably the worst-case scenario," Motycka recalls the doctor saying to her.

CBN reports Motycka was illegible for a liver surgery as too much of her organ was taken over by cancer. Cleveland Clinic's director of liver transplantation Dr. Cristiano Quintini explains, "In order to perform successful liver surgery for patients with cancer, you need to be able to preserve at least 25, 30 per cent of the native liver.

"Otherwise the patient will not be able to recover. Often when we discover cancer has metastasized to the liver and more than 75 or 80 per cent of the liver is involved, surgery would be very dangerous, in fact impossible."

After chemotherapy treatment, Motycka was informed that she was a candidate for an experimental transplant surgery that would require a live donor.

Motycka's pastor at St. Mark's Lutheran Church - where Motycka served as a youth director - wrote about Motycka's need in the Sunday bulletin.

Jason Stechschulte, a fellow church member says, "The very second I saw that and started reading it, I just had this feeling come over me that, 'This is going to be you. You need to do this.'

"It was so strong that the rest of the service I don't remember anything. I don't think I paid any attention to anything anyone said."

Stechschulte was tested and found to be a perfect match. "I think I cried for a week," Motycka says.

"He called me, actually Facebook-messaged me and said, 'Hey I'm going to be your liver donor,' and I was like, 'What?'"

The difficult surgery was a complete success for both Motycka and Stechschulte – who are now good friends.

Stechschulte says, "So many people have come up and said, 'It's so great what you did,' and, 'It's amazing. You're such a great person.

"And I always have to step back and say, 'No, it's not. You don't understand. I was called to do this.'"