Watch: Rachel and Evan’s testimony
Rachel and Evan faced great family opposition as they decided to get married, some of which turned violent. As they both sought God’s help and deliverance through fasting, responding with love, and trusting in His faithfulness, they began to witness significant positive changes in their family relationships. Praise God! Watch their testimony.
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Video transcript
Since we got engaged, God miraculously softened my mother’s heart and opened doors to new opportunities to prepare for our marriage.
Evan: We had a bad, a bad first impression with one another. I judged her for being a party girl who couldn’t even speak proper Chinese. I thought she was definitely not my type.
Rachel: I remember he seemed socially awkward and nerdy, not a cool guy at all.
Who would have thought we would end up together one year later? God is indeed full of surprises.
Evan: So, I became a Christian seven years ago and got baptised in the local church. I was just a regular church-goer, without a community and a relationship of Christ nor experience Holy Spirit. Four years ago, I felt so lost in my first job. And it was the first time when I truly learned to surrender to God.
Rachel: I did not grow up in a Christian family, but would pray to God alongside my nanny at night. It was only until college that I attended church together with Evan, but was a lukewarm Christian. I was frustrated with my first job and in need of direction.
As lost as we were, we believe God used our first jobs to humble us and bring us back to Him.
Evan: Things started to shift when Rachel and I were seeking God and served in ministry. We experienced firsthand, His goodness and promises, as we witnessed lives being touched by Him and the transformation we saw in one another, as we placed Him in the center of our relationship.
Rachel: I was baptised three years ago at church. And it was the first time Evan’s parents met with my parents.
My baptism somehow marked a turning point in our relationship with my mother, who suffers from depression and anxiety.
Since then, we faced opposition and assaults like none that we experienced before from my mother. Often, the pain was so overwhelming, the only thing we knew to do was to cry out to God on our knees.
I was living in perpetual fear and was enslaved to my mother’s emotions and expectations. I fell into the trap of self-victimisation and condemnation, striving to please my mother at the expense of my own well-being and my relationship with Evan. Deep inside, I was angry at my mother and God for the pain we had endured.
But I chose to suppress my feelings because I falsely believed that it was wrong for me to be mad.
Evan: “Why me? Why us?” I would question God like that, why I would receive these daily hostile text messages from my future mother-in-law.
Rachel: Through prayers and the spiritual counsel of Christian friends, God opened our hearts to let out our emotions and burdens to Him. There were times He comforted us through the same passage, such as Psalm 91, and reminded us to dwell and rest in His presence and to trust in His deliverance. We received ongoing healing as His Holy Spirit empowered us to acknowledge our emotions and to express them to God, to repent of judging my mother, forgive, bless, and release her into God’s hands.
God also opened our spiritual eyes to discern the devil’s tactics and respond together by prayer and fasting.
Evan: Last year, God sent us a couple, to encourage us during the time of great doubt and fear of getting married, in light of Rachel’s mother’s situation. And as they prayed for us, we saw the vision of water coming out from a rock and we were reminded that God is the one who fights for us from Exodus 14:14.
Just as He led the Israelites out in the battle and performed miracles, He will do the same for us too and He’s the God of the impossible.
Rachel: Evan and I were then led to do a 40 day fast together. We read through the book of Exodus in the Bible.
Evan: We prayed for revelation and received insights and instructions. I heard God say to me, “Go!” Therefore, I dated Rachel on the first day of this year to hike and ask her to be my wife.
Rachel: Of course I said yes, but I was overcome by great fear having to confront my mother with the news. The news of our engagement was not well received.
Things became violent and out of control at home. I was paralysed in fear and could not sleep the entire night.
Evan: So 7:00am the next day, Rachel showed up in my front door with dark circles under her eyes, passport, and her two months’ stock of contact lens. While she was resting, I realised I had been suppressing my emotions about Rachel’s mother, questioning God, “Why?”
I cried like a baby in front of my father. He came over to give me a hug and that was the hug of my life.
Rachel: We spent the entire day worshiping and praying and restoring our strength in God. We were clinging onto Psalm 27:4, “One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I see, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek His temple.”
Evan: We kept our eyes on Him and focused on praising Him until Rachel gained courage to return home.
Rachel: Our relationship with my mother has improved significantly and we felt prompted to pray and fast for her healing. Throughout the fast, I kept seeing the numbers, 11 and 44, everywhere – almost every day on my phone, laptop and screens. Although throughout the fast, I did not see significant changes in my mother, I thank the Lord for healing my wounds and restoring a newfound love for her.
God opened my eyes to see her beyond the hurts and to appreciate her the way He created her to be.
Evan: So we completed our fast on 2nd of August. God revealed the meaning of 11:44 the next day, as He brought us to read the Scripture in John 11:44, “The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of cloth and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
Jesus decided to arrive late on Lazarus’ tombstone to raise him from the dead for many to witness the miracle. As we read the passage, we were once again reminded to trust in God’s timing for He will be given all the glory and to have faith that He’s already working in Rachel’s mother.
Rachel: Four days following the fast, something miraculous happened.
I was in my room praying and I heard a gentle whisper, “The battle has been won.”
Shortly after, my mother settling called me out of my room. She was suffocating from shortness of breath and described that her upper body was in knots as if her neck was being strangled. She mentioned since her first panic attack seven years ago, when she was diagnosed with depression and anxiety, she never experienced an attack of the same magnitude, which was very unusual.
The only thing I could do was to pray. And after a short while, my mother said she experienced warmth in her chest.
She was immediately set free from the spiritual attack. At that moment, I wanted to burst out into tears because I knew God delivered her. He healed her and will continue to restore and complete His good work in her.
Evan: So we praise God for His faithfulness and goodness. We give thanks to Him for walking with us through the pain and suffering.
We want to encourage those who are going through a difficult season in your life to fix your eyes on God.
We trust He will give you eyes to see the situation from His perspective, ears to hear His words of comfort, and the heart to understand His promises. Just as He did for us, He will do the same for you.