Category: philosophy/religion topics
The Miracle of Sarah Lyn (By Frieda Yang)
(editted)
Some of us remembered interceding for Dr. Phillip Lyn's daughter Sarah. Here's the
heart-warming testimony to show that in Jesus Christ, we know that all things are
possible.
On Monday, 26th of August 2002, at about 3:45 PM, I was about to finish teaching
Andrew (Lyn), Dr. Phillip Lyn's son violin in the living room. My three-year-old
daughter Madeline Yang came to me and said, “Sarah’s got a string.”
Madeline often came to interrupt my violin teaching. Often I just ask her to wait
until I finish teaching, then I would attend to her needs. So as usual, I thought
she just wanted me to be with her as she played with Sarah, Andrew’s four-year-old
sister, who often came to my house and played with Madeline while Andrew had his
violin lessons. Without understanding what Madeline was trying to say, I just turned
to her and said, “O. K. Just a minute, I am almost finished.”
Only moments before, Sarah and Madeline were running from the front of the living
room to the back of our house. I had thought about their safety and closed the front
gate. I thought they were just playing in the back somewhere. Since Nancy, Andrew’s
mother, had not arrived to pick up Andrew, I proceeded to tell him to play his competition
piece one more time because he was performing that weekend. Madeline saw that I
didn’t stop teaching, and went to the back of the house by herself.
About two minutes had passed while I tried to perfect Andrew’s short piece of “Andantino”.
Madeline came in again and said in a persistent voice, “Mom, come. Sarah’s got a
string. Come.” This time she held my hand and pulled me. By now, although I had
not quite finished with Andrew (even though it was way past his lesson hour), I was
a little curious and wondered what Madeline meant by “Sarah’s got a string”. I decided
to follow her. With my violin
still tucked under my arm, I followed Madeline toward the laundry area behind the
garage.
As I stepped out and into the clothes-line area, an unbelievable, horrible sight
caught my eyes: Sarah was hung on the clothes-line in the hot sun!!! Apparently there
was an extra section of the strong nylon cloth-line string hanging loose, with a
loop at the end of it. The loop was around her neck tightly, her feet off the ground
by about one and a half feet; her whole body was completely limp and lifeless - like
a ragged doll. The red plastic stool that
my maid used for placing the basket of wet clothes was knocked down not too far from
her.
“Sarah!” I cried out, couldn’t believe how this could have happened, for my daughter
and Sarah always either played with whatever toys we had in the house, bicycled outside
the house, or simply ran around the house chasing each other. Why would they play
with the clothe-line string?
I threw my violin on the hot cement, released her head from the string, and lay her
lifeless body on the grass. Her hands were already cold, and the body turned blue
and black from lack of oxygen. There were many dark red spots all over her forehead
and eye lids. I could not sense any heart beat or pulse, and she was not breathing.
Lifting her eyelids, I saw that her eyes were fixed and not responding to the bright
sunlight. I did not want to believe that she had died, and did not want to accept
the truth that she was not living, I cried out to the Lord in a loud voice right
away, “Lord, save her! Lord, let Sarah live! Lord, Lord,
please don’t let her die!”
“Oxygen, oxygen!” all I could think of was how to get her to breathe again. Only
a week or so before, I had seen someone perform CPR on a drowning victim at a swimming
pool. Never having learnt it before, I just imitated the motions that I had seen:
blow into her mouth, and press a few times right below her rib. I would blow and
cry out to the Lord in a loud voice, “Lord! Save Sarah!” while I pressed her belly
two or three times (Only later, I learned that the proper way is to hold the nose,
blow air once into the mouth, and press the chest - not the belly, five times.)
By this time Andrew had stepped out. He froze in disbelief at the scene. Not wanting
him to see that Sarah was not breathing, I continued hovering over Sarah and using
my back to block Sarah from Andrew’s full view. I quickly told him to call “Uncle
Richard” upstairs.
Sarah was still not breathing. I was getting very anxious with each second passing
by, “If CPR could not revive her, only the Lord can.” This thought made me fully
aware that for Sarah to come back to life, the power was in His hands. So as I continued
the “CPR”, I begged and cried out loudly to God to revive her. If Sarah was to live
again, the life was to come directly from above, from the almighty God.
After about ten to fifteen times of blowing air in her, she started to gasp for breath
very, very slowly. By now Richard had come. He saw what I was doing, and quickly
took over and blew more air into her forcibly. The air went in more deeply this
time and her chest visibly bulged up. She started to breathe more regularly, and
started to moan.
Seeing that she was breathing on her own, Richard got up and tried to find out from
Andrew if he had reached his
Dad (Dr. Phillip Lyn) by phone.
I continued crying loudly to the Lord and continued blow air into her. Richard thought
I was getting hysterical, said, “Don’t scream, she is breathing! She’ll be fine.”
However, I was not hysterical. I was merely acting out what I learned from Bill
Gothard’s teaching according to the Bible, “The Power of Crying Out”, that in a situation
like this, our only hope was crying out loudly to the Lord. I knew that the breathing
was only a very small part of life.
“Sarah! Sarah!” I continued to call Sarah’s name to see if she would respond. “Bring
me ice!” I told my oldest son Thomas. We put the ice in a towel on her forehead,
thinking that the coolness might wake her up. As the ice touched her, I saw a tiny
stir in her that indicated perhaps she felt something, but nothing more. Though
not a medical professional myself, I could see that there were more signs of death
than life in her. My heart hung just as heavy as I first saw her.
By now, Sarah’s father, Dr. Philip Lyn – who is also our pastor, had arrived. I
was a little bit relieved. Being a professional Dr. Philip seemed to be trying his
best to remain calm outwardly. He threw the little medical box open on the grass
while trying to find her pulse. However, after fumbling through the box without
taking anything out, he shouted to the nurse who came with him, “Give me the stereoscope!”
And as he grabbed the stereoscope, I saw that his hands were shaking.
“Let’s go to the medical center.” Richard drove Dr. Philip’s car with him holding
Sarah on his lap in the back seat. On the way to the hospital, Dr. Philip cursed
the spirit of death and prayed against any spiritual attack.
Pastor Philip was the main organizer for a major prayer conference of K. K. churches
for revival that happened on August 28th. In the conference, one of the video tapes
was on an African pastor who came back to life after been dead for three days in
a mortuary. His coffin was brought into the basement of a huge healing prayer conference
and life came back to him! It was obvious to Pastor Philip that since Sarah is the
weakest member of his family Satan chose to attack her prior to this prayer conference!
As soon as they left, I went to telephone a couple of friends in church to pray for
Sarah and to call others to pray for her. By now Nancy had arrived. The moment
Andrew saw his mother he broke down. Upon hearing the awful news that Sarah was
on the way to hospital, Nancy quickly drove to the hospital.
On the way, she not only did not question God “Why did this happen?” but just simply
surrender Sarah’s life to the Lord. “No matter what happens, I still
trust the Lord,” she told us this later.
“Why on earth would Sarah play with the string?” I couldn’t get this question out
of my mind, so I asked my daughter Madeline, “Why did Sarah play with the string?”
She replied, “She wanted to fly.” I quickly said to her, “People cannot fly. People
don’t have wings. Only birds can fly. When you see Superman flying in books, it
is not real.” Madeline continued, “Sarah said she wanted to fly. Sarah got on the
chair (the stool), and put the string
on her head, and then the chair fell down. She then cried. But then she didn’t
cry. So I came to tell you.”
How the devil put a deadly idea into a little four-year-old child and deceived her!
This was a spiritual attack in the worst form. Knowing that something is terribly
wrong with Sarah, Madeline said, “Can Sarah walk?” “No. Not yet. But let’s pray
for her.” I then prayed with her and my boys for Sarah’s complete recovery.
Later, outside the Sabah Medical Center (SMC) emergency room, I saw that, with all
respect to the doctors, all they could do was to give Sarah oxygen and “I. V.” drips.
“Cat” scan could not reveal whether she had brain damage in the area of memory.
Even with the best medical equipment, the medical professionals’ knowledge was not
even close to get the brain signals to be connected to the body. I realized more
than ever the immense magnitude of our Life Giver - God’s greatness.
Along with several other Christians friends, I prayed the following prayer with all
my heart, “Lord, I don’t care what would be the chances of complete recovery medically
speaking (knowing that it could be more than three or four minutes before she regained
her breath), if You could revive a dead person after three days in the Bible, You
could do it for Sarah, for it was only minutes that she had lost breathing. Lord,
we are calling on Your name, which is greater than all other names. Save her for
Your name’s sake. The Bible says that we could call on Your name and that You would
answer us. So, do
it for Your name’s sake. Don’t let Your name be smeared.”
Later that evening, I returned home vowing that I would not eat until Sarah is all
better, knowing that we had the hope of the power of prayer and that the spiritual
battle is not yet over.
When the church organized the prayer chain that night, my turn was to be at 4:10
AM. I woke up at around 3:45 AM
and got up and prayed until 4:30. At that time, I knew things were alright.
At 8:30 AM, we gathered all our children and went to the hospital. There were quite
a number of friends and pastors gathered outside the room. Pastor Philip greeted
me with his arm around my shoulder and said, “Sarah broke
out of it at about 3:45 AM this morning. She sang three songs – one of which was
“Jesus Loves Me”, and she talked to us until about 4:30 and went back to sleep!”
Upon hearing the good news I couldn’t help but burst out aloud “Praise the Lord!”
with joyful tears in my eye.
Pastor Philip then told me that at around 3:30, he was so tired that he went to sleep
for only fifteen minutes. Before he went to sleep, he was concerned that Sarah may
be well in all other faculties except sight. Because he had held a watch in front
of her eyes but she did not seem to see. Only when he made the noise of the watch
would Sarah turn her head in the direction of the watch. Also before she kissed
the parents she would feel their faces with her hands first. Then, in his short
sleep, he dreamt that Sarah was holding up two hands and counting finger by finger
from one to eleven. When he awoke fifteen minutes later, Sarah did exactly that,
counting with fingers, counting to eleven!
When Pastor Philip asked the Lord, “Why are you so merciful?” the reply was, “Because
I love you.”
That morning, another pastor, Pastor Arthur, sensing the darkness broke off as he
prayed at 3:45 drove to the hospital to tell Pastor Philip that God has “turned a
curse into blessing, because I (God) love you (the church.)” (Deut. 23:5) What a
timely confirmation!
It was August 27th, Sarah’s fourth birthday. What a new life that the Lord has blessed
her with! We all celebrated for the Lord and for Sarah that morning, seeing that
Sarah, still in her pajamas, totally well and opening all her birthday presents.
The mark of the nylon rope was still on her neck.
I learned later that people all over were praying for her: Many pastors and churches
in K. K., in Singapore, in Kuala Lumpur, in Australia, and even in New Zealand.
(The age of fast e-mail communication really increased the power of prayer even more.)
I wanted to share several things that I learned through this incident: firstly, interceding
constantly for loved ones and for the church (I Thes.5:17). Do not let down our
spiritual guard. Since my fourth child’s birth my prayer time had not been regular.
And I neglected to be sensitive to spiritual
things. Days before it happened, I had a disturbing thought, “what if one of my
children was dead?” Immediately I thought, “How could I have such a horrible thought?”
I tried to push it away. The thought came back, “How would you feel if one of them
died?” This time the thought was accompanied by a vision of a little girl, like my
daughter Madeline, but the face was not clear, who lay dieing on the grassy ground.
I rejected the image and to continue think
any further. It was like stopping a video in my mind suddenly. Though I rejected
the thought, however, I was too embarrassed to share this with my husband, and I
did not pray against it.
Fellow Christians, if you ever receive any negative thoughts like this one, get together
with a loved-one and pray against it. By praying against it, God would break the
curse of the devil and thwart his plan. Our weapon to the devil is prayer, and pray
according to the Word of God (Eph 6:10-18, especially verse 17-18).
I was reminded that several years ago a church member named Esther received a disturbing
dream. In the dream, she saw a lady drowned in a white car falling into water.
Together with her husband Andrew Lau, they prayed against the accident and for the
safety of the lady. That evening,
at almost midnight, as they went home from the Cell group (Bible study), the exact
scene in her dream appeared in real life before their eyes: a white
car had a terrible accident and fell into the big open drain next to the highway,
except that the young lady, a daughter of a church member Ong Hock Siew, got out
of the smashed car with almost no injury! My husband Richard had also witnessed
the accident scene that night. This was a clear example of the victory of the power
of interceding for the saints.
Secondly, as a parent, do try to understand your children, especially the young ones
who have not yet learned how to communicate well, before dismissing them. If not,
serious consequences could follow. Take time and listen to them. I now coach my
three-year old that if she sees something wrong but doesn’t know how to tell, to
say the following, “Mom, come, something wrong.”
Most importantly, in a situation where no other help can be obtained, crying out
loud to God works! I encourage you all to buy Bill Gothard’s new book on “Crying
Out Loud”. It will equip you with a tool useful for life.
Lastly, cleansing the unclean spirit by prayer is essential and crucial for peace
after spiritual encounter with the darkness. Immediately after the incident, several
Christian friends came and prayed at the accident site, for the house, and for us.
But the devil continued to attack us by causing illness and fear. For several days,
Madeline would make terrible noises and kick violently during her sleep. My baby
would also wake up in sudden loud cry as though something terrible was disturbing
him. One after another, fever was upon myself as well as the two younger children.
Then on Friday, our Cell group came and prayed for the cleansing of the house, and
anointed all the entry points (the windows and the doors) to the house with oil.
We dedicated the house to the Lord, and prayed specifically for Madeline. She is
now fine. No more terrible dreams. And we could sense the spirit of death had finally
left us. We have peaceful sleep again. To God be the glory!
Exactly seven days later, during my quiet time, the Lord gave me Psalm 91 to encourage
me, “Because you have made the Lord…your dwelling place, no evil shall befall you…for
He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways.” (Psalm 91:9-11)
I am lead by the Lord to share this experience with others. Any testimony of God’s
goodness is not for our experience only, but is to be shared to glorify His name.
Friends, feel free to pass on this story to others to encourage all to come to Jesus
Christ, for He shall give you not only more abundant life on earth, but more importantly,
eternal life
in heaven. If spiritual things are real, then hell and heaven are real.Have you
ever considered, “Where would I go after this life?”
Frieda Yang
SIB Skyline Church, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia
(Dr. Phillip Lyn pastors this church)
Wow!!! Praise the Lord!!!
i got that article too. O God is so so so so so so so so so so great!!!
yes it is.
wow!!! God is good!!! that is amazing!! but then again God is nothing short of amazing!!!
wow!!! That was so amazing *smiles*
Season, I think it is when folks are given to question whether or not miracles happen...well, realy miraclous events are indeed about us. Thank You for sharing this story of uplift for our souls, our spirit. Life Flows on. Connie
Season, I think it is when folks are given to question whether or not miracles happen...well, realy miraclous events are indeed about us. Thank You for sharing this story of uplift for our souls, our spirit. Life Flows on. Connie
Season, I think it is when folks are given to question whether or not miracles happen...well, realy miraclous events are indeed about us. Thank You for sharing this story of uplift for our souls, our spirit. Life Flows on. Connie
Wow, I loved that story! It's amazing how the power of prayerworks in us! God is good forever and ever!
that was a beautiful story. Truly beautiful. God is good.
wow, that was sweet. it is important to walk by faith as it says here, and I like seeing the reminder. that was a good story.
oh wow. i am not a christian, but still that was a horrifying, yet beautiful story at the same time.
I consider myself very religious, but let's put things into perspective. I mean, yes, I do believe in the power of prayer. I've even started a few prayer circles (not organised, but please pray for so and so) on behalf of friends and loved ones. But to completely neglect the medical attention that the girl was given is ridiculous. She didn't just sit there and pray. As for the African priest, that was probably zomby powder. I seriously had to laugh at the idea of Satan attacking her. They were playing with a clothes line and probably got the idea of flying through television or books. As for prophetic dreams, I do believe those can happen, but it's difficult to tell if it's prophetic or merely your own mind, unless you're skilled with oracular work. Sometimes, though, The Gods do send signs and it's good to pay attention to them. I agree with understanding your children. That's one of the most coherent things this woman said. Sometimes, they just don't know how to explain things, but they know when something is wrong. I also believe in spiritual clenzing and purification of the house at times, especially to ward against miasma (spiritual pollution) which would certainly have been evident in this case, since the family was so close to death.
agreed tiff, but i think that anointing the entry points of the house with oil was going too far. i had this done at a mormon church because my friend at the time insisted that i go with her, they put oil on my head which is really bezzare for one thing, and it scared me to no end. one, because they were calling for the ahem, evil spirits to come out of me, and 2, they were screaming as well.
It is good that the girl survived and also interesting to read.
Wow Season sis, thank you for sharing that. It's really amazing. And to all of you who think anointing the house with oil is going too far: Trust me, it's not. Sometimes I wonder why people still doubt or say that this is too much when such a story is shared. All I know is that God is great, and, sometimes the doctors can't help anymore, like they said in the testimony. So, I totally am amazed again at how great God is.
Don't know actually.
Well, I do know that we use certain things for purification, so this could be a good thing.