All Four Best Selling Books on Near-Death Experiences in One

From NDEs: Doctors and Scientists

George realized the source of the light was a Man. He thought, “That’s the Son of Man.” He instantly jumped to attention. He knew he was in the presence of Jesus Christ but not the kind gentle Jesus of Bible school. This was the most amazing “totally male Being” he’d ever met. Jesus radiated an astonishing love. He was older than time but more modern than anyone.

From NDEs: To Hell and Back

The demons prowling the cell had extreme hatred. Bill wondered why they hated him so and what he had done to make him so angry. Only later did he realize they hated God so much and anything that was his creation.

From NDEs: Suicide Survivors

Tamara also realized that through its ferocity she no longer felt lonely and she no longer felt depressed; she had become loneliness and depression and she was now a “tormented being of fear.” In this place of total darkness, Tamara felt that her soul “had been transformed into a being of sin and death” and that death was “complete torment.”

From NDEs: Children Who Say the Have Gone to Heaven

Alex was watching everything that happened after the accident. Alex turned to the driver’s seat to see the Devil sitting there. Grinning, the Devil pointed to Kevin and told Alex, “You just killed your daddy.”

Reviews for:

Near Death Experiences: Doctors and Scientists Go on the Record About God, Heaven, and the Afterlife

HE SHOWS US THE PROOF–5.0 out of 5 stars

By Lois W. Stern

John Graden’s book, Near Death Experiences: Doctors and Scientists Go On The Record About God, Heaven, and the Afterlife is a fascinating compilation of stories of ten distinguished men and women, from Dr. Carl Jung to Dr. Eben Alexander, who share amazing accounts of their personal near death experiences. The commonalities of their stories are impressive, for until that moment in time, many were hard core scientists with “show me the proof” orientations fixed through training and mental set. Others were simply atheists or at best, agnostics.

In this book, the author uses the terms mind, body, spirit and consciousness interchangeably, exemplifying the power of the super consciousness, a force he feels every great inventor and artist of any ilk taps into. I have always been a person to “follow my intuition” (or what we often refer to as our gut instincts). John Graden’’s book convinces me that I’ve been on track all along.

Lois W. Stern

Author of the series of Tales2Inspire books:
The Emerald Collection of ‘Beyond Coincidence’ stories

The Topaz Collection of ‘Awakenings’ stories

Life Changing Stories-5.0 out of 5 stars

By rlscott - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase(What’s this?)

This review is from: Near Death Experiences-Doctors and Scientists Go On The Record About God, Heaven, and the Afterlife (Kindle Edition)

Although I have read some of these stories before and own the books about them, there were other stories I had never heard of. All the experiences were life changing for the people involved, many of whom were atheists. Interestingly, all of them now believe in God. It’s fascinating to read these experiences and learn from them. A thought provoking book!

A Book With A Powerful Message–5.0 out of 5 stars

By Sue Tucker Jones

I like this book it because it cuts to the chase and stays focused on Near Death Experiences and their aftermath. The people interviewed were doctors and scientists, the least likely people to believe in an afterlife, God or Jesus Christ. Some did not believe in God prior to their NDE, but became Christians or ministers after the experience. Also, many of the NDErs become depressed once brought back to life because life on the other side was so amazing and wonderful. Reading this book can erase any fears of death and dying.

Near Death Experiences–5.0 out of 5 stars

By Maryellen

This book was very interesting as it told different stories about Near Death Experiences. Although the scenes and stories were different, they were all the same in that during their Near Death Experience they all felt the same thing which was total love.

If you believe what these people have experienced, it may end your fear of death and instead you may look forward in the future to join God and your family , friends and pets to a life without end.

Excellent Work and Research–5.0 out of 5 stars

By Heather Hobbs “lostinthoughts89” (USA) - See all my reviews

John Graden did his research and found great people with interesting NDEs. Whether you believe in it or not, they are certainly interesting to read.

Thank You John.By Jeff Bennett–5.0 out of 5 stars

Thank you John for writing this very informative book. It’s greatly appreciated. I hope is brings comfort to all. Jeff. CourseMiracles.com

Dedication

My wife Janet and and my children, Alexander and Christopher, have completely redefined love for me and I will be eternally grateful for that.

Of course, all praise to the almighty Lord Jesus Christ.

The Super Conscious Mind

Brian Tracy

Near death experiences (NDEs) may be some of the best proof of a power way beyond our physical minds.

This power has been called many things by many people in many places. It is the fundamental principle of most religions, philosophies and metaphysical teachings. It underlies much of psychology and is the cornerstone of all success and achievement.

The first NDE story of this book is that of the great Austrian psychoanalyst, Carl Jung. Jung said that the collective wisdom and knowledge of all the ages was contained in the collective unconscious and was available to everyone.

Ralph Waldo Emerson referred to it as the “over-soul” and wrote that, “We live in the lap of an immense intelligence that, when we are in its presence, we realize that it is far beyond our human mind.” Emerson, the great American transcendentalist, felt that all power and possibility for the average person came from using this mind on a regular basis.

Napoleon Hill, perhaps the greatest researcher on success of the 20th century, called this power the “infinite intelligence.” After spending more than 20 years interviewing 500 of the most successful men and women alive in America at that time, he concluded that, without exception, their ability to tap into this higher form of infinite intelligence was the primary reason for their great success in life.

Whatever you choose to call it, this power is as available to you at this very minute as it ever has been to anyone, anywhere. I refer to it as the “super-conscious mind,” the mind that is above and outside all other minds or intelligences.

As you’ll read in these stories, almost to a person these subjects were highly intelligent and educated people of science. But it wasn’t until after their NDE experience did they fully begin to understand the power of the super-conscious mind and its existence outside the human brain.

The super-conscious mind is the source of all pure creativity. It is the super-conscious mind that is functioning at the creation of anything that is completely new in the universe.

The super-conscious mind is tapped into and used by all the great inventors, writers, artists and composers of history on a regular basis, right up to the present day. Every great work of art or creativity is infused with super-conscious energy.

Your super-conscious mind can access every piece of information stored in your conscious and subconscious minds. It can also access data and ideas outside your own experience, because it actually lies outside your human mind. This is why it is called a form of universal intelligence.

You will often get ideas that come to you from far beyond you. It is not unusual for two people separated by thousands of miles of distance to come up with the same idea at the same time.

When you are well-attuned to another person, such as your spouse or mate, you will often have thoughts identical to him or her at the same time during the day, and you will only find out that you had reached the same conclusion when you compare notes hours later. This is an example of your super-conscious mind at work.

Sometimes when you are with other positive, goal-oriented people, your combined super-conscious minds will form a higher mind that you can all tap into. This is why, when you are involved in a conversation or listening to a lecture, ideas and inspirations will often leap into your mind that have no direct connection to what is being discussed. But those ideas and inspirations may be exactly what you need at that moment to move you forward on your journey.

Because of your super-conscious powers, virtually anything that you can hold in your mind on a continuing basis, you can have.

Emerson wrote, “A man becomes what he thinks about, most of the time.” Earl Nightingale wrote, “You become what you think about.” In the Bible it says that, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that also shall he reap.” And this law of sowing and reaping refers to mental states; to your thoughts.

Of course, there is a potential danger in the use of your super-conscious mind. It is like fire - a wonderful servant, but a terrible master. If you use it improperly, and think negative, fearful thoughts, your super-conscious mind will accept your thoughts as a command and go to work to materialize them into your reality.

What is the difference between successful people and unsuccessful people? It is as simple as this: Successful people think and talk about what they want, and unsuccessful people talk about what they don’t want.

The beauty of learning about these near death experiences is that we don’t have to have one in order to learn the great lessons they teach.

Lessons about the importance of love, compassion, and that the super-conscious far exceeds the capabilities and confines of the human brain.

John J. Graden has spent a tremendous amount of time to research and chronicle some of best near-death experience stories. It’s a compelling read. Enjoy.

Brian Tracy

BrianTracy.com

Why This Book Matters

Does Consciousness Need a Brain to Exist?

What constitutes a human life? Are we just a biological robots with a brain whose existence ends upon death? Or, are we spiritual beings having a physical experience in preparation for an after-life?

Does our consciousness cease to exist when our brain dies? Is consciousness a product of the brain or is the brain a conduit for consciousness? Does consciousness even require a brain?

Religion and the NDE

From the earliest records of mankind the predominate belief has been that after death we transition into an after-life. Millions of people have reported visiting the other side and returning in a near death experience (NDE).

The first reported NDE was in Plato’s The Republic around 380BC. A soldier died and came back to report an experience that shares many of classic NDE elements. More astonishing is the story from the Holy Bible that the apostle Paul may have had an NDE after he was stoned and dragged to the garbage pile in 46 AD as described in Acts 14:20. In Corinthians 12:2:5 he shares his story and some believe it was an NDE he was describing.

Some presume that the NDE experience is spawned from the religious beliefs of the NDEer. As you’ll read, religion has no presence in these extraordinary NDEs even though God and Jesus play huge roles. Religion is a man-made concept and virtually all religions are based upon a preparation for an after-life. However, God predates any religion and his message of love and compassion has never wavered.

This is a source of frustration for many NDE skeptics as religious bias would be a convenient way to dismiss the NDE.

NDEs and the Skeptic

I think healthy skepticism is important and helpful, but many skeptics seem militant in their canned responses at the first mention of an NDE. Often, their dismissive arrogance fuels a closed minded response that is not of their own discovery or investigation but a regurgitation of one of their skeptic heroes’ sound bites.

Like unruly teenagers dreading a trip with their parents because they claim to already know where the journey will take them, many skeptics are not interested in following the truth to where it leads them but are instead canceling the trip altogether. If they would look at the science they would have to conclude that these experiences are more than lack of oxygen.

A common argument among skeptics is, “If you can’t prove it scientifically, it doesn’t exist.” To that I ask, “Have you ever been in love? Yes? Then prove it.”

I think it is the height of audacity to think that all there is to know and understand about life has to be measured under a microscope or brain scanner.

That’s why I wanted to profile physicians and scientists who have had an NDE. Virtually every person in this book was a skeptic before their NDE. I think they bring an interesting and credible testimony to the discussion.

The NDE and Science

There are decades of scientific study on the highest levels to support the hypothesis that NDEs are real and not of a physiological origin. One of the more recent studies was especially convincing.

This scientific study included 344 cardiac patients who were resuscitated after a cardiac arrest. Upon recovery, these patients were immediately interviewed about their experience. 62 patients reported having an NDE. This study was conducted in 10 hospitals in the Netherlands and was published in the medical journal The Lancet, v. 358, # 9298.

These patients had a cardiac arrest and were clinically dead with unconsciousness caused by anoxia or insufficient blood supply to the brain. In other words, they flatlined. Because the patients were interviewed right after they were resuscitated it is clear their NDEs were not something they made up years after.

As Pin van Lommel, MD, the cardiologist conducting the study says, “Our results show that medical factors cannot account for the occurrence of NDE.”

The fact is that we know very little about the brain and the mind or even if there is a difference (my money is on there is a huge difference.)

Remember, there was a time when science was convinced that bleeding someone was the best way to treat their ailment. In 1633, Galileo was sentenced to life imprisonment for insisting that the earth was not the center of the universe.

We are just beginning to scratch the surface of how the brain works. Personally, if the human brain is not evidence of intelligent design, then I think there is a lot of denial going on among the intellectuals of the skeptic world.

The Limits of Time and Context

There is one constant refrain from NDErs that even our highly educated NDErs of science echo and that is, “There are no words to describe what I experienced or saw.”

What these people tell us is limited to the evolution and context of the current time in history. As an illustration, imagine you could transport Alexander the Great from 335BC to today. You spend a few days flying him around the world in a jet. You take him to see a film in a 3-D cinema. You show him an HD video of the wonders of the world and space. You demonstrate how the entire world is just a click away in a tablet called an iPad. Then you return him back to 335BC. How would he explain what he experienced? What references could he use that would make any sense to people in his time and place? I can’t imagine that he would have any.

Like Alexander the Great, as educated as our ten subjects are they too are all limited by their current time and place context. When you experience a world without time, place or limitations, bringing a description of that experience back to the confines of our time based current world would understandably leave you at loss for words.

When highly educated, articulate NDErs struggle to accurately describe the indescribable it opens the doors for the skeptics frozen in the current time of science to discard and denigrate.

The stories you are about to read are from people of science who bring a rare perspective to the NDE experience. Pre-NDE, that perspective was narrow and set in stone. Post-NDE it was expanded profoundly.

I hope you enjoy reading these stories as much as I have discovering them.

Note: For the sake of simplicity, I will use, mind, spirit, consciousness, and soul somewhat interchangeably. There is an argument that they are all different but this book is more about 10 amazing stories than the nuance of definition.

Please visit our Kindle page, and NDEBook.com

Defining the Near Death Experience

John Graden

When I was a teenager, my mother told me that when she was in her 20s she felt herself float out of her body to the ceiling and watched the medical team work on her while she was in surgery. Ever since that story I have been fascinated by the near death experience.

According to the International Association for Near-Death Students (IANDS.org), “A near-death experience (NDE) is a profound psychological event  that may occur to a person close to death or, if not near death, in a situation of physical or emotional crisis. Because it includes transcendental and mystical elements, an NDE is a powerful event of consciousness; it is not mental illness.

An NDE may include an out-of-body experience and vivid perceptions of movement, light, darkness; encounters with deceased loved ones, unfamiliar entities and/or spiritual presences; sometimes a life review, a landscape, a sense of overpowering knowledge and purpose. The aftereffects of an NDE or related experience are enduring, often powerful, and may be life-altering.

The NDE belongs to a larger family of experiences that go beyond the usual limits of space and time and can transform a person’s life and beliefs. They may be called spiritually transformative, conversion, mystical, religious, or transpersonal experiences.”

When I started research for this book, I was shocked at how common the NDE is.

According to highly regarded NDE researcher P.M.H. Atwater, in countries worldwide that have near-death research 4–5-percent of the general population has had a near-death experience. That number jumps to 12–21-percent of people who are receiving critical care and have a near-death experience.

These are huge numbers. Millions of people from all walks of life have had near-death experiences.

What has not been discovered so far is the answer to the question, why do some people have near-death experiences and others do not?

While there are common traits or elements of an NDE, not everyone has them all. Dr. Raymond Moody, who coined the term near-death experience in his 1975 book, “Life After Life”, has compiled a list of common elements of the classic NDE.

1. Inability to describe what the person experienced

2. Hearing yourself pronounced dead

3. Feelings of peace and quiet

4. Hearing unusual noises

5. Seeing a dark or light tunnel

6. Having an out of body experience

7. Meeting “spiritual beings”

8. A very bright light and/or a being of light

9. A life review

10. Sensing a border or limit on where you can go

11. Returning to your body

12. Frustrated attempts to share your NDE story

13. Broadening and deepening of your life afterward

14. No longer have a fear of death

15. Corroboration of events witnessed while out of. your body

16. A realm where all knowledge exists

17. Cities and buildings of light

18. A realm of bewildered and/or tortured spirits

19. Supernatural rescues

Atwater has interviewed over 3,000 NDEers. He found that of the 3,000 adults 80-percent were White and 20-percent were Black.

Of 277 child NDEers 60-percent were White. 23-percent Latino, 12-percent Black, 5-percent Asian.

The Aftermath

In each story, I end with the aftermath of the NDE. According to research, 80-percent of NDErs have profound changes in their outlook on life and death. However, that change is not always positive.

Many people go into a depressed state after their NDE because they felt so close to God and naturally enjoyed being enveloped in love and compassion during their NDE. In some cases, as you will read in these stories, people are close to the edge of meeting someone or learning a great lesson when they are informed they have to go back.

For some people, even a beautiful, positive NDE creates such an unfair comparison to regular life that they have a difficult time rejoining society. The world is the same but they are different.

Fortunately,.the vast majority of people have an NDE are changed for the better. They become less judgmental and more loving and accepting. Many become more intuitive and most all are more spiritual.

One major tool in inspiring change is the life review. Though less than half of NDErs have one, the life review can be extremely powerful. From birth to death, welcome to “This is Your Life.”

Some reviews are brief while others are agonizingly detailed. Most NDErs report a life review as a non-judgmental experience in that no one punishes you. Instead, you punish yourself with shame.

In rare cases however, the people actually experience the pain they caused others and even the pain the ripple effect of their actions caused. Imagine 20-years ago you cussed someone out for cutting you off in traffic. That person gets angry and takes it out on his wife, who takes it out on the kids who then bully kids at school. You feel all of that pain.

Indeed, the life review may be the genesis of the belief that God is watching and knows everything you think, say, or do.

Some religions refer to to Book of Life as kind of a cosmic biography that you will have to answer to. While some NDErs did see a book, most report the life review has been observed on a TV like hologram.

Frankly, as you read these stories, each person was changed for the better. If there is one theme that is constant it is of the power of love. After their NDE each person worked hard to live a life more in tune with the Greatest Commandment, “Love thy neighbor as you love yourself.”

Chapter One

Carl Jung

“The unconscious psyche believes in life after death”
- Carl Jung MD

One of the most influential figures in the history of mind studies, Carl Gustav Jung’s fascination with medicine and spirituality led him to the field of psychology. Of our subjects, Jung may end up as the strongest proponent of consciousness outside the brain.

In 1902, he completed his dissertation, “On the Psychology and Pathology of So-Called Occult Phenomena” and graduated from the University of Basel with a medical degree.

He is renown for his studies of the collective unconscious, dream analysis and the human psyche.

Jung believed the human psyche exists in three parts: the ego (the conscious mind), the personal unconscious, and the collective unconscious. Jung believed the collective unconscious was a reservoir of all the experience and knowledge of the human species.

His idea of the collective unconscious in many ways mirrors the observations of many NDErs who seemed to gain a powerful insight that‚ “all is one and one is all.”

The NDE

In 1944, he had an NDE after he broke his foot and had a heart attack while in a Swiss hospital. He provides a vivid description of the experience in his biography, “Memories, Dreams, Reflections.‚‘

“In a state of unconsciousness I experienced the variance in visions which must have begun when I hung on the edge of death and was being given oxygen and camphor injections. The images were so tremendous that I myself concluded that I was close to death.”

The Light

This may be the only NDE where a reference to light is coming from an outside observer and not the one experiencing the NDE. The attending nurse later told Jung that ‚ “It was if you were surrounded by a bright glow.”

He felt like he was very high in space floating above the earth which was bathed in a “gloriously blue light.”

The Experience

He saw the sea and recognized the continents and even Ceylon and India so this was not a different land or an alternate earth or universe that is more common in NDEs.

Afterwards he found out that in order to have a view like this he would have to be 1,000 miles above the earth. The sight of the earth from this height was the most glorious thing he had ever seen. He also felt he was on the point of departing from the earth.

He turned around and saw a huge block of stone, like a meteorite. It was about the size of a house, or even bigger. The stone was also floating in space.

He saw an entrance in the stone which led to a small room. A room similar to ones he’d seen in Ceylon. A black Hindu in a white gown sat in lotus posture on a stone bench. Jung was sure the Hindu was expecting him.

As he moved toward the entrance, a strange thing happened, he had the feeling that everything was being taken away; everything he aimed at or thought of. Everything fell away or was painfully stripped from him.

The experience gave him a feeling of extreme poverty, but at the same time great fullness. There was no longer anything he wanted or desired. He existed in an objective form; he was what he experienced.

He felt sure that he would finally understand what “historical nexus” he fit into. All the questions of his life would be answered in that rock temple.

The Guide

While considering moving into the temple he saw an image floating up from the earth. It was his doctor but in his primal form. Consistent with NDE guides, the communication was non-verbal or as Jung put it, “mute.”

The doctor had been delegated by the earth to deliver a message to Jung, to tell him that there was a protest against his going away. He had no right to leave the earth and must return. The moment he heard that, the vision ceased.”

Aftermath

Jung was disappointed because he could not enter the temple to join the people and have his questions answered. That disappointment lingered for about three weeks. He couldn’t make up his mind to live again.

He lamented being back in the “box system” again. After his experience he viewed the earthly world as a “three-dimensional world that had been artificially built, in which each person sat by himself in a little box.”

He was not too happy with his doctor for bringing him back, but at the same time was worried for his health. Jung felt that since the man had crossed over to his primal form he was going to die. He was concerned the doctor would have to die in his place.

Jung was his last patient when, on April 4, 1944, the doctor died of septicernia.

Book: Memories, Dreams, Reflections

Chapter Two

Dr. George Ritchie

George reached to tap the man on the shoulder but his hand passed right through him.

A private in the Army during WWII, 20-year old George Ritchie died of pneumonia in December 1943. While he was dead for just nine minutes, he had a remarkable NDE that inspired Dr. Raymond Moody to begin to investigate these types experiences and eventually coin the term near-death experience.

As I read George’s book, Return from Tomorrow I could imagine it as a black and white film starring Jimmy Stewart as George Ritchie. It would be like, It’s a Wonderful Life meets Heaven Can Wait.

George had an enthusiasm for serving his country in a time of war and was thrilled that he had been singled out for medical training that would significantly accelerate his ascension as a medical officer. But first, he had to catch the train to get to the medical training facility to begin his new life.

The countdown to making that travel connection provides an urgent undercurrent to his NDE story that makes it both entertaining and compelling.

As a young recruit in the US Army, George was sent to Camp Barkeley, Texas for basic training in September 1943. Because George had previous medical training, the Army was going to reroute him to the Medical College of Virginia to become a doctor under the Army Specialized Training Program. It was a big honor and George was excited about his December 19th train trip to his hometown of Richmond to start the program.

In early-December he developed a fever and was admitted to the base hospital. Confident he would get out soon, he spent his time in the room mapping out every contingent train schedule that would get him to Richmond in time.

After a few days though George was getting anxious as the big day approached and he was still stuck in the hospital. He spent more hours working and reworking the possibilities of catching the one final train that would get him there.

On the day before he was to leave, he felt good enough to go see a movie on the base with another patient. Afterwards, he set out his clothes, and duffle bag, set his alarm for 3am and attempted to go to sleep.

His condition worsened. He staggered out of the room to find a bathroom when an orderly saw him and took his temperature. His fever had jumped to 106.

The man called for help to get George back to his room. George was being held up by two orderlies when he starting hearing a strange whirring sound inside his head and his knees felt like rubber. He began to fall.

The NDE

In the early hours George woke up in his hospital bed with a start. After all of his preparation, he couldn‘t believe the worst case scenario was happening. He was going to miss his train. He looked around in a panic. None of his stuff was in the room. Worse, this wasn’t even his room! He jumped out of bed looking around. He turned back towards the bed and was stunned to see another guy in the bed. Someone was in the bed he just got out of!

George ran out into the hallway desperately looking for help. He saw a sergeant and asked him a question but the sergeant just walked on.

He started to run to the outside door and was swept up into the night sky. He was flying away from the camp and towards small towns and hopefully, the train station.

George could see traffic lights flashing below. He was starting to get confused. This was all a bit much for him. He saw the light of an all-night diner and could make out a man walking towards the diner.

George descended to ask the man for directions and some help. The man acted like George didn’t exist. As the man opened the diner door George tried to tap the man on the shoulder but his hand passed right through him.

Now George is wondering what is going on. He reaches out to lean on a power pole guide wire and, again, he passes right through it.

George is clearly not in Kansas anymore. He is starting to realize that missing his train may not be the most important event happening right then. Maybe his train has left for good.

Starting to suspect that he may be dead, George wanted to find his body. That’s not something you hear about in many NDEs. Most of the time, there is little interest in the physical body left behind. Maybe as a soldier and a budding doctor, George wanted some proof or closure.

Still, like a dutiful soldier, George felt getting back to the base would provide some answers or at least some comfort. Nearly as soon as he had the thought he was rocketing back to the camp.

He quickly arrived, but realized he had a new problem. George didn’t remember what he looked like. It may be hard to imagine as I write this in 2013, but in 1943, the mirror is about the only reference you would have to your adult face. How many pictures would a 20-year old have of himself? Probably very few and they would be in black and white.

Since George can’t look for his face, he remembered that he was wearing a black onyx oval fraternity ring. Now he is on the hunt for his ring and the body attached to it. He can’t physically move anything, so he is frantically floating/flying from nearly identical room-to-room looking at hands.

He’s not sure if he’s back in the same room as all of this started but he sees a guy with a sheet over his head, and his arms on top of the sheet. On his left ring finger was his black onyx oval ring.

George’s discovery of his body seemed to have been a threshold trigger because the room began to get brighter until it was so bright that he thought that normally his retinas would have burned out. Leave it to a doctor-to-be to remember the little things. Things were about to get anything but small.

He realized the source of the light was a Man. He thought, “That’s the Son of Man.” George instantly jumped to attention.

He knew he was in the presence of Jesus Christ but not the kind gentle Jesus of Bible school. This was the most amazing “totally male Being” he’d ever met. Jesus radiated an astonishing love. He was older than time but more modern than anyone.

George suddenly realized that Jesus knew everything about him. Everything. He knew his every thought and action from the day he was born. George was humbled to say the least. Like most people, not all of his thoughts were pure or his actions right. Jesus reviewed every event of George’s life.

Though they didn’t leave the room, the walls became living murals of scenes of George’s past from childhood on. Many scenes were of people in George’s life such as when his parents first met, but the focus was the life of George Ritchie.

There were happy scenes and miserable scenes, many of which originated with him. From schoolyard tussles to nasty arguments and lustful thoughts and desires, George was on display in front of the one person in the universe that he would want to please.

However, George didn’t feel like he was being judged. It was more of an accounting. During each scene Jesus asked him “What have you done with your life?” The question was posed more as a statement than a question. It was like a standard to be risen to.

George answered that he was an eagle scout, Jesus answered, “That glorified you.”

George was fast becoming aware that in the presence of Jesus there was no such thing as hypocrisy. Jesus knew exactly what he was thinking. He couldn’t think one thing and say another. Nor can you misunderstand what He meant. Jesus knew everything about George and He totally accepted him and loved him.

The questions moved to love. Had George loved liked Jesus was loving him? George answered that he didn’t know love on this level was possible. Jesus reminded him that he taught us all by the life and death he lived that you are to love your neighbor as you love yourself.

Jesus quickly transported both of them to an over-crowded city with buildings and people hurrying by and passing right through each other.

Murderous men and women argued in eternal loops. Children begged apologies for their suicide to their parents who could not see them. Adults clung to oblivious people pleading for forgiveness. Others were fighting and attempting perverse sexual acts but no contact was possible as they were all dead. They just kept repeating the attempted acts.

Jesus told him, “They are suicides, chained to every consequence of their act.” Jesus was showing him hell.

There were thousands of scenes and it would have taken weeks, maybe months to watch them all, but there was no sense of time. There never is in an NDE.

George had the sense Jesus was taking him somewhere higher. A higher plain or place or maybe the vista was just opening up. George was not sure.

The air became more transparent and before them appeared giant buildings in a color saturated park. George sensed there was a relationship between everything he could see.

One thing he was sure of, this is a heck of a lot better than the hellish vision he’d just left. There was an all encompassing peace about this place especially compared to “suicide city.” Any attempt to compare what he saw there to anything on earth was “ridiculous.”

Enveloped in the love that permeated the atmosphere was an excitement about learning. This was a cosmic college or university. The vast halls and soaring cathedrals were teeming with gender-less beings in loose-flowing, hooded cloaks that were reminiscent of monks, but not religious.

George saw rooms filled with complex equipment and classes with these hooded figures poring over intricate mathematics and complex chartings. As educated as George was, this was far beyond his understanding.

Jesus led him to a studio where beautiful, complex music was being created and performed. Next they entered a vast library that he thought must contain the most important books in the universe.

George asked Jesus if these people had grown beyond selfish desires while on earth. Jesus communicated that, “They grew, and they have kept on growing.”

Understandably, George had many questions but began to feel they were incidental. He felt Jesus could only show him what he was capable of understanding.

Jesus did have more to show him. Jesus took him to a bright, luminous, seemingly endless city. Everything seemed to be made of light. George was in awe. The city seemed light years away but was radiant.

Two beings broke from the city and flew towards them. But as fast as they approached Jesus took George away faster.

The light began to fade, the space began to close in, and George was back in his hospital room. Jesus stood next to him, almost to protect him during the transition. Maybe to convince any part of George that may have doubted the experience he just had.

Jesus took George’s attention downward and he saw his body below, but felt nothing about it. George was to return to the body. Despite he protests, George was returned to “that lump-like thing” in the bed.

The Aftermath

Like many NDEers George was left with a lonely longing to return the presence of Jesus Christ. Who wouldn’t? Returning to.“regular life” was not easy for George. But his military duties kept him busy. Though he had indeed missed his train, the Army extended his start date so he could still enter the Army Specialized Training Program though he did struggle in the program.

Eventually, he graduated and was shipped off to Europe.

In 1945 he was a first responder to a horrific train crash in France. The train tracks had been switched by Vichy French forces under Nazi control. The train smashed into a brick wall at full speed. The carnage was like nothing he had ever seen, but he actually felt that he would rather have been a victim than a rescuer. He still felt stuck on the earth and wanted to be back in the “cosmic college” rather than where he was.

The contrast of the love that Jesus showed him and the harsh reality of human hatred enacted on earth was stunning to him. It was also isolating because he was alone in his NDE experience.

As George assisted with the triage and care he realized this was his first exposure to human suffering on a large scale. He thought if hatred could grow to be this powerful; who wants to live in this world?

At the end of a nightmare day, he lamented that the dead had been permitted to leave this world while he was condemned to stay. He had envy for those who died that day. He longed for death and felt his survival was a judgment on him and a rejection from Jesus.

George tended to a sergeant whose knee had been nearly blown off. The man’s name was Jack Helms and there was something about Jack that George felt a strong familiarity with. He had a sunburst smile and was deeply interested in other people’s lives.

Before, George had just put in his hours on shift, now he found himself staying late to be around Jack. One day, George told Jack about his NDE. He could tell Jack was fascinated and had no doubt of the stories’ truth.

As George told the story he realized that the strange familiar feeling he had with Jack was that Jesus was looking at him out of Jack’s eyes. The acceptance and the caring in Jack’s eyes were what he recognized only this time he was on a hillside in France 5,000 miles from the camp hospital in Texas.

George realized that his longing to be back in the presence of Jesus was misplaced. The very nature of Him was present-tense. He was present everywhere. George knew that afternoon after talking with Jack that if he wanted to feel close to Christ he would have to find it in the people that He put in front of him every day.

George learned to look for Jesus in the face of everyone he met. The more he learned to see Christ in others the less he was effected by the death and suffering he had to deal with everyday as a medic.

He also began to comprehend that what Jesus showed him was not paradise. That was only half of the journey. The other half was the horrific and savage, violent, sexual, materialistic loops of a eternity in hell.

George witnessed hell on earth at the end of the war when his unit was assigned to bring medical supplies to help the newly liberated prisoners in the concentration camp near Wuppertal.

He’d been exposed to the carnage of bodies torn apart by explosions but the brutal effects of slow starvation and torture was a new kind of horror.

When it got to be unbearable George would go from one end of the camp to the other looking into men’s faces to find Christ looking back. That’s when he met a concentration camp Polish prisoner nicknamed Wild Bill Cody.

Wild Bill had a great energy and bright eyes. He was fluent in five languages. He was a huge help in sorting out the paperwork to relocate and return inmates to their families or hometowns many of which had been wiped out.

His compassion for his fellow prisoners glowed on his face. George was stunned to discover that Wild Bill had been in the concentration camp since 1939. George endured six years of starvation and disease without any physical or mental deterioration.

He was a leader and friend among the inmates. They turned to him to mediate differences. Many of the nationalities of the prisoners hated each other as much as they hated the Germans. Wild Bill helped to mediate their differences and taught them forgiveness.

Wild Bill walked the talk of forgiveness. When the Germans entered his town of Warsaw in 1939, they took everyone, including his wife and five children, lined them up against a wall and shot them dead with machine guns.

Though he pleaded to be killed with his family, they made him watch it happen. Then they sent him to a work camp because he could speak German.

After witnessing such a monstrous act, he felt he had to make a choice. He could hate the soldiers. As a lawyer, he’d seen too often what hate could do to a person’s soul and body. It was an easy decision. Hate had just killed his family. Hate could not be the answer. He decided instead he would love every person he came in contact with. His love kept him alive and well in the face of untold brutality.

Years later in 1952, George was flipping through an issue of Life magazine when he saw a drawing of the first atomic submarine. That article prompted him to share his NDE story because men were entering the age of atomic power without really understanding the creator of the power, God.

He began speaking to groups with a message that everything that is not God is hell. There is no middle ground. It was a professional risk but he felt compelled to take that step.

George Ritchie passed on October 29, 2007.

Books: Return From Tomorrow and Order to Return: My Life After Dying

Chapter Three

Dr. Anthony Cicoria

The body that was laying down was not him

At a 1994 family reunion in upstate New York, Dr. Anthony Cicoria, an orthopedic surgeon, placed a call at a pay-phone when he heard a loud crack as a lightening bolt shot through the phone into his face and came out of his foot.

Though it was over in an instant, Anthony felt though he was in slow motion. The shock sent him flying backwards but then he suddenly stopped and started going forward. He is still mystified about what happened next.

His mother-in-law screamed and began to run towards him. He was wondering what was going on. She ran right by where he was standing to where he was lying on the ground. Anthony then realized that he was dead. His exact thought was, “Oh s*** I’m dead.” But he had no emotion about it.

He could see the lady who was waiting to use the phone after him. Fortuitously, she was a trained emergency medical nurse and started CPR on him as his mother in-law watched frantically. Anthony could see and hear them both but they couldn’t see or hear him.

The NDE

The first realization he had was that he had remained conscious through the experience of transitioning from the physical to the spiritual, so that body laying down must not really be him. He was in a spiritual form. His consciousness was with him. His thoughts were with him. He concluded that consciousness must be his true identity, not his physical body.

The second realization was that he had no emotion associated with the fact that he was dead.

He started floating up the stairs. As he looks down at his legs, he sees that they were starting to dissolve. He was becoming a spirit form. At the top, he went through the wall to see his family. They were all having fun painting faces. He thought, “they will be fine.” He had no emotion about never seeing them again.

He floated out of the building. As he left the building he is wrapped in a blueish white light. He felt an overwhelming sensation of absolute love and peace. It was like falling in a river of pure positive energy which he thought was God.

He knew where he was going and it was not to be feared. In fact, he felt he was being taken someplace good. He didn’t know where he was going but he was very happy about the journey. He had a brief review of the highlights and low-lights of his life. It was not an in-depth review.

As soon as he began to really enjoy the blissful joy he was experiencing he was reunited with his body and the pain of the burns on his face and foot. It was over.

He was angry. He begged God not to make him return. He went from absolute bliss to burning pain in his head and foot. He wanted the nurse to stop trying to save him.

He just wanted to go back and be with God, but he’s still unconscious in the limits of his body, but his consciousness was still active. He could see, hear, and feel everything.

After a few minutes the nurse stopped CPR and Anthony opened his eyes, sat up and thanked her.

The Aftermath

Since he survived being hit by lighting, he figured he was fine so he refused to go to the hospital. Several weeks after the accident Anthony consulted a neurologist because he was having difficulties with his memory and feeling sluggish.

The neurological exam, including an EEG and an MRI, found nothing unusual. After a few weeks his energy returned to work. Two weeks later, his memory problems disappeared. His life had apparently returned to normal.

The experience inspired Anthony to research NDEs. He believes that his consciousness is his identity. It’s the spirit that lives on. Anthony adopted a reincarnation belief that we have a memory of how many times we’ve been on this earth as different beings. Each existence is meant to help you improve as a human being. Using Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs, we all start at the bottom and work towards reaching the top of the pyramid into the state of being self-actualized.

When you reach the level of self-actualization you don’t have to return to earth again. You move up in the spirit world.

After his NDE Anthony had a insatiable desire to listen to classical music. That surprised him because he’s always been a rocker. He took piano lessons for about a year as a child but lost interest and quit. His desire to listen to classical music morphed into a desire to play classical music.

Coincidently, Anthony’s baby sitter came to him and asked if he would let her store her piano for a year. Anthony took full advantage of having a piano in his house.

He would get up at 4:30am and play on it until 6:30am before going to work. At night after his kids went to bed, he would play until about midnight.

One night at about 3am, Anthony had a vivid dream of himself wearing a tuxedo and playing the piano at a concert hall in front of an audience.

Watching himself play he comes to the realization that the music he was playing was his own. He was able to remember most of the music and started writing his own compositions.

Anthony feels the music is emotional and that is important because emotions touch people and he feels music is why God sent him back.

Anthony has also embraced meditation as a way of experiencing the spiritual world an as an avenue to awakening.

Audio CD

Notes From an Accidental Pianist and Composer by Dr. Tony Cicoria

Chapter Four

George Rodonaia

“People who believed God were idiots.”

While most NDEers are dead for up to 30-minutes, Russian Atheist Scientist George Rodonaia says he was dead for three days. He was run over by the KGB while walking on the sidewalk and pronounced dead at the scene.

A gifted intellect, in 1976 at age 20 George Rodonaia was already a practicing doctor in the country of Georgia. He never believed in God. He never read the Bible and never thought about God or divinity. He thought that people who believed God were idiots.

Unhappy with the prospects in his country, he attempted to leave his country and move to America. He was also a vocal Soviet dissident during the time when such a stance could get him killed and it did.

The Murder

On a chilly Friday night, George was waiting for a cab to take him to the airport to fly to New York when a car suddenly swerved onto the sidewalk and hit him. He flew 30 feet in the air and then the car ran over him again to finish him off.

George was taken to the hospital and pronounced dead. Ironically the doctors who pronounced him dead were his friends in the medical field.

Because the death was considered to be politically motivated, George was placed in a freezer in the morgue to allow for an autopsy on Monday morning.

The NDE

George was in total darkness. He was in no pain. He was aware of who he was but he was in the blackness of a place darker than he ever imagined. The darkness pressed upon him and terrified him. He had no idea where he was. He went into a mind-loop question, “How can I be when I am not?”

George struggled to gain control of his fear. Why was he in darkness? What was he to do? In an interesting example of awareness during an NDE, he recalled the famous line from Descartes‚ “I think therefore I am.” That helped him to settle down and contemplate his situation.

His thought process was that he had to stay positive. He had to resist the pull of panic and a negative outlook in the darkness. As soon as he thought that being positive would bring light it did.

George was immersed in a strong, bright light life a camera flash that never goes off. At first, it was too bright for his eyes. As he adjusted to it, he began to feel warm and comforted.

He began to see molecules atoms, protons, and neutrons flying round him. He took joy in the symmetry of what seemed like the chaos unfolding in front of him. He saw the universal connection of life and nature.

George felt his physical body was a limitation that he happily discarded.

Time no longer existed as he went through his life-review. He saw his life from birth to death all at once. He saw every event in his life but had no regrets or shame for any of them. He was content.

The light continued to radiate a joyful sense of peace to him. He was learning that all the physical limitations of human life were nothing when compared to this reality. He felt a wholeness and unity with the light and that everything was connected.

All of time and space was available to him. He had a sudden urge to learn the Bible so he went back and visited the minds of Jesus and his apostles. He heard their conversations and experienced what they experienced even though he had no body. He was pure consciousness. All communication was non-verbal.

He was deeply enjoying what he was experiencing when he suddenly felt as though someone had grabbed his head and pushed it down. He instantly returned to his body and felt the pain of a scalpel cutting into his abdomen.

His body was cold and he was shivering. Much to the shock of the doctors, he opened his eyes. They took him to the hospital where he spent nine-months in recovery.

Aftermath

During his NDE, if George thought of a location, he was instantly there. While he attempted to communicate with people in these places he didn’t get much response, with one exception. His next door neighbor had a new baby who cried constantly. Nothing they could do would stop the child from crying. They took the child to the doctors and they couldn’t find anyway to stop the crying.

George was able to communicate non-verbally with the child. The child communicated to George that his arm hurt. George was able to see the child had a greenstick fracture in his arm.

George’s conversation with the baby next door is important because when George told people about his NDE, many were dismissive and skeptical. However, when he told his family about the baby next door, the baby was taken to a doctor who discovered that the child indeed had a greenstick fracture of his arm.

George emerged from his experience a completely changed man. Prior to his NDE he was a staunch atheist. Afterwards, he firmly believed in God. There is only one God and that is the God that showed him wondrous stories and lessons.

The primary lesson to George was that the only important work to be done in this world is to love. Love people, nature, animals and the creation itself. To show compassion and generosity.

George took a second doctorate in the psychology of religion. He then became an ordained priest in the Eastern Orthodox Church.

The former Russian atheist spent the rest of his career as pastor at St. Paul United Methodist Church in Baytown, Texas until he passed away on October 12, 2004.

Chapter Five

Dr. Mary Neal

She could feel the ligaments tearing and bones
breaking as her knees were bent backwards.

There is an old joke that I thought of while reading To Heaven and Back: A Doctor’s Extraordinary Account of Her Death, Heaven, Angels and Life Again, by Dr. Mary Neal. In the joke, “The flood waters were rising, a man was on the roof of his house. A man in a row boat came by to rescue him. The man on the roof said he would wait for God to save him.

The flood waters kept rising and then a man in a motor boat came by and told the man to get in to be rescued. The man said he had faith in God and would wait for Him to save him. The flood waters kept rising.

A helicopter then came by, lowered a rope and the pilot shouted down to the man to climb up the rope to be rescued. He told the pilot that he had faith in God and would wait for God to rescue him.

The flood waters kept rising and the man drowned. When he got to heaven, he asked God where he went wrong. He told God that he had faith, but God had let him drown. “What more do you want from me?” asked God. “I sent you two boats and a helicopter.”

Mary had three Divine interventions in her youth yet put God on the back burner until her NDE.

As a teenager, Mary Neal was a passenger in a car that went over a ravine and while tumbling she clearly heard God say to her, “I am with you.” She relaxed and enjoyed the ride down.

At age 15, she volunteered to help an American missionary couple living in the mountains of central Mexico where they were holding Bible camps and running a rudimentary medical clinic.

Mary had little interest in their evangelical work and was more focused on the adventure and medical side of the offer. When she asked questions her hosts suggested she pray for guidance. She thought they were crazy.

Now she says God should get all the credit for her success and that some patients would not have lived without His intervention.

Years later she called out to God to help her and a friend find their way out of a cave and felt the prayer was answered.

Unlike the poor guy in the joke who drowned, Mary survived these extraordinary events though spirituality was still not a driving force in her life. Though she was a Christian and believed the Bible is the word of God, her desire for success trumped her desire to move closer to God.

As an adult she was also skeptical of near death experiences until she drowned while on vacation in Chile.

The Accident

While paddling down a river on the last day of vacation with her husband, her boat dropped down a waterfall and was pinned between rocks and another boat. She was under water for nearly 30-minutes.

Mary’s legs were broken and she had lung problems after the accident. Her vivid description of feeling both of her knees break and ligaments tearing is an unusual illustration of the expanded clarity many NDEs talk about during and after the death event.

The NDE

Water engulfed her boat. She made attempts to surface to no avail. She again asked for His intervention but not to be saved but just that His will be done. At that moment she felt an instant feeling of peace, calm, and of being held and comforted.

Though she never saw Him, she is certain her comforter was Jesus Christ. Mary thought, “How can He be helping me when there are billions of people in need?” It instantly made sense. This is Jesus Christ, He is here for all of us.

Jesus took her through a brief life review. Like many life reviews this was less about judgment but more about the ripple-like effects her actions had on others. Mary describes the profound power of seeing the effects of her words and actions dozens of times removed.

It’s interesting that while this was happening Mary describes still feeling the water around her body and she was fully aware of her dire situation. She thought about her family and how they would do without her. Once she was assured they would be okay she actually got impatient with Jesus to move things along to the next part of the journey.

The Guides

As her soul ascended the water Mary was met by a group of radiant spirits and experienced great joy at the feeling she had known them forever. As with virtually all NDEs communication was non-verbal and instant. The energy was one of a celebration.

The Light

Mary describes the source of brilliant light as a large hall that was pulling them towards the entry. The light enveloped her in an unconditional love far beyond her imagination or experience. She felt all of her questions would be answered in that radiant hall.

At the same time, she was aware that her body had been pulled ashore and her husband was calling for her. She actually got annoyed with the pleas for her to return because she wanted to go into the hall.

However, like Carl Jung being prohibited from entering the temple in his NDE, Mary was informed that she was not to enter the hall. Her time on earth is not yet up. Despite her protests, she returned to her body.

Conversation with an Angel

Later, laying in the hospital bed Mary suddenly found herself sitting in a sun-drenched field having a conversation with an angel. She asked many questions of the angel such as “Why do bad things happen to good people?”

To Mary, the message is that God loves everyone. We are all here under His plan. The beggar outside a rich man’s office teaches that man compassion. The earth and the humans are truly interconnected. All actions have a reaction.

The Aftermath

Mary struggled to recover from her injuries. In addition to two legs broken at a the knees, she had advanced pneumonia and a severely inflamed lungs.

In addition to a mandate that she share her NDE lessons with others, Mary sees one of the reasons she was sent back was to help her family deal with the loss of her son Willie sometime later.

In a fascinating juxtaposition, though Mary was saved by God on more than one occasion as a teenager, at age 4 or 5 Willie predicted he would never reach age 18 and he didn’t. He was instantly killed when he was hit by a car while roller skiing. Willie was 10-years old.

After writing her book, Mary has been profiled my many media outlets and is an active speaker on the subject of NDEs.

Book: To Heaven and Back: A Doctor’s Extraordinary Account of Her Death, Heaven, Angels and Life Again

www.DrMaryNeal.com

Chapter Six

Joyce Hawkes Ph.D.

As an avowed atheist, Joyce had no reference point for heaven or spiritual events like she
was experiencing.

Biophysicist and cell biologist Joyce Hawkes Ph.D. was the head of a research laboratory in Seattle, Washington in the 1970s.

On a cool December day in 1976, she was engaged in one of her least favorite activities-housecleaning. She didn’t enjoy cleaning and was rushing through the process vacuuming her bed room, hallway, and had nearly finished the living room when a large, heavy framed art piece fell on her head.

She dropped to the floor and remained conscious long enough to feel a sharp pain shoot through her body and then she was out cold.

The NDE

Joyce instantly entered a long tunnel with a beautiful and welcoming light. Just before the entrance to the lighted area stood her dead mother and grandmother.

They were radiant and in good health, glowing with love, and welcomed her non-verbally. Joyce was overwhelmed to see them. Since she had no belief in an afterlife, she was astonished to see them.

It seemed like they were together for an eternity, and yet she moved on without remorse or sadness into the place where the light was stronger still.

Joyce was amazed at the beauty of what she saw. The sky was a beautiful rich shade of blue. The luminous.colors lifted her spirit. Everything was basked in this light.

She was standing on a rise with a view of rolling hills lush in greenery. All colors were beautiful. The flowers glowed as though they were casting their own light.

Joyce enjoyed being immersed in peace and tranquility. She felt a humming of joy from within. She knew she never wanted to leave this place. She felt totally aware; more-so than she had ever felt.

Joyce walked down the hill into a valley all while enjoying the beautiful sites. She had no sense of time. She felt as if she had been released from the limitations of time and was simply in the present.

Prior to this event, Joyce was a staunch atheist. She had no reference point for heaven or spiritual events like she was experiencing. She also had no fear nor did she have a desire to leave.

Without notice Joyce was whisked back to her living room floor. Her head hurt and her hair was matted with blood.

The Aftermath

Joyce didn’t seek medical care until her co-workers insisted she see a doctor. His exam revealed a blood clot on her brain but it didn’t require surgery. She was sent home to rest for a few weeks.

At first, she tried to dismiss her NDE but she couldn’t forget the tremendous feeling of peace, joy, and clarity. As her awareness of the after-life expanded so did her appreciation of her human life.

Her consciousness expanded and created a new awareness of possible realities. At first, she tried to put her NDE out of her mind, but she couldn’t dismiss the clarity she had felt.

Her NDE gave Joyce a new appreciation for life. In fact, she felt that her life was given back to her for a reason and that reason is to help people.

After her NDE, Joyce noticed her hands emitted heat for some people and she was able to connect with people through her hands in an extra-sensory manner that she did not have before.

She felt she had developed a healing power as a result of her NDE and was moved to answer God’s calling that she use her powers to help.

Joyce began to research NDEs and started training with a local healer. She began to meditate daily and was experiencing a profound calling to healing.

Joyce traveled throughout India, Bali, and the Philippines to study with healers and earned a Masters’ Degree in Pastoral Ministry at Seattle University.

Seven years after the NDE she resigned her position at the research laboratory and opened a healing practice.

Joyce left science and entered the spiritual world of healing. To her, healing is about love. God is all about love and Joyce Hawkes feels she was with God during her NDE.

Official Website: http://www.CellLevelHealing.com

Book: Resonance: Nine Practices for Harmonious Health and Vitality

Chapter Seven

Dr. Ronald Whitaker

What did that guy on the cross 2,000 years
ago have to do with me?

In the mid-1970s physician Ronald Whitaker was a partier who was out of control with his drinking and drugging. He was a well connected physician with friends in the entertainment business like Hoyt Axton and Ringo Starr.

In late 1974, Axton invited Ronald to attend a TV special in LA. He knew there would be lots of booze and partying so he was excited to go. After a few days out west though he began to feel ill. He started having severe abdominal pain.

He traveled home and checked into Wadley Hospital in Texarkana in February of 1975. Ronald had acute hemorrhagic necrotic pancreatitis. Rarely, do people survive that disease. You can live with pancreatitis. You can even live with acute pancreatitis but acute hemorrhagic necrotic pancreatitis is pretty much a death sentence. His potassium, chlorides and various chemicals were so far out of balance that they had to give him IVs in an attempt to bring them close to normal levels.

At that time he was a hard core atheist and was only living for himself. After surgery, awakened hooked up to a respirator to breath for him. He couldn’t speak and had been in a coma yet he heard doctors and nurses talk about him. They were saying that he did not have much of a chance to live. They said he would never leave the hospital.

After three days, he was able to breath again. His doctor Donald Duncan told him, “If you have anything to get right now is the time to do it. If you need anything signed get it done because we don’t know how much time you have.”

Duncan told Ronald’s two sons that he would be dead before the next morning. Ronald was aware of this and scared that he was a professed atheist who didn’t believe in God.

Ronald believed in the power of the universe because he had seen it. As a physician, he dealt with life and death. He believed in something but had little patience for people who talked to him about God.

For the most part his peer group of doctors, researchers, and scientists did not believe in God. They did not believe in a supreme being. Everything had to be described by science; which by it’s very nature is lagging in reality.

Ronald worked his way up from Oklahoma welfare to being one of the most powerful men in that part of the country. He says, “It’s easy to be an atheist when you’re young and successful. It’s easy to be an atheist when you have done all of that. But it’s very difficult to be an atheist when you’re on your deathbed because you begin to think, ‘What if these people are right?’”

Ronald recalled that his friend Ron Short had talked to him about Christianity. Ron Short had witnessed to Ronald about the love of Jesus for five years before he became ill. Ronald debated him but he liked him because he did what he said he was going to do. He was the only one that Ronald saw that professed to be a Christian that lived like a Christian.

Ronald respected Ron Short. He didn’t agree with him, but he respected him. Now that was on his deathbed, Ron Short was the first person to pop into his head.

Ronald started thinking “What if Ron is right? What if there is a God? How do I get saved? What is saved? What did that man hanging on a cross 2,000 years ago have to do with me?” He sent for Ron Short. Ron could not get to the hospital until the next morning. Ronald had to hold on for one more long nightmarish day.

The NDE

That night as Ronald was laying in bed, he would begin to fade away and as he would fade away, he began to go down into darkness. It was so dark. It was like the darkness penetrated his very being as he left his body. In other NDEs people talk about a light. They talk about floating above. They describe a feeling of warmth and love. Ronald didn’t feel any of that. He felt untold terror.

Ronald was terrified because he knew that if he ever went all the way into the darkness, he would never get back. He knew that so he fought all night long not to go down again. The hospitals orderlies told him later that he pulled the mattress cover off of the mattress. He was fighting to stay until Ron Short arrived to save him.

Ronald’s skin began to get cold but not like the cold you feel when you walk into a cold evening. It’s a bone chilling cold in his lower extremities that he felt moving up. He sensed this as each part of his body moved to that dark place he wanted nothing to do with.

He was leaving his body into the darkness and he would be in the void again. When he returned to his body he actually felt his body thud or plunk down when returned.

This was the most terrifying experience that he’d ever encountered. He fought all night long waiting for Ron Short to arrive. When he did, it was around 9am the next morning. Ron’s first question was, “How much time do you have?” Ronald’s reply was “None.”

Ron led Ronald through the Sinner’s Prayer. Ron told him that Jesus had died for his sins. He had died for the sins of the world. Ronald didn’t quite understand all of that, but he was not questioning anything. As a physician, Ronald was trained in books. Now Ron introduced Ronald to a new book, the Holy Bible.

As Ron led Ronald through the Sinner’s Prayer and Ronald repeated the words, he experienced an inner-peace unlike anything he had ever encountered. He had searched for that peace in alcohol, in drugs, in women, even in needles.

There was no peace in his life until he accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. Though he knew he was possibly hours away from death, he was no longer afraid. People do not survive his illness. Ronald knows this logically because he is a doctor, but he is also not God.

The Aftermath

Ronald had a full recovery. He takes no medication and is convinced he was saved by God.

Chapter Eight

Dr. Lisa Hurtt

No one dies alone.

At age 37, Lisa Hurtt had it all. A beautiful home, fancy cars, and a boat that would end up turning her idyllic world upside down.

The Accident

On June 19th, 2005 Lisa and her soon to be ex-husband took their boat out on the Lake of the Ozarks with another couple. The day didn’t go especially well as Lisa and her husband were constantly fighting.

After a long day, they were trying to get back to the hotel. The husband of the other couple was driving the boat. The sun was down and they stopped to get their bearings.

As soon as they stopped, a 19-year old driving a cigarette boat ran right over the top of Lisa’s boat. The boat was cut in half, her husband was knocked unconscious and Lisa was hit in the head by flying shrapnel. She fell into the part of the boat that was sinking and.drowned. She was dead for 28-minutes.

Her friend awoke Lisa’s husband and they both pulled her aboard but couldn’t resuscitate her. The cigarette boat came back and took them to the shore where the paramedics resuscitated her. They took her to the local hospital to stitch her head up, and then airlifted her to Columbia Hospital. The outlook was not good. The doctors told her husband that she may not make it.

She was placed in a medically induced coma for 28-days because her lungs were full of water and she had a brain injury.

The NDE

Lisa, like most NDErs, has no words to describe her experience. This is an important point to make. We are limited by our own vocabulary and references. Clearly there are, sounds, colors, and experiences on the other side that we have no words to describe because we’ve never seen them before. As uncommon as they seem to us in everyday life, they seem to be pretty common in these NDEs which makes describing them difficult.

Upon impact, Lisa instantly was lifted into the light by two angelic beings. She went into the light and felt a wonderful love, peace, and harmony beyond anything she had experienced. It was a stress and pain free existence on the other side.

The angelic beings were tall and had a blue eyes and.Mediterranean skin though they were androgynous. They had long hair and long white robes rather than wings. They were the most beautiful creatures she had ever seen.

They communicated telepathically. She learned that no matter how horrific your accident is you will feel no pain in that realm. You are shielded from pain.

She was told she would face some hardships when she returned but that she must not take her own life. She was told to spread the word that there is nothing to fear on the other side.

She learned that no one dies alone. She had two angelic beings come to her and she feels that you are stripped of your stress, anger, and ill-will toward others when you passover. All of the stress is released and you are greeted and guided as you move into the after-life.

If you’ve had a fight with someone and the last encounter they have with you is negative before they die, they will not carry that anger to the other side. There is only love on the other side.

One message she received stood out. God has no religion. All of the ascended masters play a part in this. God is love, light, and energy. That is God. We are made in God’s image, but that refers to the energy and the light of love. We are made in His image but most of us do not turn our light on and love.

While many NDE stories include a visit with God or Jesus Christ, Lisa felt a connection with every ascended master in history though she didn’t see any human forms except the angelic beings who were actually more light than form.

The Aftermath

The hardships described to her started with the physical pain of her injuries. Though she was going through a divorce at the same time, her soon to be ex-husband took care of her and helped a great deal in her recovery.

The long-term hardship was the massive medical bills Lisa racked up because she had no health insurance.

Lisa wrote a book, Divinely Blessed: A Journey of Light, on how the NDE changed her life. She helps people to turn tragedy into transformation and is using the lessons she learned on the other side to help others. She earned a Ph.D. in Holistic Healing and hosts her web-radio show, Simply Spiritual Solutions on WebTalkRadio.com,

Book: Divinely Blessed: A Journey of Light

http://webtalkradio.net/simply-spiritual-solutions

Website http://DrLisaHurtt.com

Chapter Nine

Mary Jo Rappini

If this the light tunnel my patients tell me about?
If so, I’m not impressed.

The day before Easter Sunday in 2003 psychotherapist Mary Jo Rapini was at Gold’s gym lifting weights. She pushed herself to do one more rep when something popped in her head. It was a scary feeling. It felt as if her body was falling apart. She started sweating profusely, got a massive headache and her vision was reduced to two little pinholes out the sides. Everything sounded as though she was underwater.

In the ambulance, Mary Jo was starting to panic. As a nurse she thought she’d broken her neck. In reality she had a cerebral aneurysm.

As the pain increased, she said something she’d heard her patients say that she never thought she’d have the strength to say, “God, Your will be done, not mine. I can’t handle this. This is too big for me to take care of. Please help me with this. ”

Instantly, she felt safe and secure even though she was seriously ill. The ambulance took her to the hospital where she and her physician husband worked at. They rushed her to the cat-scanner and discovered her head was full of blood.

She laid in the hospital for four days without having surgery but her conditioned worsened. There are drains in the back of the head to help keep the spinal fluid balanced. When she had a cerebral aneurysm the drains opened so the blood can drain, but blood coagulated and clogged up the drains. There was so much blood in Mary Jo’s head that they couldn’t drain it out. This made her condition terminal unless they opened her skull up.

The NDE

It was during the recovery that she had her NDE.

When Mary Jo initially saw the light she asked herself, “Is this the light tunnel my patients tell me about? If so, I’m not impressed.” But the light got brighter and larger and she folded into it. It was a warm loving feeling and she had no fear.

Mary Jo was moving through the light though she had no sense of having a body.

She came out into a magnificent room, though she didn’t see any walls. It was a brilliant color that defies human language but she says pink is as close as she can get. The color was loving and accepting.

Mary Jo sensed that God was holding her. She felt a love from God that was not a human love. The love we experience on earth as humans pales in comparison.

God told Mary Jo, much to her disappointment, that she couldn’t stay. She protested because what she saw was profoundly beautiful and beyond anything she’d ever experienced. She did not want to leave.

Mary Jo pleaded that she was a good person and treated people well. She works at the cancer center for only $600 a month. She’s on 24-hour call and is always available to help. She shortly realized these were ego driven reasons that only served her interests. He told he she still had work to do. She had not done enough.

God then asked her, “Have you ever loved the way you’ve been loved here?” He replied, “No. It’s impossible. I’m a human.” In sort of a cosmic chuckle, His reply was, “You can do better.”

Then she was back in her bed surrounded by the surgeons, nurses, and her husband who was crying. He told her she needed surgery and said, ‚“You could die.” She replied, “I can’t die. I was just with God and He told me I couldn’t die yet.” Her husband thought she was hallucinating.

Dying Brings Healing

As someone who has worked with cancer patients for years Mary Jo has observed countless families praying for their family members. When God doesn’t heal their bodies people are disappointed and often angry. Naturally, it seems unfair for a good person to suffer.

As a result of her NDE, Mary Jo believes that the body is limited and as it’s dying the spirit is being healed. When she was suffering she felt that process helped to heal her spirit and make her a better person. It prepared her to be used by God in a way that was not possible prior to the illness because of her pride and ego.

Before the illness she wanted success and material possessions. In the end, none of that matters. The body is limited by the ravages of time. That has nothing to do with God’s timeless world. Those wants and desires are part of the limited human world.

The Aftermath

Like many people Mary Jo found inspiration out of desperation. Turning your fate over to God’s will is incredibly difficult when you are well. When you’re facing death or massive pain it gets a whole lot easier.

Her NDE made Mary Jo a far more spiritual person. She saw people differently. She became more compassionate and less needy for her own wants. She felt complete, which relieved her of want or need.

Mary Jo believes that all of us can have the experience she had, but she doesn’t know what happens next or if it is the same for all of us since she was sent back.

Even though she got well, Mary Jo still had to get help with depression. She found the after-life to be so beautiful and she knew she could never experience that level of love in her earthly existence.

Mary Jo still feels a sense of loneliness. Despite her interaction with God, she sometimes feels rejected by God because He returned her to earth.

It’s also frustrating for her to be in the medical field and have people dispute her story as nothing more than a hallucination caused by the aneurysm.

More than that, it’s the knowledge Mary Jo has that this is not the real world. Your body will end, but your spirit never ends. You’re never more alive than you are when you’re with God.

Mary Jo was always a spiritual person but felt God was a spirit and could not intervene with us on a human level. She doesn’t feel that way now. When she prays to Him, talks to Him, sings to Him, He is with her.

Mary Jo knows God is using her in ways she could have never imagined. She never enjoyed writing yet she’s authored two books and writes columns for major newspapers and magazines.

She now has a thriving practice as a psychotherapist in Houston. She is a media regular on issues of intimacy and relationships which is a perfect fit for someone blessed to be taught directly by God that love is all that matters.

She is the author of Is God Pink? Dying to Heal which describes her NDE. and “Start Talking” which gives mothers and daughters the tools to start important conversations and strengthen their relationship.

Book: Is God Pink?: Dying to Heal

http://www.MaryJoRapini.com

Chapter Ten

Dr. Eben Alexander

Between what he experienced as a surgeon and
the rejection of his own mother, his faith in a
loving God was crushed.

Much of the inspiration for this book came from this story. Dr. Eben Alexander is a neurosurgeon with stellar credentials. He was a resident and research fellow at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital and is certified by the American Board of Neurological Surgery and the American College of Surgeons. He taught at Duke University Medical Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, University of Massachusetts Medical School, and the University of Virginia Medical.

Eben’s father was an academic neurosurgeon and the head of neurosurgery at Wake Forest. He had trained during the World War Two years. He learned the craft of neurosurgery in the jungles of New Guinea and the Philippines and according to Eben his father got through that as a result of a strong spiritual core.

His father obviously also had a strong scientific sense. You might say Eben’s father was of the era when having a strong spiritual and scientific core were not mutually exclusive.

Despite being raised in a faith based home and attending a Methodist church, Eben‚‘s interest in science challenged his faith early. He recalls having active debates with this 6th grade Sunday school teacher about issues of God, heaven and science.

After seven years of residency training mainly at Duke, some at Mass General, a fellowship up in Northern England and 15 years teaching at Harvard Medical School on advanced neurosurgery Alexander worshiped science more than faith.

Another key factor in how he viewed the world was the discovery that he was adopted. His oldest son helped him search for and reach out to his birth mother but she declined to see him in 2000. Between what he experienced as a neurosurgeon and the rejection of his own mother, his faith in a loving God was crushed.

The Illness

At his home in Lynchburg, VA on November 10, 2008 at age fifty–four, Eben Alexander, M.D. awoke about 4:30am with severe back pain. What he initially thought were back spasms was actually the rapid onset of a rare form of spinal meningitis, e-coli bacteria.

To understand the severity of this strain of spontaneous e coli meningitis has an incidence of around 1 in 10–million per year or less.

His wife Holly thought he was resting so she left him alone and called some of his colleagues to ask them what to do next. Two hours later, she checked in on him and he was having a grand mal seizure on the bed.

She called 911 and the first responders couldn’t break the seizure. In fact, they took him seizing into the ER even though they’ve given him a lot of diazepam and Ativan trying to break it.

One of his colleagues there, Dr. Laura Potter said she didn’t recognize him when they brought him in. According to her, he looked like someone who was going to die quickly. It took seven orderlies to hold him down for the lumbar puncture.

Interestingly, though he was groaning and screaming for an hour or so when at one point the faithless Eben Alexander screamed, “God help me!” They were the last words he would speak for seven days.

To get an idea of how severe the meningitis was his CSF glucose–the sugar level in the spinal fluid is normally 60 to 80. In somebody with a bad case of meningitis, it might be down to 20. His was down to 1.

Furthermore, the onset of the progression of the disease from back pain to severe headache into coma and a grand mal epileptic seizure is typically within 24–hours yet his was within 3–4 hours. At that point 90% die. He did not respond for several days to antibiotics so his odds of survival diminished from 10% down to 2–3% by the end of the week.

Had Eben been his own doctor, he would have told the patient’s family that the odds of a neurological recovery were very limited and that he would probably spend the rest of his life in a nursing home if he survived.

As if that was not enough to garner this books‚ “Miracle Recovery Honors” it is highly unusual for patients lucky enough to survive such an onslaught to have any memory at all for within the experience. Eben remembers everything.

Meningitis works to wipe–out the neocortex, the outer surface of the brain which is the part that makes us human. This is a major fact in this NDE. His neocortex was shut down. Consciousness had to operate outside of the neocortex.

The NDE

In an uncharacteristic opening NDE scene, Eben first recalls a visible darkness. He was within a blurry type of “dirty jello” that was suffocating. At the same time, he felt a rhythmic pulsing or pounding in the air and land.

Eben was unaware of having a body. In fact, he was unaware of language, emotion, logic, memories, family, even his own name. He felt as though he had regressed back to the beginning of time, but like most NDEs, time doesn’t exist.

Being there was all he knew. He was simply in the present with no knowledge of past or future.

The Revealing

As Eben’s awareness expanded, he saw or sensed root like growths around him. He likens the experience to being a worm in a ground tangled with roots and growth. Later he called this the Realm of the Earthworms Eye View.

As he became more uncomfortable in this realm of worms, repulsive animal faces began to emerge from the mud and muck emitting pained sounds and submerging. Some sounds seemed like ancient chants.

He began to experience smell and it was not a pleasant odor. He describes it as a biological death.

Though his anxiety increased as his awareness of his macabre surroundings increased he had no idea where to go or what to do about it.

The Light

A pure white light, tinged in gold, descended accompanied by the richest, most complex, most beautiful piece of music you’ve ever heard.

Eben perceived an opening in the light and rapidly entered a world totally the opposite of what he had been experiencing. It was “the strangest, most beautiful world he’d ever seen.

Familiarly, he cites a lack of words powerful enough to describe what he saw and experienced.

The Landscape

Eben describes an earth that is not quite like our earth. He saw adults, children, even dogs all playing, singing, running and jumping. Most of all, he felt the place was completely real indeed,”hyper–real.” People wore simple “peasant–like” clothes that had pleasant, warm colors.

The Guide

Eben notices a beautiful girl and realizes they are riding on the wing of a butterfly. They spoke without speaking. The message was essentially, “You are loved. You have nothing to fear. You can do no wrong here.” For Eben the effect was instant relief.

She said that they will teach him but he must return. Eben had no idea where he was from or where they might return him to.

Angels

He saw beautiful winged shimmering orbs soaring across the sky that he sensed were higher entities.

Eben describes hearing and seeing as a blended experience as hearing beauty and seeing the music. It seemed as though you became part of everything you saw and heard.

The wisdom of the divine came to him in the form of a beautiful warm wind. His questions were answered instantly in an explosion of light, color, love, and beauty. Like the guide, the answers were nonverbal.

Interestingly, Eben uses the pronoun “Om” for God. While Om is a mantra used in Buddhist meditation, he associates Om with omniscient and omnipotent.

The Om told him love was at the center of all of the universes and there were many and that evil is required for us to have free will.

Aftermath

Eben describes his NDE in some ways as a perfect–storm of near–death experiences. As a practicing neurosurgeon with decades of research and hands–on work in the operating room he was in a much better–than–average position to judge the experience and its implications.

Before his NDE, Eben would have said any such experience was caused by the brain. The brain creates consciousness is the theory for materialistic thinkers and atheists who believe that when the brain dies consciousness dies.

After his NDE, the implications were beyond description. His experience showed him that the death of the brain and body are not the end of consciousness. Human experience continues after death. He states that the after–life is under the gaze of God who loves and cares about each of us and about where the universe itself and all the beings with it are ultimately going.

Eben is convinced his NDE is impossible to explain through typical neuroscience. If anyone is qualified to know, it’s Eben Alexander M.D.

Book:.Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s

Journey into the Afterlife

http://www.LifeBeyondDeath.net

Luke 18:16

But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.”

Introduction

John J. Graden

The first thing I discovered in compiling good stories of the near-death experiences of children is that there are not very many. There are tons of stories, but the stories I share have to go through a media vetting process first. I will not share long-drawn out stories by children speaking to the camera at the behest of their parents describing their NDE.

That said, there are some excellent stories in this short book. These kids have some fascinating accounts to share.

What is intriguing about these stories is that consistently, the child sees things, events, places, people both past and present that they should have little or zero knowledge of prior to the NDE.

Kids don’t typically have an agenda though no doubt some of their parents may. I’ve tried to weed through the tons of stories to bring you what I think are the seven best stories of near-death experiences of children.

Most of these are short stories and that’s hard to avoid as most kids are not the most articulate at describing the amazing visions and experiences they’ve had. Still, if you’d like an entertaining short read, this should be for you.

If you like it, please tell your friends and give it a nice review or star rating. If you don’t like it, drop me a note at johngraden@mac.com and suggest how I can improve it. I also enjoy good feed back.

Thank you,

John J. Graden

Author

“Near-Death Experiences of Children.”

“Near-Death Experiences: Doctors and Scientists Go on the Record About God, Heaven, and the After-Life.”

“Near-Death Experiences: Suicide Survivors.”

“Near-Death Experiences in Hell.”

Chapter 1

Colton Burpo

4-Year Old Meets His Unborn Sister in Heaven

At the gates of Heaven, he was greeted with a huge hug
by a young girl. She said, “I am your sister.”

Colton Burpo is the son of Todd Burpo, a small town pastor at Crossroads Wesleyan Church in Imperial, Nebraska. When Colton was nearly 4-years old (3-years, 10-months) in 2003, he became very ill.

Stomach flu was going around at the time, so his family was not too concerned. However, Colton didn’t get better and one day became limp and lifeless. His family rushed him to a doctor.

They learned that his appendix had burst and an infection was spreading throughout his body. He had to go in for emergency surgery. Tood say Colton being rolled away on the gurney and screaming, “Daddy, don’t let them take me!”

Immediately after Colton was rolled away, his mother Sonya got on the phone and started to get Colton’s name on prayer chains around the area. She believed strongly in the power of prayer and she made it her mission to recruit as many people as she could as fast as she could.

While Sonya got to work, Colton’s last words on the gurney haunted Todd’s ears. Hearing his son terrified plea for help tore into Todd’s heart. He was a pastor, a husband, and a father. He was the support for so many people and Colton begging his father to not let the doctors take him away felt like he was failing his roles.

Todd decided he needed time to himself to pray for his son’s safety. He found an empty room to escape to. He was scared to death that he couldn’t protect his family.

His prayer was raw and different from his sermons. It carried a desperate, angry edge. Todd wanted answers. How could this be happening to them? He was a good Christian man raising a good Christian family? Why was this happening?

He referenced the story of David and begged God to give him the same outcome. To save his son.

Afterwards, Todd went back to the waiting room. Sonya was angry with him for leaving her for so long. She had made so many calls, that her phone charge died and she wanted to use his phone, but she couldn’t find him. She was upset about the lost time. She was not done trying to save her son. Todd didn’t tell her about the contentious prayer he just performed.

While she stayed busy on the phone, Todd simply sat feeling frustrated and helpless.

Colton’s surgery was problematic, and during the hour and a half procedure, he.went to Heaven.

At the gates of Heaven, he was greeted with a huge hug by a young girl. She said, “I am your sister.” She explained to Colton that she was conceived after his older sister Cassie but she was miscarried. 4-year old Colton had never been told of this.

She led him into the throne room of God and Jesus then appeared. Colton was scared and confused. Jesus calmed him down by having the angels sing to him. Colton heard his favorite songs from the church, including “Jesus Loves Me” and “Joshua Fought the Battle in Jericho.” It was then that Colton began to get a sense of what was happening and where he was.

He saw many historical figures in the throne room with Jesus including Samson, King David, the apostles Peter and John. He even met Jesus’ mother Mary. Jesus showed him his horse and sat Colton on his lap, explaining how the Holy Spirit sends power from Heaven to help people every day.

Colton spent his entire time in Heaven with Jesus. Colton loved His sparkling and beautiful eyes. Jesus began showing Colton previews and reviews of the past, present, and future.

For the past, Colton met his great-grandfather, but he looked young. His grandfather explained that everyone in Heaven looks as they did in their 20s and 30s and that kids who died grew to their prime in Heaven. Then his grandfather told him stories about playing with his father when he was a boy.

Then Jesus showed Colton the future. He told Colton there was going to be an Armageddon. The angels, good people, and Jesus would battle the demons, bad people, and Satan. Colton watches it happen and sees his own father in battle. It takes a long time, but Colton sees Jesus win the battle.

Finally, Jesus showed Colton the present-tense at the hospital. He saw his parents in separate rooms. His mother was on the phone, praying with others. His father was angrily talking to God, begging for his son to be saved. Jesus turned to Colton and says, “We are going to answer your father’s prayer and send you back to your family.”

Before he left, Colton saw God in the throne room. “He was just there. A huge presence. He was a being who radiated love. Even though He is so big, you aren’t scared of Him because He loves you so much. He helped Heaven be a happy place.”

Colton returned to his body and told his parents he almost died. It was until four months later he told his parents the whole story. They were driving in the car and Todd made a joke asking if Colton wanted to go to the hospital. Colton giggled, saying no. After a pause, he asked, “Why did the angels sing to me?”

Todd was confused. As the pastor of their church, he knew the preschool curriculum. They did not discuss angels often, only basic Bible stories and Jesus. The only time angels were mentioned were during the Nativity story at Christmas. Todd asked what he meant by the angels singing to him and Colton started telling his whole story.

The part that shocked Todd into believing the story was when Colton described watching his dad vehemently praying to God in the hospital room, something he had never told anyone about. “You don’t brag about prayers like that, even to your wife, and here is my son saying, ‘Dad, I saw you.’”

Stunned as they were, they both fully accepted his story when Colton described meeting his miscarried sister. They had to. It was the truth and they had never told him about her. 4-year olds don’t make up stories about miscarriages. Knowing that Colton had a chance to meet her helped finish their healing process from the loss.

Todd and Colton co-authored a book about Colton’s experience, Heaven is For Real and became a New York Times Bestseller. In 2014, a movie of the same name was released.

Colton continues to share the story of his amazing experience. While seeing his parents worry, meeting his sister and great-grandfather are truly astounding, the over-looked part of hit story is the warning of Armageddon. If true, that could well be the beginning, middle, and end of what makes the NDE of Colton Burpo significant.

Chapter 2

Alex Malarkey

Came Back from Death after Visiting Heaven

Alex turned to the driver’s seat to see the Devil sitting there. Grinning, the Devil pointed to Kevin and told Alex, “You just killed your daddy.”

Alex Malarkey is part of a big and religious family in the Columbus, Ohio area. He has three younger siblings and they are all home schooled by their mother. His father Kevin is a Christian-centric therapist.

Alex and Kevin are close as father and son. The were almost like best buddies and did everything together.

In 2004, Alex was six years old when the family moved to a new area. After a busy Sunday morning of moving, the family wanted to rest, but Alex and Kevin decided to go to the local church to worship.

Their new home was located in a rural area with tricky roads. Kevin pulled up to a stop sign and looked both ways for traffic. Alex asked his father a question. Kevin turned to him to answer and began pulling out without looking again. As they were turning onto the hilly road, another car crested and slammed into Kevin and Alex at 55 miles per hour.

Kevin was ejected from the car through the windshield and landed 50 feet away. He was briefly knocked unconscious, recovered, and rushed back to the car. Alex was still in the car and Kevin thought his head was hanging a little strangely. He was not breathing or moving.

A retired firefighter who lived nearby came out when he heard the crash and saw Alex was in bad shape. He did his best to keep Kevin calm who thought he had killed his own son. Together, the retired firefighter and Kevin prayed.

An ambulance was on the way to the scene of the accident. While they were on the way, the paramedic felt moved to pray. This is an action he rarely performs on the way to calls.

When they arrived, they were shocked to see Kevin moving around despite being ejected 50 feet from the car. They assessed Alex and called Life Flight to rush him to the hospital. Kevin refused to be taken to the hospital in the ambulance until Alex had taken off in the helicopter.

Alex had suffered a condition called internal decapitation. There was a severing separating his spine from his skull. In the hospital, Alex’s temperature had dropped to 91 degrees and his heart rate to 60. He also had mucus buildup that was obstructing his trachea, making it difficult for him to breathe.

Alex’s parents saw the MRI scan before they got to see their son. The doctor showed them the severity of Alex’s injuries and coldly said Alex would never be able to move, breathe on his own, or speak again if he survived. Alex’s mother flat out told the doctor he was wrong and began inviting people to pray for Alex.

The Malarkey’s new pastor rushed to the hospital when he heard about the accident. He tried his best to comfort Alex’s parents, saying he would be with Jesus now. The pastor did not realize how right he would be.

Alex was watching everything that happened after the accident. He watched as five angels lifted his father out of the car and set him gently on the side of the road. Alex turned to the driver’s seat to see the Devil sitting there. Grinning, the Devil pointed to Kevin and told Alex, “You just killed your daddy.”

Next Alex found himself going through a long white tunnel that was extremely bright. There was loud music in the tunnel played on instruments with long strings.

He did not like the music much, but once he got to Heaven there was loud and powerful music playing that he enjoyed much more. The gates of Heaven were beautiful and Alex loved how they looked like rainbow scales of a fish.

The five angels who lifted his dad out of the car surrounded Alex and comforted him and spoke of Jesus returning to earth one day. Alex then saw his father talking to God. Kevin had bad injuries and God was healing him in Heaven “to bring glory to his name.” Kevin asked God if he could trade places with Alex but God said no. He would heal Alex later on Earth. Kevin has no memory of going to Heaven.

Alex watched his father’s spirit return to his body and saw him lying in a ditch. He watched Kevin wake up and saw his body being loaded into the helicopter. Alex was pleased when the paramedics made his father get in the ambulance.

Alex watched everything that happened in the emergency room when he arrived at the hospital. He was standing near the ceiling with Jesus by his side. Since Jesus was with him, He was not afraid.

He saw doctors working on his body which looked blue. The doctors were methodically working on him, but also talking amongst themselves how unlikely it was that he would survive. Jesus turned him away from the scene when they began attaching bolts to his head.

On earth, people signed up to pray in the room with Alex before he would undergo a complicated surgery to fuse his spine back together.

Two of the women who had shifts in the room said they sensed the presence of angels with them. Another woman said she had a vision of three angels holding Alex’s head up and she painted it for his parents.

The day of the surgery, the doctors performed one last scan of his condition. They were shocked to see that his vertebrae were back in place without any actual medical assistance. While his spine was healed, Alex was still in a coma for two months. The entire time, Kevin desperately wanted to apologize to his son for the accident.

To keep things light, the family joked around in the hospital room and kept Alex’s three younger siblings happy. Alex’s younger brother Aaron was four years old and idolized his brother. He was sitting on Alex’s bed, playfully smacking his face and giggling.

After a few moments, Alex began smiling back. The whole family gathered around Alex and began joking and laughing to get him to wake up and before they knew it, Alex woke up smiling.

For a while, Alex could only respond with “yes” or “no.” Kevin noticed that Alex would seem to look through him at times. Kevin remembered what some women had told him about angels being in the room and asked Alex if that was what he was seeing. Alex would respond yes.

Kevin kept asking questions to see how many angels there were and found out the room was full of them.

Once he was able to speak, Alex said, “I’m sorry dad.” Kevin asked what in the world he could be sorry about. Alex explained that he saw the car coming but did not tell his dad about it. He then told him about the Devil being in the front seat of the car after the crash. At first, Kevin thought Alex had brain damage. But the more stories Alex told, the more convinced Kevin became of his heavenly experience.

Alex had full recollection after the accident and even knew things they had not told him, like how he had bolts in his head for a time.

Alex is now a quadriplegic and needs a ventilator to survive. However he is strong and tells everyone the stories of what he experienced in Heaven. He serves as an inspiration to his entire family and all of his siblings say that Alex is their hero.

Together, Kevin and Alex wrote a book about Alex’s journey called The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven. It became a New York Times bestseller. Alex and his siblings are home schooled and Kevin spends his time doing book tours, putting his therapy practice on hold until Alex’s story reaches far and wide.

Chapter 3

Kristle Merzlock

Drowned and Almost Stayed in Heaven

Then she saw a bright light at the end of the tunnel. The light was the most beautiful and loving light she had ever seen.

In 1982, Kristle Merzlock was seven years old and attending a children’s birthday party at a local swimming pool. Even though Kristle had only recently learned to swim, she felt comfortable playing and splashing on her own in the water.

At first she was playing in the shallow end but got bored and began walking toward the deep end on the side of the pool. A group of boys were horsing around and accidentally knocked Kristle into the deep end of the pool.

Immediately Kristle began swallowing water as she futilely gasped for air. She struggled to grab onto the top of the water and pull herself up, but her skills were not honed well enough to survive. Kristle ran out of air before anyone could get to her and she fell unconscious.

Kristle found herself in complete darkness. She slowly let her eyes adjust and did not know where she was. Then she began to see a bright light at the end of the tunnel. The light was the most beautiful and loving light she had ever experienced. Her surroundings became clear and Kristle saw the bricks on the wall of the tunnel were colorful.

At the end of the tunnel, Kristle met a woman. She came towards her, soft and slow, and introduced herself. The woman was named Elizabeth and she communicated that she was Elizabeth’s guardian angel.

Elizabeth led Kristle into and through the light to enter Heaven. As Kristle entered Heaven, she knew this was the place she wanted to be.

When she entered, she met two other girls named Heather and Melissa. They were guardian angels also, but none of them were born yet. They would soon become her friends on Earth if she chose to return.

Elizabeth showed Kristle her body and the medical team working on her. Kristle felt as if she was floating over her body as she watched the doctors sticking things in her arm and up her nose.

Kristle told Elizabeth she did not like watching all this being done to her. Kristle asked Elizabeth if she could stay in Heaven with her. Elizabeth told her that was fine and that it was Kristle’s decision.

Heaven was a beautiful place. Kristle saw plants, flowers, and gardens everywhere. It was full of peace and love. As she spent more time in Heaven, Kristle started thinking about her mother and how she would never hug her or anyone else ever again. She began to reconsider her decision to stay.

Kristle told Elizabeth she wanted to go back to earth and her mom. Elizabeth said that was her choice and to go back to her body. Kristle began walking away, then turned back and asked, “I don’t know how to go back.” Before she could find out the answer, her spirit returned to her body.

Dr. Melvin Morse and his team were the ones who received Kristle as a patient. He saw that Kristle’s pupils were fixed and dilated, indicating no brain activity. She had no normal reflexes and had a Glasgow Coma Scale score of 3. Dr. Morse thought she would not survive. He was able to save Kristle, but she was in a coma for three days.

Two weeks later, Dr. Morse met an awake Kristle for what he thought was the first time. Dr. Morse introduced himself and Kristle replied, “Oh yes, I remember you. You were putting something in my throat and working on my neck. I didn’t like it. First you worked on me in the ER and took me in a different rom.”

Dr. Morse was shocked at the knowledge she had of her resuscitation and asked her more questions. Kristle’s experience inspired Dr. Morse to interview more children who said they went to Heaven during a near death experience. He wrote a book detailing the experiences of children who had brushes with death, becoming the first reputable source on near death experiences.

Chapter 4

Jamie Untinen and Jessica Lott

Drowned and Almost Stayed in Heaven

Jamie floated out of her body and saw herself from above.

The two girls in this chapter were very young when they had their near death experience. Dr. Melvin Morse interviewed both of them about their experiences after viewing their medical history and seeing how close they came to death.

Jamie Untinen was five years old when she entered cardiac arrest unexpectedly. She came as close to death as possible while still surviving. Dr. Morse explains that another ten minutes without proper medical treatment and she would not be alive to tell her story of heaven to us all.

Jamie was rushed to the trauma center in the emergency room. She was given oxygen and had an IV placed in her arm. During her resuscitation, her heart stopped beating entirely. According to Dr. Morse, clinically speaking, she was dead.

During this time, Jamie floated out of her body and saw herself from a high vantage point. When she looked above her, she saw God and all of his angels protecting her. God told Jamie it was not her time to die yet.

He explained that Jamie’s mother was going to have a son and she had to go back to help her mom take care of her soon to be little brother. Jamie agreed and floated back down to her body and woke up in a different hospital room than the trauma center where she left her body.

When she described her near death experience to others and Dr. Morse, she was asked to draw a picture of what she experienced.

In her drawing, Jamie is seen laying on an operating table with two doctors pressing their hands on her, performing CPR and trying to get her back. Dr. Morse is seen standing at the foot of her bed with a stern look on his face. The door to the room is on the far right of the paper.

Above the image of Jamie on the operating table is another Jamie floating in the air. Jamie in the air has a smile on her face, floating near a sun. Clouds line the top of the paper and to the right in the clouds are three angels and God in front of them. Her experience was brief, but absolutely beautiful.

Jessica Lott

Jessica’s grandmother sat in a chair with
a smile on her face, completely frozen.

Jessica Lott did not have a floating out of body experience where she met God. At ten years old, Jessie became ill. Her parents believed she simply had a bad cold, but then her liver began to fail. Jessica entered a coma and her inter-cranial pressure reached 100. Her heart stopped for 20 minutes before she came back to life.

When her heart stopped, Jessica found herself in a room with her grandmother who had died a year ago. The grandmother wore a white robe and looked exactly how she did before she died. Jessica was shocked to see her grandmother and was confused, not knowing what to think about seeing her.

Jessica’s grandmother sat in a chair with a smile on her face, completely frozen. Even though Jessica was frightened about what has happening, she was very happy to see her. The next moment Jessica found herself awake in a hospital room. She told the story to her parents who are not very religious and explains she does not know where she went during that time. Her parents believed it was Heaven.

The stories of Jamie and Jessica show that as close to death as they were, both they both found safety and help in the fear of the moment.

.

Chapter 5

Ari Hallmark

Stairway to Heaven via an F-4 Tornado

After the sirens started and the house began shaking,
the next thing Ari remembers is being led up a long
staircase by an angel.

The Hallmark family lived in peaceful Arab, Alabama in 2011. Ari Hallmark was seven years old and lived with her parents, her two cousins, and her grandparents.

In February of that year, Ari said she was told in a premonition that her family would die in two months’ time. Even though this idea scared little Ari, she used the two months to treasure spending time with her family.

On April 27th, tornado sirens started blaring in the small town. Ari and her family rushed to the bathroom. Ari and her younger cousin Julie were placed in the bathtub while the rest of the family took cover on the floor. 

She remembers cows flying through the air, trucks hitting the house, glass breaking all around her. Ari says she did what she was taught at school and wrapped her arms around her legs with her head tucked in.

Her Dad was hanging onto her in the bathroom when everything started hitting the door. He was hugging her tight. They could hear trucks hitting the house. The house turned over and the sink fell out. It was fast. Then something knocked her out.

The tornado was a severe long-track F-4 rating and destroyed the small town and leveled their home.

Ari does not remember much about the tornado. After the sirens started and the house began shaking, the next thing Ari remembers is being led up a long staircase by a tall female angel with wavy blonde hair.

The angel told Ari that she would see where her family was going to go and why they could not be with her any longer. At the top of the steps, she describes seeing two huge doors. “They were really tall and had diamond handles,” she said.

The angel and Ari entered Heaven through the doors to find her whole family there. All had been killed in the tornado. Ari was struck most by her father. All her life, Ari’s father was bald and wore glasses. In Heaven, he had a full head of hair and no glasses on. Ari even noticed he did not have the markings around his face where the glasses would normally rest.

She also saw someone holding her cousin Jayden. Ari believes it was Jesus holding her.

In Heaven, Ari got a chance to say goodbye to her family. They reassured her everything was going to be okay. The angel told Ari that she had to go back down to earth and tell her story to other children who had lost their parents. Ari was meant to be a messenger and a healer for these lost children. The angel led her back down the long staircase and out of heaven.

Ari suddenly found herself in a field that was nearby her house, covered in debris. She just laid there and cried for her family. She was hurt, but was taken to the hospital to be treated. Ari found her cousin Julie in the hospital and both survived. The rest of her family – her parents, grandparents, and little cousin – were gone.

Ari went to live with her maternal grandmother and still has Julie and two other uncles in her family. She started seeing a therapist to cope with her grief, but Ari is at peace with her loss.

She says she had so much time to prepare for losing her family and spent every moment until April 27th coping with her loss. She is energetic and happy, an attitude that gives hope to other children who lost their parents or other family members.

Ari’s story inspired her therapist to get a book written about her experience. The therapist had Ari draw pictures of her story, including visiting Heaven with her family.

Even though Ari is not a big fan of reading, she reads a lot to get better at storytelling. Together Ari and her therapist created a picture book called “To Heaven After the Storm.”

Ari wants all children to seek comfort in her story and is happy to have all proceeds from the book go to ministries that help other children including Treasure Boxes which is a guide that teaches people how to talk to children about the death of a loved one.

Chapter 6

Josiah Lamb

God Saves Him from Decapitation

Josiah saw the warrior angels with flaming swords.

Josiah Lamb was an active, happy eight year old who loved spending time with his family at the lake. One Fourth of July weekend, Josiah went out on a jet ski with his brother-in-law. His brother decided to let him drive. Josiah loved it, gunning the throttle and performing spins on the water. He was having a blast.

Both Josiah and his brother-in-law were having such a good time they did not see the blue boat line in the water. This line is a place where people tie their boats up to. Josiah hit the line at full speed, causing a crash.

At that instant, Josiah saw the sky light up beautifully and felt time freeze for a moment. Josiah then saw angels fill the sky, but they were not the typical image of angels with halos and feathered wings.

Instead, he saw the warrior angels with flaming swords. Josiah saw how huge they were and understood the massive power they possessed in the sky.

Time was still frozen and Josiah heard a voice. He knew that the voice belonged to God as He instructed, “Put your hand up, Josiah!” Josiah obeyed, then everything went dark.

Josiah’s brother-in-law pulled him out of the water, completely limp. His father cradled Josiah’s head in his lap and saw that his neck had a deep gash that was pouring blood.

Bubbles were coming out of the tear and he could hear a whistling sound going through the back of Josiah’s neck. “Don’t worry about it, everything will be okay,” his father told an unconscious Josiah. As chaotic as the moment was, he fathers reassuring words seemed to help calm the family.

The doctors placed Josiah in a coma for 24-hours in an attempt to reduce the swelling without interference. Josiah had also broken two fingers and his entire left arm became scar tissue.

By lifting his arm when God told him to, Josiah prevented the rope from going through his neck and decapitating him.

The first four days after his coma he could not speak, but as soon as he could he excitedly told his parents what he saw before flying off the jet ski. He explained that God told him to put his hand up and it was Him who saved Josiah’s life.

Josiah began telling his friends and other children about what he experienced and how God spoke to him. The children he talked to began asking Josiah to pray with them and for them. Josiah felt urged to lay his hands on these kids and pray for them as hard as he could.

On a mission trip to Baltimore, Josiah and his mission group passed a homeless man in a wheelchair. Josiah told his group that he had to help the man. He walked over and laid his hands on the man, praying for his health and wellbeing. The man’s legs began twitching and Josiah began to pray harder, wanting more reaction than that. After three deep prayers, the man was able to move his legs completely and took steps out of the wheelchair for the first time in years.

The story amazed Josiah’s parents. They talked to their pastor about it and he said that Josiah was given a gift that day on the jet ski. God communicated with him on a spiritual level and gave Josiah the gift of being able to pray for and heal people.

To Josiah, his own story is unreal. Before the accident he knew there was a God, but he thought of him as a judge. He didn’t think God as a kind entity. He thought he might send you to hell which is not a nice thought.

Now, he sees God as the ultimate source of love and compassion. According to his mother, God came off the pages of the Bible and became a reality in Josiah’s life.

Chapter 7

Mark Botts

Remarkable Story of an NDE at Nine-Months

There was no way Mark should be been able to see his
mom or grandmother because there were many walls
and hallways between them.

Mark Botts was age five when he astounded his parents with a detailed description of his near-death experience at nine-months old.

Mark was born with a condition called tracheomalacia also known as a floppy windpipe which causes breathing problems.

At nine-months, Mark was admitted to the hospital for an emergency tracheotomy. After the surgery, the nurses placed Mark on his back with a breathing tube in his trachea. However Mark was a tummy sleeper and flipped over in the middle of the night.

His breathing tube fell out and he went into cardiac arrest. Baby Mark was without a heartbeat for 40 minutes. Remarkably, Mark had no brain damage despite the extended lack of oxygen.

Though he was resuscitated, he spent the next three months in coma. Once he recovered, he was fitted with a trachea tube until he was three-years old. The tube prevented him from speaking.

When he was five, he started telling his dad the story of when he died. His parents were shocked because Mark was never told he had died. Imagine having this conversation with your five-year old. Keep in mind, this is in the mid-70s. NDEs had not had any real exposure yet.

Mark told them that he remembers floating out of his body. He watched as nurses and doctors tried their best to resuscitate him. He could see see his grandmother trying to find his mother way down the other end of the hall.

Next Mark found himself in front of a three dimensional wall. There was no way through it, over it, or around it. However it was transparent and Mark could see his mother and grandmother crying and hugging each other. Mark heard his mom say, “He’s gone” over and over again. There was no way Mark should be been able to see his mom or grandmother because there were many walls and hallways between them.

He saw his hospital bed and his “elaborate IVs” with cups around it. Mark says that time was endless and without meaning. He stayed watching his family as long as he was allowed. After some period of time, Mark began floating upwards again and found himself in an extremely dark tunnel.

As a baby, Mark began crawling through the dark tunnel. Every two or three feet Mark would fall or flatten out but he kept going. Mark struggled along.

Halfway through the tunnel, a light began to appear. Mark loved the light as it made it easier to crawl through the tunnel. It felt as though it was pushing and helping him to the light through. Soon he got to the top and saw many different kinds of yellow and red lights. However the lights did not hurt his young eyes at all. It was warm and beautiful.

Mark glided along this new world. He saw white, clouded faces that never approached him on his journey. However, the beings emanated warmth and love. They were not happy or scary or recognizable, but they comforted Mark.

Out of the clouds, a being approached Mark and took him along golden roads. He communicated with Mark, “I am God.” He asked Mark if he wanted to go back. Mark responded, “No. I can breathe. It’s wonderful here. I don’t want to go back to the pain.”

Keep in mind, that Mark is nine-months old and God is all-knowing. Mark would not have to articulate that message. The natural instinct to move towards pleasure and move away from pain would been an easy feeling for a nine-month old to communicate.

God understood, but explained that Mark had a purpose in life. Once that purpose was fulfilled, he could go back to Heaven and stay with God for eternity. Mark agreed and he was returned back to his nine-month old body.

What adds interest to this story is that Marks’ mom has come out to say that Mark grew up in a tightly restricted life. He was not exposed to the typical influences of children in the 1970s. He had never been to church or Sunday school. He’d lived an isolated life, which considering his condition, makes sense. According the Mark Bott’s mother, there is no way he could have known anything about these things.

She has also been asked many times; “How can you believe the recollections Mark has when he was just nine-months old?” Her response is, “How can you NOT believe it when he tells me exactly where I was, his grandmother was, and what the doctors and nurses were doing when there is no way he could have known that?”

Now that Mark is older, he shares his story to let everyone know how peaceful and quiet Heaven is and how it is a wonderful place to be.

Introduction
John J. Graden

The Depths of Despair

Suicide is a dark subject. After reading these stories, you may get a sense of how truly dark and destructive it is.

I first became interested the near death experiences (NDEs) of suicide survivors after listening to an interview with Dr. Sam Parnia. Dr. Parnia is director of Resuscitation Research at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, USA

He is the principle investigator of the AWARE study (AWAreness during REsuscitation), which was launched in 2008. The AWARE study was the subject of the interview.

Essentially, the AWARE study is focused on interviewing people who have flat lined and been resuscitated. 18% claim to have had an NDE. Dr. Parnia said in the interview he felt that closer to 100% had them, but like dreams, most people simple do not recall the NDE.

This is unique study in that it is conducted at a resuscitation hospital so the consistency in circumstances from each patient and in each case is high.

One of the points he made was that while most NDEs are wonderful experiences that is not the case for suicide victims. Without elaborating he said suicides have very different, darker experience than typical NDEs.

Suicide is a sin according to the Bible and after researching these stories, it becomes clear to me that there are serious consequences for taking your own life far beyond death.

Essentially, the message is to not discard the gift of life that God has given us. The difficulties of life are part of the learning process for the soul. Embrace this life and look forward to a natural transition to the after-life rather than jumping into, what may be an eternal dark abyss by suicide.

Chapter One

Tamara Laroux

15-Year Commits Suicide

“It was like someone took acid and poured it over the top of my head until it ran over every inch of my body … I became a tormented being of fear.”

In 1985 15-year old Tamara Laroux stepped into the shower with her mother’s 38-caliber gun in her hand.  She got down on her knees and called out to God to forgive her as she placed the gun to her head. She says, “I was convinced that there was no way to live a completely happy life. And if I couldn’t live happy, I didn’t want to live at all.”

Tamara’s father and mother had divorced when she was just six years old and she had been left with an overwhelming sense of rejection and feelings of loneliness and despair.

At such a young age, it felt to her that the divorce was in some way her fault. Those feelings were compounded all the more by her father’s tendency to speak only to her two sisters when he called and not to her.

As she grew into a teenager, her belief that she caused her parent’s break up led to her magnifying the tiniest of comments into a huge negative slight against her. No matter how insignificant the comment.she began to see herself as a burden on other people.

Her ever-increasing sense of unhappiness, rejection and despair led Tamara to believe that nothing was ever going to be right or that she would never be completely happy. If she could not live happy then she should not live at all. To her, the only answer was suicide.

As she got down on her knees in the shower with her mother’s gun in her hand, she was absolutely determined to end the loneliness and suffering she felt by taking her own life. Sobbing and crying out to God for forgiveness, she took a deep breath and placed the gun to her head.

Her finger was on the trigger when she heard a very small but very calm voice tell her to change the position of the gun from her head to her chest. Her initial reaction was to argue with the voice because she knew she wanted to commit suicide and she did not want anyone or anything to get in her way.

However, the voice persuaded her to listen by explaining that it would be better this way for the family she was leaving behind. Finding her with a shot through the head would be much tougher than a shot through the heart.

With the gun now pointing at her chest, she took her last deep breath and, asking God for forgiveness once last time, she pulled the trigger.

Tamara felt the pain of the bullet piercing through her chest and she was aware of her lungs beginning to fill with blood. Her hearing dimmed until she became deaf. Though her eyes were still open she knew she was blind.

The sensation of taking her last breath was one of knowing that death had gripped her soul. She was leaving her body and began falling and falling at great speed. She was traveling faster than the speed of light and was no longer in control of her destiny.

With a feeling of intense pain inside that she can only describe as being like the agony of having someone take acid and pour it over the top of her head until it ran over every inch of her body, Tamara found herself in a place of total darkness. The burning pain inside of her was unlike anything she had ever experienced in life and therefore impossible to describe in words.

Tamara also realized that through its ferocity she no longer felt lonely and she no longer felt depressed; she had become loneliness and depression and she was now a “tormented being of fear.” In this place of total darkness, Tamara felt that her soul “had been transformed into a being of sin and death” and that death was “complete torment.”

In the darkness, her cries for forgiveness became screams and she became aware of other souls surrounding her, all screaming in agony and begging to be forgiven.

In what can only be described as a “fiery pit” filled with hundreds of screaming souls, Tamara realized that although they were all in there together, there was no means of communication and her feelings of isolation and loneliness were greatly intensified.

She could see other isolated screaming souls all around her but she also caught a glimpse of a terrifying creature standing behind her. Again, like the feeling of intense pain she felt inside her body, there are no earthly words Tamara can find to describe the hideousness of the form she saw other than to say it appeared to have more than one dragon-like head on its unearthly body

It was at that moment that Tamara realized every screaming soul surrounding her shared a desperate desire to call out to everyone they had left behind on earth, “Do not come here: acknowledge that life is about Jesus Christ.”

She was experiencing Hell as a reality. To her, Hell was real so therefore Heaven was real and eternity was real. This realization led to her feeling a desperate need to call out the truth she now knew to everyone still on earth. She felt desperate to let everyone know that the way you live your life on earth will determine where you go in death.

As the desperate screaming continued, Tamara saw what she believed to be the hand of God coming down toward her. Without a word being said, she knew the hand was coming down to pick her up and the moment it did, she felt a sense of being cleansed and her feelings of torment being instantly lifted from her.

Not only did she feel free of torment, she felt she was being lifted by God and taken on a journey through the Heavens, an experience that yet again mere words can’t describe. She could see a void that was completely without color separating the Heavens from the torment of the total darkness below and it was through this void that the hand of God had appeared to lift her to a place where the colors were brighter and more vivid than anything she’d ever experienced, filling her with a type of energy she’d never imagined possible.

The peacefulness and magnificence of what she saw was beyond anything she had ever experienced or imagined. Although she couldn’t see a clear image of God, she could feel His presence envelope her with an overwhelming sense of serenity and total joy – a complete joy she had never felt in her life.

However, her journey through the Heavens was to be all too brief as she felt herself being lowered back through the universe in God’s hand. She could see earth down below her and as it grew nearer, she saw herself being gently lowered back through the ceiling above the shower in which she had died and then back into her physical body as it lay there.

It was then that Tamara opened her eyes. As she did so, she saw God leave her and rise up and away from her back through the ceiling, but she knew in that very moment that God loved her and in having this knowledge she felt she had also been given a spiritual strength and a sense of peace the likes of which she had never known.

Without knowing how or why, she instantly knew that everything she’d been given was everything she would need to face whatever lay ahead for her.

The bullet had missed Tamara’s heart by only a few millimeters. It was later explained to her that the pressure of a 38-caliber gun being fired into her chest should have caused untold damage by effectively exploding her heart, but medics were startled to discover that all she had suffered was a few broken ribs.

Prior to her NDE, Tamara had been an infrequent church goer but today she is an ordained minister and a member of the American Association of Christian Counselors.

Along with her husband, she founded Life Change International, an organization dedicated to sharing the power of God’s love and to spreading the truth of the Gospel as she experienced it.

Her out of body experience taught her that she needed to begin taking personal responsibility for her unhappiness in life and to stop looking for others to blame. She teaches others that we will all go in one of two directions when we leave this earth: we will either be transformed into “a being of sin and torment” or “a being of light and love and joy” and the direction we go in or the being we’re transformed into will be decided by the way we live our lives on this earth.

In her words she says, “Now I am full of joy; now I am full of peace. I am as God says I am. I am loved.” It’s her believe that at the moment of taking her own life she called out to God to forgive her – and He did.

Chapter Two

Matthew Duvell

Saw Heaven and Committed Suicide to Go Back

He realized that he was not going to reach his dream of going to heaven. Instead, he was going to hell.

Matthew Duvell was 12 years old the first time he died.

He was trying to swim the entire length of a pool underwater. He did it and surfaced for breath. His friends, being playful, pushed him back under. Matthew was completely out of breath, so he instinctively breathed in and swallowed water.

As he took a breath of water, a white light engulfed him completely. He flashed back over the moments of his young life. He was completely happy to be in the white light and wanted to experience it more.

A beautiful creature came out of the middle of the light. Matthew knew that it was Jesus Christ. He grabbed Matthew by the wrist and said, “You have to go back.” A moment later, Matthew was instantly on the side of the pool, lying on his back. His friends had rescued him, but the glimpse of the afterlife confused him and left him depressed for years to come.

The decade after his near death experience, Matthew started a cycle of alcohol and cocaine binges. He was trying to reach the same euphoria he felt going to heaven, but nothing ever came close.

Even after he got married and had a daughter, he did not stop his addictions. Matthew says, “I would drink ‘till I blacked out and found out the cocaine allowed me to drink more, stay awake, and not black out.”

Since the substances weren’t working, Matthew came up with an idea to get back to heaven. He says, “I couldn’t live like that another day. At that moment I chose to commit suicide. It was like a joy came over me. It was the answer to all my problems and I get to go back to heaven.”

Matthew bought his favorite gin and three bottles of sleeping pills. He drove to a remote bird sanctuary in Anchorage, Alaska. He spent the next few hours in the front seat of his car, slowly swallowing sleeping pills, one by one. He washed the medication down with the gin.

When he ran out, he sat in his car, looking over the land. Matthew saw a flash of light and he was suddenly outside. He didn’t know how he got there, but he realized that nothing had color. Everything around him looked gray. Matthew thought it was so strange, so he closed his eyes and another flash occurred.

Matthew felt himself in mid-free-fall going into a pitch black pit. He realized that he was not going to reach his dream of going to heaven. Instead, he was going to hell.

Matthew found himself in a very hot place. It was humid and dense with smoke coming out of the ground. He was split into seven people and groups of himself were forced to watch different things about his life. Parts of himself were living in the past, experiencing all the people he had met throughout his life.

These people came up to him and got in his face, pushing and screaming at Matthew. He was also forced to relive moments where he caused these people pain.

Matthew saw the suffering he would cause also. He saw his mom collapse when she found out he had committed suicide. He saw his 18 year old daughter on the floor, contemplating her own suicide because her dad was not there for her anymore.

All of these images impacted him greatly. Matthew began weeping for Jesus to save him. Suddenly he felt himself being picked up by the back of his neck and lifted out of the void. He knew that it was Jesus who had rescued him from hell.

Jesus told Matthew that he still had work to do: “If you continue to live your life like this, Hell is where you will spend eternity.”

Matthew awoke a changed man. He got rid of his drug and alcohol habits and became a better father and a better person. Now he is determined to live his life as a good person so he can see heaven again when his time comes.

Chapter Three

Martin

Spoke with a Loved One after Suicide before
Returning to His Body.

Martin grew up in Elko, Nevada. It is a small community with a little bit of a big city feel. In a family of six, Martin is the oldest with three half-sisters. He is outgoing and popular in school. Everything was going great for him.

When Martin was 17, he began to accept his homosexuality. It was difficult to keep his sexuality a secret and began to have a lot of difficulty handling day-to-day life. His joy of life began to wane.

No one in his family knew that he was gay. Martin finally came out to his mom first. Even though she said she understood, her eyes began filling up with tears and Martin knew she didn’t really understand.

Around the same time, Martin met someone and began seriously dating. It was his first love and he became extremely attached.

This made the entire relationship very difficult for Martin. They dated for about seven months and had very bad fights.

Martin recalls their negative relationship, saying, “I never had someone basically crush me, tell me how worthless I was.” This relationship was spiraling Martin deeper and deeper into depression. He didn’t know who to turn to for help.

As with most high school romances, the feelings, whether good or bad, are amplified and hyper-emotional.

In January of 2010, Martin heard a rumor that his ex was dating someone else. He became extremely angry. “I just kept telling myself over and over again,” Martin recalls, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore.”

Martin spotted a huge bottle of pills. “It was an instant reaction,” Martin started taking all of the pills in the canister. Once they were gone, he went through another large bottle. “I took painkillers,” Martin explains, “all of my antidepressants. Anything I thought I could consume, I did.”

After finishing off the pills, Martin was alone in his room with his Chihuahua Eddie. He started to feel an intense tranquility thanks to the pills. Martin got his phone out and texted everyone he cared about, family and friends, to tell them that he loved them. In hindsight, he thinks it was a call for help.

He felt comfortable, safe, and secure in the space between the dresser and his bed. That is where he decided he should die.

He locked his dog Eddie into his cage and crawled into the space with a blanket. He began to lose consciousness and he lay in this space, crying and crying until he fell asleep.

Two hours after he sent the text message, Martin’s mother heard Eddie barking from the bedroom. She found Martin deeply unconscious and called 911.

When they arrived at the hospital, Martin’s body was failing and the doctors told his parents that he was going to die. The doctors asked if his parents knew of any last wishes Martin had. But his parents were not going to let him go that easily.

Martin’s mother harassed the doctors until they agreed to transfer him to a better equipped facility.

He was taken in a helicopter to a different hospital. Time was of the essence because Martin was not getting enough oxygen to the brain, increasing the chance that the cells would die. Martin was loaded flat on his back with the flight medics maintaining his airway the entire time.

As they were about to take off, Martin’s body jerked upward and he spewed blood. The line on the monitor went flat. Martin had died.

The entire flight the medics worked to restart his heart and breathing. He was not responding to stimulation – a bad sign. As soon as they landed, Martin was rushed to the ICU. The whole time he was flat-lined.

Martin had no idea all of this was going on. After he fell asleep in the safe spot of his room, he awoke in a dark room. He could see himself overhead while still feeling himself in his body.

Martin saw two people in the room. They were both sitting in chairs, conversing while a spotlight shone on them in the dark room.

One person was himself, dressed completely in white. “When I saw myself, I was perfect.” Martin recalls. “I was completely perfect. I was dressed in white and I remember it was the cleanest, whitest white. I was rejuvenated. Everything about myself was just the way I liked it.”

The other person was a woman. Martin could not see her face, but believes she was his grandma who died a few years before. He believed this because the conversation his perfect self was having was extremely comfortable and tranquil.

The two people talked for a long time. Then a door opened and a light filled the dark room from the opening. His grandmother got up and went towards the door. Martin panicked. He desperately wanted to go with her, but he was rooted to the ground and couldn’t move his feet. “I stuck my hand out to follow and I couldn’t move.”

Martin’s grandmother turned around right before she went through the door and told Martin it was not his time yet. With her words, Martin found himself back in his physical body. His eyes opened a little and he knew he had survived.

Martin waking up was a miracle in itself. Everyone thought he was going to have some kind of organ failure, either his kidneys, liver, or heart. They also thought he was going to experience some degree of brain failure and would not be able to walk ever again.

Martin was in and out of consciousness. He kept trying to make himself stay awake, blinking his eyes over and over. The doctors and his mom kept talking to him and he heard what they said. He could even feel his mother holding his hand.

At one point during his consciousness, Martin told his mom that he was sorry for what he did. His mom told him he did not need to apologize, but had to focus on getting better. Martin was confused why he was allowed to be alive.

When Martin fully awoke, the doctors explained his situation. They broke the news that he probably would never walk again. To prove them wrong, Martin got out of his hospital bed, still attached to monitors and various IVs, and walked across the room. This was the beginning of his remarkable recovery with very few medical complications.

Martin is still uncertain why he got a chance to live, but has a theory. “I don’t think God wanted me and I especially don’t think that my grandma would have allowed that because she was a very religious woman. I don’t think she wanted that. I don’t think God wanted that. That’s why they both wanted me here.”

Martin also learned how many people were there for him. His mother showed him his phone after he sent his last “I love you” message to everyone he cared about. Every single person replied, “I love you, too.” Martin realized that his friends were there for him the whole time, but he didn’t know it. Even though he had felt alone, he really wasn’t.

Today, Martin’s parents are more accepting of his sexual orientation. Even though they do not entirely agree with it, they have told Martin he is the only son they have and they are going to work with it.

Martin believes he was supposed to die and failed, but he does not regret the experience. “It might not be the best experience or best form, but that’s what I needed to wake up. I’ll look at it as something that I’ll never forget and something that was a gift. I got my life back.”

Chapter Four

Jeff Jones

Threw Himself In Front of.Speeding Semi

Jeff recalls this moment, saying, “I felt Jesus in the room. I felt like I was just an audience to Him.”

When Jeff Jones was 16 years old, he made a pact to himself that he would commit suicide. This was the genesis of his negative, downward spiral and suicide became an obsession.

He reassured himself that whenever things got hard or when bad things happened, he could always kill himself to escape that pain.

His parents helplessly saw him turn to darkness and said that he acted like he was possessed by some evil and there was nothing they could do to stop it.

Jeff’s parents tried hard to get him help. They thought maybe that a brain injury Jeff sustained as a child was the cause of the problem.

They took Jeff to multiple counselors who could not explain why he had suicidal tendencies nor could they ease the pain.

The family took a trip to get more help for Jeff. They stayed at a motel next to the highway.

While in the motel, Jeff’s girlfriend called to break up with him. His mom watched him pacing around the hotel room. While she was concerned, she remembered counselors saying that, in times like these, she needs to give him space. So when Jeff said he needed air, she let him walk away from the motel.

Jeff wandered toward the interstate and hurled his body in front of a semi going 65 miles per hour down the highway. His body was crushed.

Jeff’s father saw the commotion on the freeway from the motel room. He called his wife and they rushed to the interstate. When they found Jeff, his father thought he was dead.

The father worked in the ER and assessed him quickly. He believed Jeff was about to die or in a deep coma. As they were waiting for the ambulance to come, Jeff’s father kept telling Jeff that he loved him.

The injuries that Jeff sustained were severe. He had a massive head injury. His left lung had collapsed and his left arm was only attached by a sliver of skin. His spleen was ruptured, bleeding into his stomach. The worst injury was a tear in his aorta. Jeff was rushed into surgery where the tear was repaired and the spleen was removed.

After that, Jeff went into a coma. His brain swelled and threatened to blow out his brain stem. Weeks went by with these injuries. Jeff had a heart attack, lost 50 pounds, and contracted a deadly staph infection. The doctors told his parents that there was no hope for him.

However, Jeff survived and was put into rehab. During this time, Jeff’s father began praying for him, praying that Jeff would get a visitation from Jesus.

Those prayers seemed to be answered when, in the early stage of rehab, Jeff’s mother walked into his room and was shocked at what she found.

Jeff’s arms and face were lifted up to the ceiling and his eyes were completely lit up. Jeff says, “I felt Jesus in the room. I felt like I was just an audience to him.” Jeff says that Jesus told him He loved him and wanted him to be a light to the world now. With that, Jeff woke up.

Following his experience, Jeff spent six years in rehab working on physical and speech therapy. His faith grew with each passing day. “It was a very difficult process and I just felt God was with me,” Jeff explains. “I felt like I had the strength that wasn’t mine.” Jeff knew someone was right by his side the whole time.

After rehab, Jeff graduated with a 4.0 GPA from the University of Montana’s School of Pharmacology. He went from a dark, sky kid to an extrovert who enjoys life, trusts God, and has a great family.

“It’s just a miracle I am here,” Jeff says. “If you turn your life over to Jesus and just give him that and give him your whole life and your everything, He will give you everything. He will give you that happiness and that contentment that we all long for. That’s the only way I’ve ever found it.”

Chapter Five

BJ McKelvie

Suicide Led Him to a Dark, Empty Place

BJ saw a window appear and his family on the other side. All he wanted to do was tell them he didn’t mean to do this. He just wanted to tell them he was sorry.

BJ McKelvie was 21 years old with amazing opportunities ahead of him. He had just graduated from college and had a great career lined up. What he didn’t realize was that he was suffering from severe depression.

Right before he was due to start his new career, BJ was staying in a family summer cottage. He had a sore throat, so he visited a family doctor nearby. While he was in the waiting room, there was a poster on the wall that listed a bunch of symptoms of depression.

BJ read through the list and realized he had a lot of the symptoms that were listed. He told the doctor about it and he was given medication.

BJ didn’t tell anyone he had the medication or that he was depressed. He was a proud person who often made fun of people who had depression. It was embarrassing to admit he had what he perceived to be a.weakness. After seeing the poster he began to dwell on the fact the he had depression. As one can imagine being depressed because you’re depressed is not a healthy cycle. He decided to kill himself.

The decision to take his life was a spontaneous one. As the weight of the realization fell on him, he decided he didn’t want to live anymore and took all of his medications.

In a twisted application, BJ put his knowledge of pharmacology to his plan. He he would take two pills at a time, thinking he wanted to take just enough so that they could not pump his stomach. He thought that, if he took all of them at once, he would just get sick and he would be saved by doctors. He didn’t want that to happen. This was not a suicide attempt; it was serious.

After taking his pills, he laid down, but nothing happened after 20 minutes. He got up and searched around the cottage until he found some sleeping pills. BJ performed the same process, taking two at a time slowly so he wouldn’t be sick.

“I remember laying down,” BJ recalls, “and the last thing that I said was, ‘God, please forgive me for what I’d just done.’ And then I went to sleep.”

BJ was supposed to start his new job the next day. His mom got up early the next morning and found BJ gray and blue. The nearest hospital was 60 miles away, so his parents took him to a country doctor. That doctor immediately saw how serious his condition was and told his parents to take him straight to the hospital.

As soon as he got to the hospital, BJ’s heart stopped. The doctors were able to get him back, but his heart stopped again and it was too late. The doctors told BJ’s family that he was gone.

BJ remembers his parents being told that he was gone, because he appeared in the room at that time. He saw a sink first, then looked around and realized where he was. A nurse walked by him, ignoring his presence. BJ thought to himself, “Boy, she was rude. She didn’t even see me.”

Next, BJ saw his brother and sister run by him. His gaze focused on his parents next to his bed. BJ realized the person in the bed was him. He noticed a black diamond forming under his bed. BJ went over to it and was suddenly sucked down into pitch blackness.

BJ found himself in a place that was nowhere. There was no ground and no sky. BJ describes it, saying, “If you could imagine nowhere or nothing, that’s where I was.”

It took BJ a little bit to realize where he was and what was going on. BJ saw a window appear and saw his parents and family on the other side. All he wanted to do was tell them he didn’t mean to do this. He wanted to tell them he was sorry. It was then that he realized what was happening was very real.

It was so dark where he was that the only thing he could see was his hand. BJ tried to walk forward toward the window, but he was stuck. The window started to fade away and BJ got a very real sense of eternity and a sickening sense of dread as he realized that he was stuck there forever.

BJ heard an angry, vicious, huge voice behind him, saying, “Those who commit suicide go nowhere. You’re not getting a second chance.” BJ turned to look at where the voice was coming from, but there was no one there.

Time passed and BJ realized the horrific sense of separation. He did not go through physical pain because he did not feel anything. Instead, BJ was going through mental anguish, saying, “I realized I wasn’t going to be able to see anybody ever again. I was so alone.”

The voice came back again, still angry and saying, “You’re not getting a second chance.” There was still no face attached to the voice, but at that moment BJ accepted his fate of eternity alone.

As soon as BJ accepted his fate, the voice came back. This time it was gentle and kind, saying, “You’re not getting a second chance, but a new beginning.”

At that second BJ woke up in the hospital with his sister at the foot of the bed. After his experience, BJ became a record producer and spent two years trying to find God. He was asked to produce a 10 hour Christian Christmas show for free. Something inside of him agreed to it, even though he would spend 40 hours working on it without pay. After it premiered with wild success, BJ was asked to produce a 6 hour Christian show every weekend for free. Again, BJ agreed.

BJ spent hours listening to Christian music and began to hear little things that had happened to him in the afterlife in the music. He asked the minister who hired him about the message in the music and who exactly Jesus was. The minister preached for three hours about the music. BJ went home, gave his heart to the Lord, and now dedicates his life to Him.

Introduction
John J. Graden

The Definition of Hell.

In my first book on NDEs, Near Death Experiences: Doctors and Scientists Go on the Record About God, Heaven, and the Afterlife, I was struck by the many similarities of the ten stories presented.

In this book, I’m scared of the similarities of these stories. Hellish near death experiences are rare yet riveting and at times down right terrifying.

While there are no shortage of definitions of hell in theology, one of the subjects of this book describes hell as, “the absence of God.” As you read these stories, I suspect you, like me, will find that definition to be spot on.

Chapter One
Bryan Melvin

Atheist Gets a Terrifying Tour of Hell

The man was a child serial killer in 1940. Suddenly, a giant snakelike demon came from the sky and swallowed him whole.

Bryan Melvin described himself as being a “rough and ready kind of guy” who enjoyed drinking and partying. He was an atheist and a construction worker, living in Tucson, Arizona.

One day while working on a construction site, a coworker brought him some water that was contaminated. Bryan drank it by accident and became sick with cholera. He had extreme dehydration and after 72 hours, died and had a near death experience.

He stared across the room he was in and thought it was odd he could see so clearly even though he was nearsighted. He tried turning his head, but his body would not move. He felt himself detaching from his body until he was able to look at himself.

Then Bryan ascended through the ceiling of the room and traveled through a very dark, black void. He heard a voice in his head speaking to him but it wasn’t his. This entity, telepathically, was giving him answers to many questions of life. While Bryan doesn’t remember the enlightenments of life today, the voice explained everything as he was transported towards a light.

Bryan finally understood he had died and he was going to be judged and he was comfortable with it. It was clear to him that the judgment and everything that was happening to him was perfectly just and right.

While traveling, Bryan was stopped in the darkness at a huge boulder with a throne on it. On the throne rested a being that emanated a powerful white light. Bryan was enveloped in a feeling of love and compassion, along with a sense of firmness and fairness. Bryan realized the being was Jesus and He said, “Look what you have done with God’s gift. If I let you into Heaven with what you know now, you would misuse it and keep sin alive in Heaven. You cannot come in. It is granted to you to see a land unknown that is best forgotten but will not be left unseen.”

Bryan watched as Jesus pulled a set of keys from his robe. The scar from Jesus’ crucifixion caught his eye. Bryan saw the bones were split apart in his wrist. Jesus selected one of the oddly shaped keys to open a door that looked like a gate. As the door opened, a veil passed over Bryan and it was dark again.

Everything changed in an instant. Bryan was pulled through the door and entered a tornado vortex void. He was traveling through a tunnel that spun and roared horrendously. Bryan experienced horrible smells and heard screeches and slurping noises. An extreme heat washed over him as he fell through the sky and hit the ground hard.

Bryan stood and saw a house in the distance. Suddenly, he was surrounded by people he knew. Some had died and some who were still alive. They came around him, slapping him on the back and welcoming him. While everything about this journey had been “other-worldly” there was something about these people that made Bryan uneasy. Something was not right.

Their eyes were yellow like a reptile’s. Bryan saw his best friend turn into something horrid. They all began to morph into ugly, hideous creatures. They looked like rotting vegetables that were distorted, twisted, filthy, and smelly. They came at Bryan like they wanted to shred him to pieces. They tore at his chest and his legs, pulling at him.

A reptile-like creature that looked like a dinosaur spoke to him. At first, Bryan thought it was another language, but soon figured out it was broken English. The creature was saying, “Come follow me.” Bryan understood this was his demon leading him through Hell.

Bryan and the creature advanced to a horizon of vast fields and mountains. Suddenly, the creature stuck his hand through the picture and ripped it open as if he were parting a veil.

They moved onto a wide, dusty road and he was horrified at what he saw. Bryan had just left a cube-like cell. It was surrounded with hundreds of other cubes, stacking six tall to the sky of the pit. People were trapped inside of these cube cells, reliving parts of their lives over and over again. They were experiencing a living nightmare; an endless loop of retribution for all of the wrongs they had committed in their former lives.

The creature took Bryan through the middle of the road where demons and creatures were running amuck. Some leapt into cubes and began attacking the people inside of them. Once they were in the cubes, however, they looked like ordinary people.

Moving down the road, Bryan passed by a creature that was tall with a gorgeous purple hue. The creature had many faces that revolved in a seductive and flattering manner. Bryan thought the creature was beautiful and hideous at the same time.

The creature tried to plant thoughts in his mind, saying, “Why would such a good God allow people to suffer like this?” trying to get Bryan to curse God. All Bryan knew was the creature had great power and authority. He guessed the purple man was either second in command or Satan himself.

Bryan passed by one cube that contained an old Pilgrim sailing ship. On the ship, the captain was being flogged for the things he had done to his crew in his life. He had been mean to them for pleasure, and now he was paying the price for his wrongdoings.

A woman who just died in a car crash was sent through the vortex and Bryan watched her fall into a cube that contained the picturesque scene of her grandmother’s farmhouse from her childhood. Her long-dead grandmother appeared, saying, “Dear pudding, you made it to Heaven. I’m so glad you are here.”

The woman thought she was in her childhood paradise, but Bryan knew better and saw the dark side of the grandmother. In her life, the woman had pushed her children to do things her way. When they disobeyed, she beat them or verbally abused them. Bryan watched the woman happy in her paradise until tree limbs reached down and grabbed her.

Bryan continued walking down the road, looking into cubes. Some people in the cubes were engulfed in flames with their skin intact but burning. He knew they were in agony. He passed one cube with a man playing pool who believed it was his break until the next punishment. The man was a child serial killer in 1940. Bryan saw demon-people enter the cube and begin tearing him up. Suddenly, a giant snakelike demon came from the sky and swallowed the man whole.

The small demons called out to the snake, saying, “That wasn’t fair, we didn’t have our chance with him.” The snake demon regurgitated the man whole and the small demons jumped on him with their claws out.

In another cube, Bryan passed a woman who was a temple prostitute in Corinth in 69 AD. Bryan knew that she had been responsible for putting babies on a flame-covered statue as an offering. As Bryan admired her fine dress, all the babies she had burned, some belonging to others and some her own, attacked the woman.

Bryan came across another woman in a cube who had practiced witchcraft hundreds of years ago. She was trapped in a coffin, scratching at the walls trying to escape. When she finally did escape, a crowd of demons pounced on her. In another cube, a woman said Mother Earth would save her if she believed in the rocks and the trees hard enough. She danced around a fire with other people, praying to Mother Earth.

Bryan watched as demons entered her cube, asking, “Will this stone save you?” as they hit her with rocks. The demons then reached into her mouth and tore her tongue out, then slowly peeled her skin off and broke her bones. Bryan turned away after her body came back together and the demons started their torture over again.

The most memorable cube Bryan witnessed was one with Adolf Hitler inside of it. He was just sitting in burning flames with his flesh slowly rotting off. He would turn to ash, then come back whole only to be burned slowly again.

Bryan believed he was paying for all the Jews that were burned in concentration camps. The look in Hitler’s eyes that was one of vicious anger.

Bryan continued traveling down the road with his demon guide until he reached another pit segment of Hell. He saw the purple hue creature entering a cube with what looked like a dentist chair inside. Demons surrounded the cube, telling Bryan, “This is where you are going.”

Throughout his tour of Hell, Bryan was terrified of what he was seeing. The whole time, he kept saying, “Jesus Christ,” desiring salvation. Bryan felt a small connection with the Lord as he walked through Hell, but the fear was stronger. As he saw the cube that was meant for him, he started repeating “Jesus Christ” in a steady stream.

He felt something coming for him, but he was too petrified to distinguish what it was. Bryan heard thundering footsteps coming up behind him, but did not turn and look because he thought the demons would pull him toward the cube.

The footsteps drew closer and the creatures kept calling for Bryan. He was completely terrified as the presence came up behind him. The demons scattered and the tall, purple creature began to back away. The purple creature bowed and slithered into the darkness.

It was then that Bryan realized it was Jesus who had come to save him. Bryan was lifted into his arms and again noticed the place where the nail went in on the cross. Bryan began crying, saying, “You died for me!” Jesus floated him in the air and they traveled through the ceiling of the bottomless pit.

Bryan remembers bits and pieces of being taken to the hospital. He felt nurses poking at him and awoke in a hospital room. Bryan grabbed the doctor and asked, “I’m not in a cube, am I?” The doctor, a little bemused, said, “No, you’re in a hospital.”

Chapter Two
Howard Storm

Atheist College Professor Attacked by the Damned

The journey gradually became darker and darker. As they traveled further into darkness, the people became openly hostile to him.

Howard Storm was a thirty-six year old atheist college professor when he encountered death. It happened on a three week tour in Europe with art students and wife.

They were in Paris at 11 in the morning when Howard felt a perforation in his stomach. It was so painful that.he dropped to the ground, recalling, “I’m twisting and kicking and moaning and screaming and yelling around on the floor.”

The wife called the front desk and a doctor came in to check him out. that Howard needed an ambulance and was taken to the General Hospital in Paris. Howard was wheeled to emergency where two doctors looked at him and said he needed to go to the surgery hospital down the street for a critical operation.

When Howard arrived, there was no surgeon on staff and he had to wait on a gurney for twelve hours until a nurse came to check on him. She apologized, saying that there was no doctor to perform the surgery but hopefully they would get one the next day.

Howard recalls, “That’s when I knew that it was over for me. I was dead.” The only lifeline he had was the fact he didn’t want to die. “I was scared to death of dying because… I was an atheist, a non-believer. A person who lived for the gratification he could get out of the moment. Dying, for me, was the worst thing that could happen to me because it was the end of life and there was no more. There wasn’t anything else.”

Terrified of dying, Howard was struggling to live. He could only tolerate the pain with hope that a surgeon would arrive. Now that there was no hope, he turned to his wife and said it was time to say their goodbyes. They both told each other how much they loved the other after 20 years of marriage and embraced for what Howard thought was one final time.

His wife started crying, knowing it was over. It was hard to watch her crying, so he closed his eyes and let go into unconsciousness.

Howard woke up a few minutes later standing up next to his hospital bed. He knew where he was and the situation without any confusion in his mind. Howard felt more alive than he had ever felt in his life. He was the opposite of a ghost, feeling “more than great.”

Howard began looking around the room and saw a body that was covered with a sheet. He pulled the sheet back and bent over the bed. The head was turned away from him, but he could clearly see his own face on the body.

This image took Howard by surprise. He tried to talk to his wife and ask what was going on. She couldn’t hear or see him, so Howard thought she was ignoring him and became very angry. He started screaming, “How did that body on the bed get here? That looks like me!” As he was yelling, he had a sneaking suspicion that the body on the bed was him, but he didn’t want to think about it. The thought terrified him. The whole situation was too weird and impossible for his brain to comprehend, causing him to become agitated and upset.

Howard then heard whispers of people outside the door. They said, “Howard, you’ve got to come with us now. Quickly, come out here.” Howard left the bright, real, and clear room and entered a dank, hazy, and gray hallway. The people who were calling to him were dressed in gray hospital clothing.

Howard tried to explain the operation and his situation, asking if the surgeon was now available to operate on him and if he was going to die. The people only said they understood what he was going through and continued to call to him. Finally, Howard followed the people.

Howard was going on a long journey. There was no time because time is an illusion, but if he had to compare how long it was, the journey was as if he walked from Nashville to Louisville. The gray-clothed people stayed around him as he walked in his hospital gown. The journey gradually became darker and darker. As they traveled further into darkness, the people became openly hostile to him.

The people scolded Howard for asking questions and told him to hurry up as they descended further into darkness. As their ugliness grew, Howard stopped and said, “I’m not going to go with you any further.” The people told Howard he was almost there. Howard refused to go and the people started to fight. While at the beginning of the journey there had only been a handful of people, now there were hundreds, all pressing and pulling at him in the complete darkness.

It felt like the people were playing with him. They did not want to outright destroy him, but he believes they wanted to inflict pain on him for their own personal satisfaction.

Howard does not like recalling the next part because “it gets ugly.” Initially, the people bit, tore, gouged, scratched, and ripped at him from all directions with hundreds of hands. Howard tried to fight them off but it was like being trapped in a beehive full of angry bees. Soon Howard couldn’t fight them off anymore and he was lying on the ground, all ripped up with pain inside and outside of him.

The hardest part was the emotional pain and degradation. He didn’t feel like what the people did was unjust or wrong. Somehow, Howard felt he deserved that pain and punishment.

Even though Howard had no thought or voice to say it, he was hearing his own voice saying, “Pray to God.”

Howard was thinking in response to the instructions, “I don’t believe in God and I don’t know how to pray anymore.” He had not prayed in nearly 23 years and believed that prayers were reciting something you had learned. He tried to think back to his days at Sunday school as a child and remember prayers they recited. He kept getting everything mixed up, one minute reciting the Shepherd’s Prayer and the next minute the Gettysburg Address.

Even though Howard was having trouble praying, he noticed that, every time he said the name of God, the people around him shrieked and screamed and uttered the worst profanity Howard had ever heard. It was as if saying God’s name was like throwing boiling water on them. Every time he said His name, the people backed away because they couldn’t bear to be near him while saying His name. Howard used God’s name as a weapon and pushed the people away.

After the people had left, Howard was still alone. He was laying there for an eternity because there was no sense of time. As he lay there, he thought about his life and what he had and hadn’t done. He came to the conclusion that, as an adult, he had lived a selfish life.

The only God in his life was himself and that meant he had lived wrongly. He realized the people who attacked him were not demons or monsters, but people like him who had missed the point of “being born and alive in the world.” All of these people had lived lives of selfishness and cruelty and were doomed to an eternity in a world with nothing else but those emotions and actions.

Howard knew he was now a part of it even though he didn’t want to be there. He had a sense that he deserved it because of how he had lived. The realization was emotionally painful for him to comprehend.

As eternity passed around him, His thoughts broke the darkness. He remembered an image of himself as a child sitting in a Sunday School classroom, singing “Jesus Loves Me.” He could hear the lyrics in his mind and heard his own childish voice singing along. “I could feel it in my heart,” Howard still gets choked up when telling the story.

There had been a time in his life where he was young and innocent and believed in someone greater who was good and loved him. Howard wanted that feeling back that he had betrayed and thrown away.

“I didn’t know Jesus, but I wanted to know Jesus,” Howard recalls. “I didn’t know His love, but I wanted to know His love. I didn’t know He was real, but I wanted Him to be real.” All of these feelings were pouring out of Howard and he called out, “Jesus, please save me!” And He came.

A tiny speck of light appeared in the absolute darkness. Very rapidly it became bright, so bright that if he were in our real world it would have fried him. In the darkness, however, it wasn’t dangerous. Jesus was in the light. He reached down and gently began to pick Howard up, holding him tenderly.

In the light, Howard saw his filth and wounds, saying he looked like road kill. As Jesus carried him, everything went away. The wounds healed, the dirt was cleansed, and the pain evaporated. Howard became whole and healed, filled with His love. When Howard recalls the love, he becomes frustrated because there are no human words that articulate the feeling. All he can say is to know the love was the point of life. It was everything.

Jesus held him, rubbing his back in soothing circles like a father would a child. Howard said he began bawling from the complete happiness and relief of being lost then being found. Jesus carried him up and out of the world of light. As Howard was carried, he experienced tremendous shame because he had been so bad in his life.

He thought of himself as garbage and knew that Jesus had made a mistake rescuing him from the darkness. Jesus and Howard stopped somewhere in between Heaven and Hell and He said, “We don’t make mistakes, you belong here.”

Jesus brought over angels so they could go over his life from beginning to end. The angels showed Howard everything he had done right and wrong in his life. When Howard was a loving and kind person considerate of other people, he made everyone in Heaven happy. But when he was selfish and manipulative, it made everyone in Heaven unhappy.

The angels told him his purpose and existence was to love God, his neighbors, and himself. The angels also told Howard that he had failed, but he had to go back to the living world and try to live how God wanted him to live. They said Heaven is the most wonderful place, but that Howard wasn’t ready for it and it wasn’t his time to go.

At this point in his memory, Howard was very upset. He wanted to go to Heaven and experience the peace he already felt. He told the angels and Jesus that his heart would break if he had to go back to the living world without them. They responded, “We have always been with you all this time. You’ve never been alone.”

He kept arguing with them, resistant to return to the world of the living. He bargained with them, saying, “You’ve got to let me know you are around.”

The angels gave Howard some advice: “Pray and confess your sins to God and give everything to Him. Then you will know in your heart that we are there and experience our love.”  With that, Howard returned to his body.

It was 9:30 in the evening when the nurse ran into the hospital room, saying the doctor is in the hospital and they can perform the surgery now. He had just awoken, but the orderlies were ushering his wife out of the room. It was disturbing because he wanted to tell his wife everything that had happened to him. As he passed his wife in the hall on the gurney, he said, “Everything is going to be great.” He remembers his wife bawling because she thought those were his last words to her. But he had been saved.

Chapter Three
Gene AKA Genius

Asian Drug Gangster Sees the Portal of Hell

Gene looked at the ceiling and saw a dark mist of smoke billowing, entering from the corner of the room… It was then that he knew Death was coming for him.

Gene, also known by his thug name Genius, grew up with a spiritual background that was forgotten when he began dealing and using drugs in high school. He acted like a normal teenager, getting ready for school every day and doing his homework. But by his senior year, he was selling every kind of drug in between classes.

Whatever he could get his hands on, he sold it, from marijuana to cocaine. In time he became a user as well as a seller After he graduated, he used the cash from his drug business to buy a brand new BMW.

Gene was inspired by ballers, people with no jobs who drove through his neighborhood with expensive cars. They all belonged to gangs and Gene decided to get involved, adopting the name Genius for the streets. He became well connected in the drug game and crossed paths with every kind of gang imaginable. Hell’s Angels, the Mexican Mafia, Bloods and Crips. Gene loved the feeling of being a part of something that was bigger than himself. He believed that he was making a name for himself. It was empowering to build connections while hustling drugs.

Gene’s life was not easy. He was crossed a few times in a bad situation. Throughout his street life, he had all kinds of different guns pointed at him with his life on the line. He justified it all, thinking he was contributing to his neighborhood society.

Despite his religious background, his conscious was suppressed. The drug lifestyle never made him feel guilty because all he was thinking about was who to rob next to get more. Money became his idol and his God. Sometimes he felt God speaking to him, telling him to exit the game. In the back of his mind, he had a good versus evil conversation running. One side told him his actions were bad while the other side suggested a better way to do it. Gene ignored these conversations and kept hustling.

Gene became conditioned to that way of life. When he used drugs while dealing, it helped him become sedated to the worry and stress of a street life.

Drugs gave him a hazy vision of reality. Doing wrong became as natural as breathing because he never got caught. It made him believe he was invincible. He had no fear of death because he was constantly anticipating it.

Gene got to the point where he didn’t care about himself or anyone else. Even good friends of his tried to talk him out of his lifestyle. He thought, “Who are they to tell me what to do with my life when I am getting everything I want and they have nothing?”

Unknown to Gene, he was about to go on his last stint. It was a robbery, classified as armed because his partner was carrying a gun.

Right before they left to commit the crime, Gene heard a song in his head about God watching over everyone. Later, Gene realized it was God speaking to him, telling him it was wrong to do this. At that time, however, Gene ignored it and went to the robbery.

For the first time, Gene was caught. The cops swarmed him with five shotguns pointed at his head. He knew that, since his friend had a gun, he would get charged with at least 15 to 20 years jail time. As the guns were pointed at his head, Gene was thinking, “This is it for me. I’m either going to die or end up incarcerated for life.”

He was no longer invincible as he used to believe. Gene understood for the first time there were consequences to his actions. He had been suicidal for a long time, not caring about himself or anyone else.

Luckily, Gene was only charged with an attempt at robbery, not armed. His brother bailed him out of jail and Gene paid for a hotel room that night with his then-girlfriend. As he lay on the bed with his girlfriend, everything started to come down on him.

He decided to do the crime because what the hell, he could get away with anything. But after being caught, all of his depression and fear and wrongdoings began to fill his head.

Gene told his girlfriend he was cold and started shivering uncontrollably. His girlfriend laid on top of him, attempting to keep him warm. She turned blue and died for about 60 seconds.

All that Gene knew was that something really reeked. He smelled something horrible in the room. He tried to describe the smell, saying it was like dead bodies and ten times worse than the smell at a dump site. It smelled like death.

Gene looked at the ceiling and saw a dark mist of smoke billowing, entering from the corner of the room. It was as if he was in a fire, but there were no flames. It was then that he knew Death was coming for him. He called the black smoke a bad spirit and knew that was coming to take him to hell.

The prospect of being dragged to hell was terrifying to him. All the street fights and gang banging he’d faced was nothing compared to the shear terror he felt as he faced the prospect of eternal damnation and torture in hell.

As the smoke and smell filled the room and enveloped him, Gene still felt cold despite the weight of his girlfriend on top of him. Suddenly, the weight was gone as he felt his spirit leave his body and hover above the bed.

From his vantage point above the bed, Gene could see his girlfriend on top of him and knew in that moment that he was dead. Then a tunnel appeared with a light at the far end shining back toward him. A fear of God filled him. Gene said, “I was getting ready to die. I was giving up myself, my spirit, everything. All I could remember as I was leaving my body and spirit is to utter these words: Please God, help me.”

As he said the name of God, the light at the end of the tunnel shifted and God came to Gene. He said, “It is not your time yet.” When God spoke, it felt like freedom. There was no pain, no feeling but happiness. Gene felt his spirit lay back down within his body.

At the same corner the dark mist came from, Gene saw a light take the black smoke out of the room. Then there was a burst of light and Gene abruptly felt cold again. He was alive.

When Gene tells his story, he says the power of the word God saved his soul from Hell. Gene knows the black mist was an evil spirit, opening the Portal to Hell to pull him down. When Gene remembered his religious childhood, God saved him.

The near death experience turned his life around. Today, Gene is a successful graphic artist. He also works with Green Tech, an environmental and gang and drug prevention program. After seeing what is on the other side, Gene wants people to know how the word of God can save them from the street life. No thug is tough enough to make an eternal deal with the devil.

See Gene tell his story.

Chapter Four
John Ramirez

Satanist Turned Christian

The doors opened and John knew he had arrived in hell. He stepped into the darkness.

John Ramirez had an abusive, intense childhood that never allowed him to understand the power of God or the greatness of Heaven. John grew up in the Bronx, where all of his relatives practiced a form of Satanism know as Santeria. His father’s side of the family was full of witches and warlocks and John’s father was heavily involved in Santeria and spirituality.

Growing up, John always wanted a relationship with his father, but only experienced abuse. There was no love or compassion from his father and frequently watched his mother get beaten and verbally abused. John’s father would come home, drunk and demanding.

If John did not do something a certain way, profanities and insults were slung his way. Still, he followed his father around, trying to find an opportunity to interact with him. But there was never any time for him because his father was so ingrained with demons and spiritualism.

Even though his mother was abused Santeria also influenced her. His aunt suggested John’s mother take him to a tarot card reading to understand his potential and purpose in their satanic religion.

The tarot card reader looked at the cards and said John needed to perform the inoculation ceremony, or he would become blind in 30 days. His mother, terrified for the well being of her son, prepared him for the ceremony immediately.

John was blindfolded, bathed in herbs, and made to chant to the five main god-demons from Santeria. At only nine years old, his personality and everything he stood for was erased. John says, “I felt like someone took a black blanket and just put it over me spiritually.” From that point on, he answered to demons along with his parents.

He was trained by highly ranked demon worshipers. They taught him to go to funerals to try to steal a soul and cast it on someone else so they died the same way.

Once he say someone die in the street and he had the desire to collect the blood to perform witchcraft. John enjoyed the feeling of power and respect for the first time in his life, saying, “People knew that I was a force to be reckoned with. I liked that power. I was talked down to as a boy; now I have the authority and power to do whatever I want.”

When he was thirteen, John’s father was killed in a bar fight. John thanked the devil for relieving his mother’s suffering. Before the ceremony, John had tried talking to God to help his mom, but he never showed up.

John believed the devil was behind his father’s murder. The devil said to him that his father never loved him or provided for him.

The devil promised he would take the role of his father if John practiced the religion. The devil said to John, “I’ll give you anything you want, just ask.”

John became devoted to the devil, casting him as the father he never had. Every day he would perform rituals to the devil by lighting candles and spitting rum into a bowl. He would also blow cigar smoke into the bowl because it symbolized power.

He would kill a rooster and use its blood for the ritual, but sometimes he didn’t have enough money to buy one. When this happened, he used his own blood for the ritual in desperation to serve the devil.

When this ritual was performed, the atmosphere in the room would change. He could sense someone there and addressed him like a family member, saying, “Father, I’m here. What would you like to speak to me about? What is it you want me to do?”

Eventually John practiced his powers outside of his apartment. He would go to clubs, which he refers to as the devil’s playground, and prey on Christians.

John would wait until they started drinking, then would tell Christians that he had something important to tell them. When they insisted on knowing what John had to say, he said that a gateway would open for the devil to enter.

John progressed in his satanic religion to become a high priest in African spiritualism. He was taught about spiritual warfare and took the battle seriously. John learned astral projection in order to leave his body and enter the spirit world.

He could weaken or kill people in the spiritual world and it would happen in the physical world as well. He claims his soul traveled all of the world, entering different neighborhoods and speaking curses on people’s lives.

Sometimes in the spirit world he would encounter a group of people praying together. John could not touch these people because they were blessed and sanctified through prayer. John had no choice but to leave these people alone and travel to other spiritual neighborhoods to wreak satanic havoc.

Things began to change for John when he met a beautiful girl who invited him to meet her parents. Her parents had a Bible out and tried to talk to John about Jesus. At that time, John viewed Christians as amusing and harmless. He believed her parents were crazy, but allowed them to talk about Jesus.

He even started going to church with her. “We had a different system than they had,” John explains about his time with Christians while still practicing Santeria. “Their system was just kisses, hallelujah, we love you. So I kept coming to church to please her, but I wasn’t going to leave the people I was committed to.”

After John saw this girl, he would go home to worship the devil. He spent all night killing animals, then would see her the next day and go back to church.

One day at church, the pastor gave an altar call. With the encouragement of his girlfriend, John went forward unprepared. He thought the devil couldn’t touch him in church, in front of the pastor, and believed he was protected.

All of a sudden, a demon seized control of John. Without his consent, John’s hands grabbed the pastor by the neck and raised him into the air, saying, “I’m coming for you!” People rushed to the altar to stop John, but with the power of the demon John was able to throw them away from him.

What happened next astounded John. The people in the church stood and began praying together. He says, “[It was] spiritual warfare for a person who would have killed them in a heartbeat… I saw the power of God in that church.” One guy who had tried to stop him earlier was able to hold him down and whisper that John needed to say that, “Jesus is Lord.” John resisted. He was not going to give in. But after much struggle, he said the words and the devil left.

After the outburst, John was embarrassed and had no idea what to do next. He was still dedicated to Santeria but also experienced the power of God, something he had never understood before.

A church elder approached him after the incident and gave him a present. It was a sweatshirt that said he was a warrior for Christ. The church elder explained that Jesus wanted him to have the gift. John recalls, “For someone to come and say this is a gift from Christ, he loves you… to me that was amazing.”

John wanted to believe in that love, but he was still committed to the dark religion and the devil. He explains his struggle, saying he was caught between spiritual wars.

John decided that the only way to end the struggle between God and the devil was to take himself out of the equation. John thought, “Jesus can’t have me. The devil can’t have me. The best way out is suicide.”

Today, he understands he was living in ignorance and shame during this dark period. He was too far-gone and spiritually drained from the war for his soul.

Growing up in Santeria, John was never taught how to pray and was still struggling between it and God. Frustrated, one night he spoke to God angrily, saying that he didn’t like God and didn’t want to know him.

He told God he hated him, that he would never be a Christian, that he would worship the devil until he died. He ended his rant to God by saying, “If you want me, you have to show me or leave me alone.” With that, John went to sleep.

In his sleep, John was traveling on a subway train that was faster than light and packed with people. Instinctively, he knew they all were going somewhere bad. A woman who was elegantly dressed spoke to him in demonic tones. With his Santeria background, he understood what she was saying. She was calling him a traitor for leaving them.

To escape the woman, he tried moving to the middle of the packed train. Before he could, the train stopped. The doors opened and John knew he had arrived in hell. He stepped out of the subway and into the darkness.

John was walking through the tunnels and feeling a heat that could not be found on earth. The power of the heat gripped him with fear and sucked all hope from him.

As he made his way through the tunnel, John suddenly encountered the devil. John describes him as being bigger and stronger than he had ever seen. The devil spoke to John: “I’ve been with you since you were nine years old. I’ve been a father to you. I’ve given you everything.”

The devil then threatened John, saying that he has the power to keep John there and never let him go back “upstairs” to his body. He told John, “You belong to me and you’re not going to leave. You know too many secrets about my religion.”

John saw the devil coming forward to grab him. Out of nowhere, a cross appeared in John’s hands. He was confused because he did not call on the cross, but he held it up to the devil and used it as a weapon. Once he held up the cross, the devil felt like nothing, like a baby with no power at the foot of the cross.

That was the last thing John experienced in hell before he woke up. He knew Jesus was Lord as soon as he awoke back in his body. John took out a piece of paper and wrote out a promise that he would serve Jesus all the days of his life.

John threw out all of his witchcraft paraphernalia, but his old religion did not leave him alone.

Every night for a month after his near death experience, John underwent a spiritual attack from demons. It began with feeling a presence in the room. Sometimes John would see a figure standing there. Other times hands would close around his neck, trying to pick him up and rip his soul out of his body. A few times the foot of the bed shook before it levitated to the ceiling.

Every time the demons visited, John.could not breathe, could not cry, and could not call for help. He was feeling his life being choked out of him.

Every night he tried to call out to Jesus. He struggled against the demons and their hold until he could finally call Jesus’ name. Then the attack would stop… until the next night.

John didn’t understand why God allowed him to struggle against these demons. He asked God why he was being abused since he gave his life to Jesus, to serve God’s word. God answered: “I wanted to know how much you loved me and how much you trust me.” After that answer, the devil never showed up at John’s house again.

Today, John knows Christ walks with him every day. He can hear his voice in his ear, comforting and guiding him. John says this has made him “victorious in Christ.”

He now has peace, fulfillment, purpose, and destiny because he said yes to Christ. He learned that shedding blood in his old rituals is unnecessary when Jesus shed blood for him, saying, “That’s what counts.”

John works as an Evangelist for “the kingdom of light” in his words. John spends his time today spreading word about the gospel, helping people understand what it means to serve Christ.

See John Ramirez tell his story.

Chapter Five
Randy Hicks

Drug User Goes to Hell and Back

Randy looked up and saw Death with hell in his eyes.
He knew he was at the Edge of Hell.

Randy Hicks was a drug user that lost everything to his addiction. He was kicked out of the military for crystal meth addiction, he went to jail for robbing a gas station while high, and he lost the support of his family. It took two near death experiences to set Randy straight and change his life.

Randy was one of nine children with little parental supervision. When he was just eight, he went into his parents’ garage and saw his brothers smoking marijuana out of a large bong. Randy was curious about the bong and his brothers let him try it. He’s been an addict ever since.

Randy and his brothers mostly smoked pot. They hid their stash in the garden, their backpacks, and under their mattresses. One day, Randy found a bag of cocaine that belonged to one of his brothers. The powder fascinated him and he put some on his lips. Instantly they went numb and Randy loved the sensation.

Soon after he saw one of his brothers snorting it and learned how to use cocaine.

By his senior year Randy was an experienced drug dealer. He went into the army after high school and was sent to Fort Irwin, California.

Rather than using the military to straighten up, he got involved in a bad crowd and started drinking very heavily. Drugs reentered his life as Randy was introduced to crystal meth by his new friends, a popular drug of choice in the area.

As with many addicts, crystal meth was Randy’s strongest addiction. He would go on days-long meth binges and began selling his possessions to get more. The army discovered Randy’s addiction and sent him to rehab, then released him from the military. Randy said, “It bothered me. I was like, ‘Man, I had this great opportunity to turn my life around. Why did I go back to doing drugs?’”

Even though Randy was upset with his life choices, old habits die hard. He spent a year of his life in jail after robbing a gas station. Randy was so high that he does not remember the robbery or reports that he held a gun to the clerk’s head.

“At age 27 Randy was released from jail and wasted no time getting so stoned that he overdosed, died and didn’t even know it.” All he experienced was darkness and woke up the next morning with a white sheet over his head.

His arms and hands were secured to the bed with leather straps. Randy was terrified of waking up this way, under a sheet, and began struggling against his restraints. The startled doctors immediately uncovered him.

They told Randy that he died the night before. They also said that Randy’s mother had been outside the hospital room all night, praying for her son. Randy truly believed the prayers of his mother saved him and was scared into going to church.

However, church did not help Randy after his first death. He heard what the preacher was saying, but he did not allow the word of God to penetrate him and save his soul.

Randy did not give his life to Christ because of peer pressure, saying, “I always had friends telling me. [When you] get saved, you gotta change everything. Your life, your friends, everything. God wants all of us, not some of us, and I did not give Him all of me.”

Randy felt no guilt about keeping his addictive lifestyle. He continued leading a double life, going to church every Sunday but seeing his druggie friends during the week.

After his first death, Randy married and had two kids, but alcohol and drug use destroyed his relationship. His wife left with his two young children in 1997. Randy hit a low point in his life.

The second time he died, Randy was walking through his mother’s house in the morning. He was completely sober, but had planned on going out that night and partying.

However, the decades of drug use had taken a toll on his body and his heart faltered. As he was going through a middle bedroom, everything suddenly went black. He dropped to the ground, his hands hitting and digging into the carpet.

The room was filling with fear. A dark fear so strong that he could feel his flesh quivering.

He had the terrifying sensation that someone or something was physically dragging his spirit out of his body. It didn’t physically hurt, but feeling his soul being torn from his body was horrifying. He was halfway out of his body. Randy saw his hands digging into the carpet and his body not moving, yet he was distinctly being dragged away from himself.

Randy looked up and saw a dark creature or entity with hell in its eyes. He knew he was at the Edge of Hell, being dragged into the dark depths of torment.

Death was “a darkness within a darkness that had living power. Death looked like a fallen angel with a huge skull-looking face and curled horns like a ram.” Randy felt his spirit separating from his body further as Death filled the room.

As he was being dragged to hell, Randy had a moment of clarity. He knew he had been scared into going to church yet had not committed and submitted to God.

Death had authority over him because he did not have Jesus Christ in his heart to protect him. Randy knew he was going to hell and realized that he had to cry out seriously and sincerely to God.

Randy began begging God to save him, asking Jesus to forgive him. He wept that he did not want to go to hell, that he needed Jesus to save him. Randy cried, screamed, and begged, unsuccessfully grasping the carpet trying to keep his soul on Earth.

Suddenly, Randy felt an unbelievable peace that was not of this world. It was perfect and beautiful. Somehow Randy knew everything was going to be all right. The fear and worry left the room and Randy knew an angel would take him up and save him.

An indescribable force made him turn and look at the door to the hallway. As soon as he looked at the door, it opened. Randy saw a long, white robed hand. The white was unearthly and glorious. Randy understood the power behind that hand and felt peace and safety from Death. A comforting voice belonged to the robed hand and it said, “Everything is alright, I was right here all along.”

After his heavenly near death experience, Randy went to church for real this time. He sang the songs, read his Bible, listened to what the preacher said, and began praying to God for guidance on how to best live what he learned in church every Sunday. Randy began a true relationship with God, saying, “I pursued Him with reckless abandonment.”

Randy’s addiction to drugs was replaced with an addiction to God. He wanted to know God better and serve him completely in return for being saved from hell.

The second near death experience is what finally gave Randy the motivation and strength to turn his life around. Seeing what was waiting for him if he changed his ways was so beautiful and peaceful.

Now Randy travels across the country, spreading the story of what he experienced. He believes in the power and salvation of Jesus Christ and wants everyone to be able to experience heavenly peace after their death.

Randy understands that, in order to experience this power and beauty, people need to commit themselves completely to God. As it says in Jeremiah 29:13, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” In Randy’s last moments as he was being dragged to hell, he sought God with all of his heart and truly found him. He now works as a messenger of God, spreading the word about what Christians will experience after their death.

See Randy tell his story.

Chapter Six
Mesiah

Drowned and Rejected by Satan

Fear grew with each step he took among the

pieces of gold beneath the flaming light. Slowly, he started to realize that he might be dead.

In March of 2003, Mesiah had moved back to his hometown of Detroit, Michigan after going back and forth between Detroit and Minnesota.

Friends and family saw that he had grown up and converted from Christian to Muslim, but he was still the same hardworking person he was before. Mesiah was dating, but his primary girlfriend Someka was back in Minnesota with their child, Isiah.

After moving back to Detroit, he went with his mom to Minnesota to visit Someka and his two brothers. They decided to have a mini family reunion and got a hotel with a pool to stay at.

Even though he could not swim Mesiah planned on bringing all of the kids down to the hotel pool to go swimming in the shallow end. Someka warned him not to get in the water. He reassured her that he knew his limits and would not swim.

Mesiah brought nine kids down to the pool with him. His brother, Leonard, thought that was a lot for Mesiah to handle and ran upstairs to get his swim trunks so he can help. All of the kids were playing and Mesiah noticed one of his nieces, Kiara, trying to jump in off the deep end. Mesiah remembered it looked too dangerous, so he went to get her before she fell in. Kiara slipped and caught herself on the ladder. Even though she looked okay, Mesiah rushed over to get her off the ladder.

That was the last thing he remembers.

Mesiah fell into the pool and slammed his head on the concrete bottom. He went unconscious and began breathing water into his lungs. Mesiah felt the sensation of drowning, the fearful feeling of helplessness.

He could not move or feel anything. He saw huge bubbles the size of his head, one after another floating around him before they disappeared. Then he blacked out.

The first time Mesiah awakes, he finds himself in a hospital bed wearing a gown. However, he has no injuries or an IV. Everything in the room, the sheets, curtains, and gown, are all brand new. The room was so clean and perfect that Mesiah knew it couldn’t be real.

In the hospital room there was a nurse who kept her back to him, messing with the drapes. Mesiah got her attention and she turned to look at him, saying, “You’ll be fine.” Mesiah was amazed because the nurse looked like a lighter skinned version of Someka, his girlfriend. In the moment, he thought it was her. They shared a warm smile and Mesiah felt comforted.

Suddenly, Mesiah experienced complete darkness like he had blacked out, but he was still aware. He heard voices that whispered at first, saying things like, “It’s okay,” or “You’re going to be alright,” or “Don’t be afraid.”

As the voices grew louder, Mesiah realized that they belonged to people that were dead. He heard his aunt and his grandmother specifically, telling him that everything was going to be okay but he had to keep moving.

Mesiah was being upset with their words because they wouldn’t communicate with him or answer his questions. Then Mesiah saw two lights in the distance and began walking towards them with the encouragement of his aunt and grandmother.

As Mesiah drew closer, he realized that the lights were actually two torches of flames. Gold coins, goblets, and idols appeared around the flames, scattered all over the ground.

His fear grew with each step he took among the pieces of gold beneath the flaming light. He started to realize that he might be dead.

Mesiah saw a figure sitting among a heap of gold that was shaped like a throne. The figure was enormous, over twelve feet into the air with a menacing look on his face.

Mesiah describes a bull’s head with a human face, the color a deep red that was almost black. It was intimidating with curled horns; a terrifying figure of Satan. “Seeing Satan face-to-face, I knew I was dead and I was going to hell,” Mesiah recalls.

With this realization, Mesiah was confused about what he had done wrong. In his youth. He had tried to do everything he could to stay away from trouble.

After realizing he was going to Hell, Mesiah knew he had to accept the facts as they were even though he did not understand why it was happening. There was no turning back.

With his acceptance, Mesiah asked his aunt and grandmother a new question, “Is this what you want me to do?” They replied, “Yes, it’s okay. It’s going to be fine.”

They kept speaking to Mesiah. Satan, about 50 yards away, looked around to see who they were speaking to. Mesiah was mad at Satan for ignoring his presence, “If this is the way I’m going, I want him to know how unhappy I am about it.” He began yelling and cussing at Satan, daring him to come and get him.

Mesiah was about 25 feet away when Satan finally looked directly at him. The whispers of his family died down; only his grandmother continued telling Mesiah that everything was going to be alright.

Satan looked at Mesiah. His eyes were yellow with a slight haze around them. Satan leaned forward to get a better look, then eased back into his chair as if to say, “No, I’m going to pass on you for now.”

Mesiah’s grandmother said, “I told you it would be alright. You don’t have to be afraid.” With her words, Mesiah was slowly drawn into a darkness as if he was falling asleep.

Little did Mesiah know everything that went on around him after he fell to the bottom of the pool. The kids thought he was playing a game and pointed to Mesiah drifting along the bottom when his brother Leonard showed up. Leonard saw Mesiah looking up at him and started screaming for help since he too couldn’t swim to save his brother.

A passerby dove to the bottom and dragged him up, but his eyes were closed and his body was limp. The ambulance came and continued CPR on him. They got him to spit up water and found a weak pulse, but Mesiah remained deeply unconscious.

Mesiah’s son Isiah had called Someka, saying, “Mom, I need you to come back because dad died.” Someka rushed to the hotel to bring Mesiah’s mother to the hospital.

In the ambulance, Mesiah stopped breathing and flat-lined a second time. When Someka and Mesiah’s mother get to the hospital, the doctors take them into a back room, explaining that Mesiah’s lungs were filled with chlorinated water. The chlorine was attacking the lungs and causing Mesiah’s kidneys to shut down.

This condition is known as secondary drowning. 90% of drowning victims are never revived.

Someka snuck away and found Mesiah. The blood had stopped pumping to his limbs and his blue legs were swollen to two times their normal size. Mesiah flatlined again and Someka watched the doctors shocking his heart, his body jolting off of the table with each, “Clear!” The doctors began compressions on him as well, saying, “Mesiah, you need to wake up.”

After some time, the doctors are able to get Mesiah’s heart beating again, but he was still in critical condition. His kidneys were failing and his blood pressure was impossibly high.

They placed Mesiah in a medically induced coma with life support. The doctors told the family he needed to be placed in long term care because he couldn’t breathe on his own and wouldn’t wake up.

Mesiah’s mother was arguing with the doctor. She wanted Mesiah taken off of the medication so he could get a chance to wake up. Despite the doctors’ protests, Mesiah’s mother was firm about her wishes, saying, “I’m his mom, he will do what I tell him to.”

Off of the medicine, Someka saw Mesiah’s eyes fluttering. Mesiah’s mother asked him to open his eyes, but they only moved without opening. In Mesiah’s darkness, he heard whispered voices. Soon his mother’s voice became clear.

Mesiah responded, opening his eyes and seeing a blurry light. Mesiah put effort into focusing on his mother and she smiled. Someka saw the look of shock and bewilderment on the doctors’ faces.

Mesiah is very grateful for his second chance. The doctors told him that they would have taken him off life support later that day if he did not wake up. His right lung had collapsed and he needed a machine to help him function.

When Mesiah awoke, he didn’t want to scare Someka with what he saw but he had to tell her what he realized. He asked Someka if she was pregnant. Someka didn’t know and asked why. Mesiah explained that he saw a nurse when he died that looked just like Someka, only with lighter skin. He said that the nurse was their future daughter. Someka thought he was crazy until she took a pregnancy test and found out she was pregnant.

Mesiah proposed to her right afterwards and she said yes. Today, they are married with Mary, the daughter he saw when he died, and his other daughter Mira.

Mesiah always looks at the scars on his arm and on his head, reminding him every day that he is a medical miracle. He has not wasted his second chance at life. Mesiah believes the voices wanted him to be a good person and always have faith. Now he goes to work, raises his family, and has faith and wonder at what tomorrow might bring.

See Mesiah tell his story.

Chapter Seven
Kenneth Hagin

Died Three Times and Saw the Gates of Hell

Looking across the flames, Kenneth saw what he believed were the gates of hell. He was physically drawn to the gates, forced to take steps toward the opening even though he tried to stop himself.

Kenneth Hagin was born in 1917 with a deformed heart. The doctors did not expect him to live long and in April of 1933 Kenneth became bedridden. The evening of April 22nd, Kenneth took a turn for the worst. His family stayed by his side while they waited for the doctor to arrive.

A pain shot through his heart like lightening and he believed he was living his last few moments. He recalls, “My toes seemed to go numb. This numbness spread to my feet, my ankles, my knees, my hips, my stomach, my heart, and I leapt out of my body.”

He knew he was out of his body because he could see his family in the room but he couldn’t contact them. He tried to communicate, but felt his spirit leaving the room.

Suddenly, he fell into a downward cavern. As he descended, Kenneth saw the lights of earth fading away and he became covered by darkness.

Once he reached the bottom of the cavern, giant orange flames surrounded him. Looking across the flames, Kenneth saw what he believed were the gates of hell.

He was pulled to the gates, even though he tried to stop himself. He was like a magnet, drawn by a force that was impossible to resist.

Kenneth was aware there was some kind of creature in the flames, waiting to meet him at the bottom of the pit. Kenneth recalls, “I didn’t look at it; my gaze was riveted on the gates.” The creature grabbed him, but was stopped when a thunderous voice spoke.

Kenneth couldn’t understand the voice, but whatever it was saying made the hellish place shake and tremble. The creature released him and he was pulled toward a light.

Abruptly Kenneth came back into his body. He thought he only had a second to speak to his family and wanted to tell his mother goodbye. However, only his grandmother was in the room since everyone left thinking he was dead. Before he could see his mother, Kenneth said he was going again. He told his grandmother he loved her and died again.

This process happened three times within the space of ten minutes. Kenneth would die and be sent down the cavern into hell.

He would be drawn to the gates and the creature would impede his progress by grabbing him. Before the creature could do anything, a thunderous voice would boom and shake the cavern, causing the creature to release him.

Then he would ascend towards a light back in his body, only to tell his family he loved them before dying again.

By the third time, Kenneth was sure he was hallucinating the entire thing. Yet the way the darkness surrounded him convinced him that the hellish place was real. Kenneth began calling out into the darkness, “God, I belong to the church. I have been baptized in water.”

The third time Kenneth ascended toward the light after the thunderous voice saved him, he prayed, “Oh God, I come to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I ask you to forgive me of my sins.”

This time when he re-entered his body, it was for good. Kenneth’s.prayer lifted a two ton weight from his chest. Eventually, he recovered from his heart condition.

Kenneth became the founder and president of the Rhema Bible School and Ministries, known internationally today as Dr. Kenneth Hagin, Reverend.

Kenneth preached that he was raised off his deathbed by the power of God and the revelation of faith in God’s word. Since his three times near death experience, Kenneth had Jesus appear to him in visions eight times over several years. These encounters changed the course of his ministry.

Today, the Rhema Ministries are run by his son as Kenneth has experienced his fourth and final death, resting peacefully with the Lord.

See Kenneth Hagin tell his story.

Chapter 8
Mickey Robinson

High Flier Barely Escapes Hell

“You wouldn’t want the worst person – Adolf Hitler, Bin Laden, Saddam – you wouldn’t want any human being to ever go there.”

Mickey Robinson never knew anyone who had a personal relationship with God. He never understood the need to have any sort of religion or relationship. Instead, his religion was all about seeking thrills. He was big into aviation, first learning how to fly a plane and then become a certified skydiver.

He became obsessed with skydiving. His life revolved around the seconds of free-fall and the minutes of parachuting down to earth. It became his drug.

One afternoon after takeoff, Mickey relaxed and began dozing on the floor of the plane next to the pilot. He was awakened by an unfamiliar sound – a silent motor. Still in a daze, the pilot had to slap Mickey awake and tell him the plane was going down.

Suddenly the plane pitched forward and plummeted straight down at over 100 miles per hour. Mickey was later told that the plane crashed into a huge oak tree and burst into flames. Mickey’s instructor friend began pushing people out of the plane and gathering everyone a safe distance away. No one knew he and the pilot were still trapped in the plane.

When the other instructor realized they were missing, he went back to the plane. Part of the wing had been torn loose from the plane and the instructor jumped inside. Some part of Mickey’s clothing or parachute gear was caught on the plane. He was also soaked in jet fuel and on fire from head to toe.

What happened next Mickey calls God’s first miracle. The instructor grabbed the parachute harness with both hands and tore it loose. This was miraculous because each strap has 200 pounds of tension strength.

The instructor pulled the straps so hard that both of his thumbs popped out of their sockets. His moment of strength worked and he was able to pull Mickey safely away from the plane. The instructor tried to slap the fire out, but it would come back. There was no hope for saving the pilot.

Mickey was taken to a hospital. He had extreme burns on the right half of his body, a brain injury, and he was now blind in his right eye. The doctors told his family he was going to die and to prepare themselves.

He was wracked with pain and discomfort all over his body. Suddenly he could feel his legs through the springs of the bed as his spirit began to climb out of his body. He says, “My spirit came out of my body as if you were taking a glove off your hand.” He was completely separated from the pain.

He didn’t look back at his body because he was immediately transferred to a another world.

Instantly, Mickey knew he was in the spiritual world. This is because there was no logic or reasoning in the world. He was having constant revelations instead of thinking through things.

The colors in this world were brighter, the edges sharper, and the emotions enhanced. There is a complete absence of time awareness because everything is relative to eternity instead of relative to time. He was amazed that he was instantly conscious about eternity.

He felt he was traveling through the spirit world. Looking ahead, he saw a pure white light. He explains the depth, saying, “It was whiter than the brightest snow and brighter than ten thousand suns.” Even with this brightness, he had no problem looking directly at it. The light was compelling, drawing him in like a tractor beam.

As he drew closer to the white light, he saw a blackness sweeping from his right side. Since there is no reasoning in the spirit world,

Mickey instantly knew the complete nature of the blackness. It was eternal, without matter or life, completely void of anything. He knew that it was a forever non-negotiable cut off from the source of life.

The more he looked at the blackness, the faster it would sweep. The feeling of being cut off from life forever grew in intensity.

It was so horrific that to this day, he can’t be around anyone who “go to hell” to another person. He says, “You wouldn’t want the worst person – Adolf Hitler, Bin Laden, Saddam – you wouldn’t want any human being to ever go there.”

As the blackness swept it began to eclipse the light. It was like a dark room with light outside the doorway and someone was closing the door until there was only a sliver of light left peeking through the door. Standing on the precipice of eternal separation from life he began screaming, “I’m sorry, I want to live! Give me another chance!”

Just before the darkness took over, Mickey abruptly found himself standing in the presence of God. Even though he could not see God, he felt His presence standing beside him. He felt the mercy God offered and an instant understanding that he had eternity; that he would never truly die.

He was standing in a river of “golden radiation” that was alive with a current of golden light. He felt the strength of the river going through him and says, “[At that moment], I’m more alive than anyone can imagine. This is the height of the experience of life… Somehow I knew this being was going to take care of me for the rest of my life.”

He was filled with God’s love, majesty, and authority. The feeling of God’s nature was vibrating like a tuning fork. God spoke to Mickey not in a language, but as “the word of his purpose.”

Returning to his body was as if he were being “reeled in like a kite.” His spirit settled into his body with the ability to hear and see out his good eye. As he reentered the room, Mickey heard himself speaking a beautiful language that he had never heard anyone speak. When his brain finally turned back on, Mickey was born again and filled with the Holy Ghost.

The experience changed Mickey’s life forever. He wondered for years what the blackness was and why it swept so far, only to stop and show a sliver of light. Years later, God revealed the answer.

God explained that the blackness was the historical record of his life. It represented all of the years he had lived in darkness. God gave him the sliver of light as an opportunity to cry out to him. “In that space,” Mickey explains, “it changed my future, my destiny, my whole purpose of living.”

Mickey understands that God loved him the whole time and was with him. Mickey now tells his story, saying that waiting until that desperate moment in the spiritual world to make a connection with God is terrifying and a huge risk. Instead, Mickey explains that people should accept God now and form a relationship with him in the physical world.

See Mickey Robinson tell his story.

Chapter Nine
Christine Eastell

Car Accident Sends Her to Hell

The voice responded to her protests, saying, “When I tempted you with worldly things you chose that way. You stopped going to church, you stopped listening. You belong to me.”

Christine Eastell had a normal, good life living in Nottingham. She was a regular church attendee and even ran the Sunday school, went to Bible studies, and hosted a Bible story discussion every week. Once her kids were grown, Christine got a sales job to make a steady income.

Even though she was great at her job, it was stressful and time consuming. She wad obsessed with her work, always trying to find jobs that paid more. She became more and more materialistic and gradually stopped going to church because of her busy lifestyle.

On December 11th, 1989, Christine insisted on going to work at her new job even though she was feeling ill. Her doctor and family told her not to go yet she went in anyway. Christine struggled through work all day and asked to go home early around 4:30.

She felt so awful that she took a quicker rural route home, even though it was wet and misty outside with poor visibility. Christine lost her concentration for a second and crossed over the white line, hitting another car head on.

The other driver was miraculously able to get out of the car and dial for emergency services. Firefighters arrived and cut Christine out of the car. Christine was embarrassed at the mess she made and kept asking to go home.

Her injuries were terrible and she was taken straight to the ICU and placed on life support. Her family traveled in from Suffolk and Scotland only to learn that Christine had gone into septic shock and had a heart attack that she was barely resuscitated from. Doctors told her family to prepare for the worst.

Behind the scenes, Christine had a second heart attack. For a moment, she died and that is where her experience begins.

She was traveling down a black bottomless pit with no sense of direction. There was a complete blackness that is deeper than anything on earth.

Christine began to see people everywhere walking around with “complete torment” on their faces. Their shoulders were slumped as if “everything bad in the world was on them.”

Today when she tells her story, she can still feel the pain, torture, and torment from the people in the pit. She shut her eyes, thinking, “I’m obviously dreaming,” but she wasn’t. Every time she opened her eyes, she still saw and felt the despair.

By this point she was hysterical and her terror grew when felt a deeper despair and evil growing in the background.

Christine looked up and spiritually knew she was in the presence of Satan. She said, “I’m a Christian. I’ve led a good life. There’s no way I should be here. I’ve done everything I was supposed to do.”

The voice responded to her protests, saying, “When I tempted you with worldly things, with success, you chose that way. You stopped going to church, you stopped listening to where you should be. You belong to me.”

After Satan spoke those words, Christine.got on her knees and prayed to Jesus to rescue her and take her out of that place. Christine recalls, “I’m not sure what I was expecting. I just literally bowed down and asked for forgiveness. And, at that point, I thought there’s just nothing more I can do.”

As soon as she knelt and began praying, she was instantly taken out of the pit and was placed in God’s presence. Christine felt a drastic change from the despair to the absolute pure love, joy, hope, and peace. Jesus was in front of her, surrounded by a bright light that obstructed his face.

“I was very happy there and felt this is where I want to be,” Christine said. However, she was not allowed to stay. Jesus said she had to go back and share her testimony, saying, “Tell people that hell is a reality but the alternative is Jesus.”

After He spoke to her, Christine looked down and saw herself in a hospital bed. She flew back into her body.

When Christine awoke, her family was all around her and she felt truly blessed. She was discharged in a month, completely healed.

She moved from Nottingham to Suffolk so she could be near her parents. She became involved with a small church in Suffolk and spoke with the pastor’s wife about her experience. The wife prayed with Christine and she became born again.

Christine says the experience changed her life completely. She admits that she does not have the perfect life and gets worried just like everyone else. But she stops her negativity in its tracks and shares what happened to her as often as she can.

She says, “I know it was a long time ago, but it doesn’t leave me; the feelings, the love, the worry, the despair. It’s all there.” Christine knows she was given a glimpse of hell, saying, “It never left me and that is what I know happened to me… I do know there is a hell and I do know there is a heaven and nothing will sway me otherwise.”

See Christine Eastell tell her story.

Chapter Ten
Bill Wiese

Christian Gets a Glimpse of Hell

One demon picked Bill up and threw him against the stone wall. Bill heard and felt his bones break and screamed in agony.

Bill Wiese has been a Christian his whole life. He was newly married to his beautiful wife Annette and had a successful realty company that grossed half a million dollars per year.

Even though he was a practicing Christian, he never thought about hell. Bill had no interest in the place and he and his wife never saw dark movies on the subject to avoid entertaining evil. All he knew was that hell was a fiery place and that’s it.

On November 23rd, 1998, Bill woke up at three in the morning to get a drink of water. Once he reached the living room, he suddenly felt like he was being pulled out of his body. He began falling through the air, tumbling down a long tunnel. At the end of the tunnel, Bill entered an open cavern and hit the stone floor in a prison cell.

The cell had having stone walls and bars. Even though it was a prison, it looked like a dungeon. It was filthy, stinking, and filled with smoke. He was fully awake and aware, knowing instantly he was in hell by the heat. The heat is beyond what can be experienced on earth.

Bill saw demonic creatures in the cell, pacing like a caged animal. They were ferocious and vicious, unlike anything that can be seen on earth. They looked reptilian in appearance with bumps on their skin and scales all over their bodies. The demons had huge jaws, sunken eyes, and claws that were a foot long. The demons in his cell were over 12 feet tall.

The demons prowling the cell had extreme hatred. Bill wondered why they hated him so and what he had done to make him so angry. Only later did he realize they hated God so much and anything that was his creation.

The demons began attacking Bill. One demon picked Bill up and threw him against the stone wall. He heard and felt his bones break, as he screamed in agony. Another demon dug his claws into his chest, tearing the flesh open. “The flesh hung like ribbons, but I noticed there was no blood,” Bill recalls.

Bill’s screams of agony and torment joined the millions of others trapped for eternity in hell. The screams were so loud that it was hard for Bill to stand listening to them. He knew that there would be no peace or quiet, no escape.

The smell of hell was also unbearable. It was putrid and disgusting, worse than an open sewer. It was hard to breathe because of the burning sulfur. Bill wondered, ‘How can I be alive, breathing this toxic air?’ Yet you keep going,”

There was not enough air to breathe. He had to fight and gasp for the smallest breaths. Bill said, “At any moment, you feel like [you’re] going to die from a lack of oxygen.”

While suffering, Bill also saw others being tormented. He.saw people burning in a raging pit of flames with flesh hanging off their bones. The demons surrounded him and he realized he was standing on a bed of maggots. Seeing this torment and going through it himself was exhausting, but Bill said it was impossible to sleep in hell.

The demons continued to tear at him and Bill said there was nothing he could do to defend himself. There was no strength in his body to fight back. At the time, Bill understood that the pain he was experiencing was not as bad as it should be for the torment he was put through. The amount of pain he experienced was enough for him to want to escape, but somewhere inside of him, he knew that it should be much worse.

Bill felt that he would never get out of hell. Worse than the pain, this feeling of hopelessness consumed him. “Ten million years could go by,” Bill explains, “and I’m still there. And that’s the worst part, knowing there’s no one going to come rescue you. There’s no cavalry coming over the hill, there’s no angels to protect you. You are lost in a torment and hopeless forever.”

Out of nowhere, Bill was pulled up the tunnel he fell through and a bright light appeared. An outline of a man appeared. Bill couldn’t see the face, but he had a feeling he knew who it was. Bill asked, “Jesus?” and Jesus said, “I am.” When Jesus answered, Bill.fell to His feet and Jesus touched Bill in a comforting way.

Bill did not want to ask questions, but thoughts entered his head and Jesus answered them.

Jesus said that his mind was blocked from knowing he was a Christian and that he would be able to escape hell. The purpose of Bill traveling to hell is to experience what an unsaved person would experience there. Jesus explained that He wanted Bill to feel a little bit of pain, just enough to understand it so he could tell people the pain is real, not metaphorical or allegorical.

Jesus wanted him to tell people that Hell is a real place. He said, “Even some of my own people do not believe hell exists.” Jesus wanted people to be warned of the horrors of hell, that there are literal burning flames, and they need to understand the word of God to avoid condemnation to hell.

Bill had to experience the hopelessness of hell to warn people of its eternal torment. Bill.learned that God did not create hell for bad people. Instead, God withdrew his attributes from hell once it was created as a place for the devil and his fallen angels, not man. God’s attributes are everything good in life.

Bill explains, “If you want nothing to do with God, there’s a place prepared for you for that. People send themselves to hell by the rejection of the directions He gives.”

Bill says that Jesus allowed him to experience a piece of His heart – the piece that breaks every time someone goes to hell. Bill.watched Jesus cry as people fell to hell. Jesus died on the cross so man would not have to experience hell and He cried at the choices of the people that caused them to be sent to hell. Bill explains God gave people the free will to choose whether or not to follow Him and that he needs to explain to people the importance of following Him.

One of the last things Jesus told Bill was, “Tell the people that I am coming very soon.” Jesus repeated himself and Bill felt in his heart that he really meant it. Bill.was frightened to tell people in case they thought he was crazy or just had a bad dream.

Jesus reassured Bill, saying it was not his job to convict hearts, but the Holy Spirit’s job. Bill just needed to tell people about hell so they can make an informed decision about how to live their lives.

Annette, Bill’s wife woke up at 3:23 in the morning when she heard Bill’s screams coming from the living room. She ran to the room and found Bill traumatized in a fetal position on the floor.

She thought he was dying and began to call 911 until Bill called out instructions, that Annette needed to pray for him before the Lord sent him to hell. Annette.felt relief at these instructions because she knew it was God giving her peace in that crisis.

Both Bill and Annette’s lives changed after the experience. They both left their successful careers because they had an urgency to tell people about Jesus’ word and save people from experiencing hell. Bill says that God removed his trauma from the experience and left his passion and compassion to help people understand the love of God.

See Bill Wiese tell his story.

Chapter Six

April

Bride-to-Be Commits Suicide and Sees Hell

Something started striking out at her. At first she thought they were hands ripping at her, then she realized they weren’t hands. They were snakes.

A 22 year old woman from Gary, Indiana, April was a happy bride-to-be, ready to marry the love of her life in a week. She was going to her fiancé’s house one night before the wedding to make him dinner, already practicing for their life as a married couple.

She entered the home and called for him, but there was no response. She looked around and found a note addressed to her from her fiancé. The note explained that he had fallen in love with another woman and had run away from her. He said it was impossible to marry her because of the love he felt for this other woman.

The bride-to-be could not believe it the note. She reread it over and over again, trying to understand it. She didn’t know what to do. All she knew was that she could not stay in the apartment where she had loved and longed for a future with her fiancé. She had to get out of there.

April ran to her car and started driving, hardly paying attention to the road in front of her. As she drove, she thought about her future and how it was destroyed, saying, “I loved him like I had never loved a man before. Our wedding invitations had already been sent out and my parents were going to be there in two days. How was I going to face them? My whole world had fallen apart.”

The more she thought about it, the more she didn’t care anymore. About her life, herself, or her future. She decided to kill herself.

Without warning, she swerved her car and drove it off the road, over a steep hill. The car rolled over a few times before landing at the bottom of the hill. She heard the crash, saying “It was as if the whole world had exploded around me and then there was only silence and darkness.”

Suddenly, she was speeding through a long, dark subway tunnel. She was in such excruciating pain that she wanted to scream, but found that she couldn’t. She was so cold and terrified, not understanding what was happening to her.

Something started striking out at her. At first she thought they were hands ripping at her skin, then she realized they weren’t hands, but snakes. As she was being torn and ripped apart, she came out of the tunnel into “a horrible swamp full of dead people moaning and crying out.” She could smell death everywhere and she cried out to God, asking him to pray for her.

The dead people were everywhere in the swamp, reaching toward her with blank stares on their faces. She kept trying to scream and run away, but the people were everywhere. All of the grotesque people came at her, grabbing her and dragging her away with them. She was in such extreme pain that she couldn’t fight back.

They pulled her over to a pit and made her look down into it. The pit was hideous and bubbling, but they forced her to watch what happened in the pit. She saw the grief her suicide caused her parents. They pushed her head around so she was forced to look at two small children begging for her life. She realized they were her children that would never be born because she had killed herself before they could be conceived.

All of this was too much for her. She screamed, “Get away from me! I want to go back, I want to live!”

With these words, she woke up surrounded by people who had pulled her from the car wreck. They were all shocked to see her awake and told her that she was absolutely dead when they pulled her out. The people called an ambulance for her, and she lived.

Chapter Seven

Angie Finemore

Committed Suicide to Escape Turmoil and Found Even More in Hell

Angie realized the turmoil she had faced in this life was nothing compared to the turmoil in hell. It was a manifestation of what she was already experiencing.

Angie Finemore did not have an easy life. At nine years old, her mother left the family. Angie had to take on the responsibility of taking care of her younger sister and alcoholic father who psychologically and sexually abused her. She became consumed with feelings of utter worthlessness.

When she was 19, Angie thought that getting married and starting a family of her own would relieve some of her mental anguish.

As she built her family, Angie realized that having her own family would not free her from her inner misery. She tried to fight her depression for years, but the feelings of self-loathing prevailed.

She believed she was a bad mother and that she was dooming her children to a horrible existence. She justified her thoughts of suicide by convincing herself that her family would be better off without her.

Angie thought death would be a glorious escape, thanks to her stepmother’s near death experience. She had been in a car accident and told Angie that she saw her body in the hospital room before being embraced by love, warmth, and peace. She had not wanted to return back to her body. Angie thought her death would be the same.

Angie first tried to commit suicide by slitting her wrists, but it failed. On a cold January morning, she decided she was going to do a better job.

She wrote a suicide note to her husband, telling him what to do with her wedding rings and to tell her kids she loved him. She was sorry that she was leaving, but that she had to. Angie then took a bunch of pills and laid down on the couch to die.

“When I was dying, I could feel this tremendous energy encompass me,” Angie describes. “I could feel my spirit and my body separating. It was very powerful and far more real than anything I’ve experienced in this life.”

Angie then saw images racing toward her. She saw the first memory of her being born and then went through every moment of her life exactly as she had lived it. The only difference is Angie felt everyone else’s feelings and perspectives while feeling her own.

She gained a completely renewed understanding of what her life had been like. Angie saw what her parents were really like and what they were trying to do to raise her. The most important thing she learned was that her mother had truly loved her.

Suddenly Angie sensed she wasn’t alone. There was a presence with her that was viewing her life with her. She continued to watch the moments of her life, ending with her suicide. Angie then became surrounded by darkness before descending into another plane of existence.

Angie was aware of disembodied spirits who had chosen the same path of self-destruction. They were mumbling to themselves, completely self-absorbed. Angie realized they were reliving the worst experiences of their lives, over and over again. They were constantly experiencing the agony that caused their suicides.

Angie realized the turmoil she had faced in this life was nothing compared to the turmoil in hell. It was a manifestation of what she was already experiencing. Angie explains, “I wanted so badly just to end my life and be done. I found I took all of that with me and it was just multiplied and intensified beyond anything we could even have the power of understanding in this life.” Angie had a concept of hell before going there, but it was nothing like she was expecting. Hell was unrelenting emotional distress.

In the misery, Angie heard a voice saying, “Is this what you really want?” Angie looked to see where the voice was coming from and saw a pinpoint of light above her that looked like a little star. The light grew in intensity and came toward her very quickly. She realized the light was not a falling star, but a being made of light.

Angie realized it was God, saying, “I didn’t have to be told. The universe reverberated his name.” God spoke to her, saying she could not take her life because it was not hers to take. He explained to Angie, “Life is supposed to be hard. You’re supposed to pass through these things, all of us have done this.”

With his words, Angie was filled with understanding about the purpose of life. She understood what we are doing here and the importance of thinking about how we treat other people.

Another presence appeared next to God and Angie felt it was the same being who was with her during her life review. She senses a connection with him and felt incredible love, peace, compassion, and pain. It was Jesus, and the pain was for what she had done.

Angie knew she was in the presence of the savior of the world and could feel what he had done for her. She felt the moment of his crucifixion and the suffering he went through.

Angie was then shown what would happen to her children if she stayed dead. Her oldest son, in particular, would be terribly harmed by grief and pain. Angie saw how he would suffer the rest of his life and be unable to complete his mission successfully.

Her desire to die disappeared and she was ready to come back. She knew that she needed to understand her life was not her own with this experience in the afterlife, saying, “What we are doing here is so important and every life we touch is so important.”

Before she could go back, she was warned that there is a scheme to get everyone in hell. God told her about an organized being of darkness with concourses of dark angels assisting him. The main purpose of the darkness is to thwart the plan of God and direct the people on earth to do harmful things. God warned her to live her life in the light to avoid this evil.

The return to her body was instantaneous. Angie was rushed quickly through the darkness. She opened her eyes and found herself lying on the couch. Angie felt all the pain she had experienced and felt the drugs she had taken, but had a new understanding.

Today, Angie understands how she got to a place where she wanted to commit suicide. “I didn’t get there because other people had done things to me as much as I had chosen not to overcome the things that are intentionally given to us. Problems, things we need to overcome so we can grow.

“I still have trials that I need to overcome, but the important thing is to find happiness. Actually make happiness.”

Angie had a third child that brought her immeasurable happiness. She doesn’t know why she got to come back, but she is filled with gratitude that she was. Angie knows that she still has a purpose here and that she is important, especially to her children. She avoids the evil plans set by the dark being by living her life in the light. This choice has improved her life measurably.

Chapter Eight

Sandy Jones

Gained Worldly Understanding After
Speaking to Female God

Sandi Rogers was an L.P.N. before she decided to commit suicide. She even used her knowledge as an ER nurse to find the exact place of the heart before placing the barrel up to her chest and pulling the trigger.

Sandi sensed commotion beneath her and sensed people lifting her up onto a gurney. The next second she realized EMS workers were pushing her down her hall on a stretcher. Sandi knew she should be concerned with where her body was going and what was wrong with her, but she kept getting distracted.

First, she saw some “plain-clothed” policeman next to the gun she used to kill herself. One of the policemen was theorizing about the gun and Sandi realized what he was saying was wrong. She was trying to tell him he was wrong, but then was distracted again.

Suddenly a light seemed to appear in the corner of the room. Instead of wondering where the light came from, Sandi recognized a person was behind the appearance and she asked, “Where did you come from?”

The light answered her in a female voice, saying, “I’ve always been here, but you weren’t able to see me before.”

Even though it was a female voice, Sandi knew it was God. This is because She emanated feelings of selflessness, all-consuming love, understanding, and kindness. Sandi explains, “Those were attributes I thought of as being feminine.”

Sandi remembered she was supposed to be keeping up with her body. She began following her body to the end of the hall and out her front door. As soon as she stepped outside, Sandi became distracted again. “There’s something about being outside when you’re out of your body,” she explains.

The lights felt wonderful and filled her with warmth. She experienced a feeling of lightness. Sandi was enjoying herself so much that she seemed to be “looking through the ambulance because I was enjoying being outside. It’s really kind of a nice experience.”

Then Sandi was able to talk to God again. Sandi realized that She had taken all of the pain and suffering with complete understanding of what had brought Sandi to the point where she wanted to commit suicide. Sandi describes them as being intertwined and everything she felt, God felt as well. There was an unconditional love, like parents have for their children. Sandi understood that, no matter how bad she had been, she was completely loved and understood.

God understood the motivation behind what she had done. Sandi was filled with a “wonderful love,” full of togetherness and empathy for Sandi. God explained the options to her, saying, “You can stay here or you can go back. If you stay, you’re going to have to go through everything that brought you to this point.”

As God spoke, Sandi saw all the things that had driven her to commit suicide, calling them, “the things in my life that were painful.” There were other things that Sandi experienced also, but the painful things made the biggest impact on her while she was floating between life and death.

Sandi knew she didn’t want to go through all of that pain again, so she chose to go back. But she learned many lessons about life that she is determined to share with anyone who is going through the pain she went through before attempting to kill herself.

Sandi understands now that there is no way to escape. She tells people who are considering suicide that they will have to go back and live their life from the beginning, going through everything that was painful in their lives. Then they still have to go from the point they killed themselves into the afterlife, a place that is unknown to Sandi because she chose to return to humanity.

She tells everyone there is no escaping the pain, only learning ways to change your outlook on life to erase the pain from your present and future.

After being given a second chance at life, Sandi has learned how to love other people and how to forgive and put herself in the place of other people in order to understand them more complexly. “That’s something that you have to do,” Sandi explains, “in order to love people and in order to love yourself. If you hold grudges, it hurts you and it hurts the other people.”

Sandi says grudges and resentment are barriers to love and that forgiveness is important. “You don’t necessarily have to forget when people hurt you, but you have to understand them and forgive them,” she explains.

The most important thing Sandi has learned about love is forgiveness. Now she looks at how people are like her rather than how they are different to become a more accepting and loving person.

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