BIBLE AND THE NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES (NDEs)

– Until now nobody has sufficiently explained the phenomenon of near-death experience. The only people actually know that it is real or fake is the individuals who had it and many of them will never tell the truth if it was actually their own imaginations.

– Many Christians were quick to believe those people’s stories because they forgot or did not know how to check with the Bible to find out the truth. Among them are church ministers, too. May be they had other reasons to believe such stories and invited those people to come talking to their congregations.

– But we Christians have the Bible and we should understand that God gave us the book for some reasons. As Jesus had warned His disciples that don’t let anyone deceives them, the warning is for us today, too.

MARK 13: 5 – And Jesus, answering them, began to say: Take heed that no one deceives you.

– And because God did not give us anything else except the Bible, so it means we must use it to check the truthfulness in others. So, for this matter relating to near-death experience, we will use the Bible to examine it.

– People who had the experience said that they saw Heaven and beautiful things that could not find on Earth. But according to the Bible, that was not Heaven and the explanation is:

– Except God and His angels, no human has ever seen or had a chance to be in heaven. The Apostle Paul, as exceptional as he was, was allowed to be in Paradise only:

2CORINTHIANS 12: 2-4 – I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago — whether in the body I do not know, or whether out of the body I do not know, God knows — such a one was caught up to the third heaven. And I know such a man — whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows — how he was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.

– If an exceptional apostle like Paul, who was worthy enough to be used by God to perform so many miracles that nobody after him has ever been able to do, was allowed to be in Paradise only, who else can be better than him to have a bigger reward of seeing Heaven as they had claimed?

– If they were actually allowed to see heaven while Paul were not, God was not a Just God anymore, because His rewards as such to those who had NDEs were unjustly to Paul, for they were spiritually lesser men than Paul. But it’s certainly not the case, for God is always Just in everything He does.

– We should also understand that Paradise and Heaven are two different places. Many Christian scholars had make this mistake because they did not check that assumption with the Bible. Jesus had made clear that the two places are different.

– Before He breathed His last breath on the cross, He had declared to one of the criminals next to Him that he would be with Him in Paradise on that day:

LUKE 23: 43 – And Jesus said to him: Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.

– So, that means Jesus was in Paradise during His time of death. But after He rose from the death, He said to Mary that He had to return to Heaven because He had not seen God the Father yet:

JOHN 20: 17 – Jesus said to her: Do not cling to Me, for I have not yet ascended to My Father; but go to My brethren and say to them: I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God.

– As the Bible declares that God is always in His heaven, so, with His saying, Jesus clearly indicated that Paradise and Heaven are two separate places.

– If Paul was only able to see Paradise, those who claimed they had seen Heaven during their NDEs were not telling the truth, or the experiences were just illusions of their own minds.

– That’s why Christians who have studied the Bible carefully and deeply will not invite such people to come and talk to their congregations.

(will be continued)

MORE READINGS:

– Brain Surgeon Recalls His Near-Death Experience, Says He’s Been to a Heavenly Kingdom