The daughter of a prominent Beijing pastor detained by Chinese authorities has spoken about growing up Christian in China, the cost of faith under Communist rule, and why she still believes God is at work despite intensifying persecution.
Grace Jin Drexel, whose father Pastor Ezra Jin founded Zion Church, told Premier Christian News her childhood was shaped early by the knowledge that her family was “different”.
“When I was growing up… there weren’t that many Christians in China, and people didn’t really even know what it meant to be a Christian,” she said. “When I told people my dad was a pastor, they just did not understand what that was at all.”
To avoid awkward questions, she began telling classmates her father was a teacher. She described being singled out at school because of her family’s faith. One teacher, shaped by the Cultural Revolution, viewed Christians as “the remnant of old superstition”.
“She told me I wasn’t allowed to join the Young Pioneers [a group for children to learn socialism and communism] because my family was ‘bad’,” Grace said. “When the whole school saluted the flag, I was the only child just standing there, looking to the side.”
“From a very early age, you knew you were different because you came from a Christian family.”
“A blessing and a curse”
Despite the hostility, Grace said church life gave her something many of her peers lacked.
“Every Sunday I had tons of ‘aunts and uncles’ who loved me, gave me food, asked about school,” she said. “It was a blessing and a curse. I knew I was different — but it wasn’t all negative.”
Christians in China face close monitoring and tight controls, due to Communist Party viewing the faith as threat. Registered churches in China fall under either the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPA) or the Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA), but are tracked closely by the State in terms of what is preached and who is there.
Pastor Jin initially served in a state-sanctioned church, but the compromises soon became unbearable as he always felt “pulled between what the Communist Party wanted and what he felt led by the Spirit”. Grace described State churches as “a church in captivity”.
“Your paycheck was controlled by the government. Your authority didn’t come from God or the church, it came from the Party,” she said. “If you’re on their bad side, everything can be taken away.”
Shock of freedom in the US
The family later moved to the United States, where Pastor Jin studied at Fuller Seminary. Grace remembered being shocked that people both knew what a pastor was, and respected it as a job.
Eventually, Pastor Jin felt called back to China after church members said they needed him and hadn’t found an adequate church since his move to the US. “He felt like a shepherd who had left his flock,” Grace said.
In 2007, he founded Zion Church, which grew into one of Beijing’s largest unregistered churches. By 2018, the congregation numbered around 1,500, with multiple services each week.
Church shut down, pastors detained
Grace said the first major wave of persecution came after the Chinese government enforced new religious regulations. “Churches were levelled. Crosses were taken down, and it wasn’t just Christians. Catholics, Muslims, Buddhists were all targeted,” she said. Under-18s were also banned from attending church.
On 9th September 2018, around 100 police officers arrived at Zion Church, confiscating all its belongings and shutting the church down. Grace said the immediate trigger was the church’s refusal to install facial-recognition cameras in the sanctuary.
“They wanted 23 cameras inside,” she explained. “We said, ‘Come and listen to our sermons, we’re open.’ But we couldn’t agree to that level of surveillance.”
“Then the gospel will spread even further”
In October last year, Pastor Jin was detained again, along with other church leaders. Grace said the family feared the worst, especially after seeing other pastors imprisoned - such as Wang Yi of Early Rain Covenant Church, who received a nine-year sentence.
When asked how he would feel if this was “the big takedown”, Pastor Jin’s response stunned those around him.
“The first thing he said was, ‘Hallelujah, then the gospel will spread even further,’” Grace recalled.
China’s ‘Online Code of Conduct for Religious Professionals’ came into effect in September 2025, which led to authorities charging Pastor Jin with “illegal use of information online” for holding services online. It’s a charge Grace calls “bizarre”.
“There’s nothing criminal about the sermons,” she said. “It’s just blatant religious persecution under a legal guise.”
“I just want my dad out”
Grace, now based in the US, said she recently quit her job as a US Senate staffer to advocate full-time for her father’s release.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she admitted. “I just want my dad out. I want all the church leaders released so they can preach and pray again.”
She said Pastor Jin had already offered to retire. “He hasn’t seen his family in seven years because of a travel ban. He missed my wedding. He missed graduations. He wants to be a father and a grandfather.”
Call to prayer and action
Grace urged Christians in the UK to pray and to speak out.
“Prayer is so integral,” she said. “We believe in the God who opens prison doors.”
She also challenged Western governments to live up to their values: “When leaders say they stand for human rights but don’t act, China points to that and says, ‘You’re no better than us.’”
Asked about the role of US President Donald Trump, she said she hoped his administration would raise her father’s case, noting his past role in securing the release of Pastor Andrew Brunson, who was imprisoned in Turkey from 2016-2018.
When asked what Western Christians can learn from the Chinese church, Grace said: “When pastors say, ‘Take me, I’m willing to lay down my life,’ that kind of faith is so counter-cultural. It’s powerful. And that’s why Christianity is growing in China.”
She added: “God has not given up on China. And neither should we.”
