I recently read most of Todd Burpo’s book “Heaven is for Real” which details the story of his son, Colton’s, visit to heaven during a surgery.

I am still digesting the book, and contrasting it with different and similar books I have read on other people’s experiences.

Here are a few first-blush reactions.

1.  I am a bit bothered by books of this sort which seem, at first glance, to wonderfully confirm all of our best and brightest beliefs about God, heaven, and the afterlife.  We as evangelicals tended to read such stories and breathe a collective sigh of relief that, “Whew, we got our theology right… High five!”  I doubt that we actually have our ideas of God and heaven all correct.  So, why do stories like this seem to confirm, not challenge, our beliefs?

Well, my best guess is that perhaps heaven is trying to reassure us rather than start fights, so they tailor the experience to the crowd that is most likely to hear it.  Heaven understands that if you tell evangelicals a story that is a few degrees of the compass off of what is expected, nobody will listen to you.  There will be an awkward silence, and then the conversation will change to something more agreeable.  Heaven doesn’t want to start any religious wars any more than we do.

In Rebecca Springer’s book about her experience in heaven, “Within Heaven’s Gates“, she makes the observation that folks in heaven are grouped into communities of like-minded people.  In other words, Native Americans, who arguably base their concept of God on some sort of Great Spirit idea, spend their time interacting predominantly with others from their tradition, while adherents of mainline Protestant Reformation churches spend their time listening to heavenly lectures by departed saints like Martin Luther.  I used to wonder why Catholics were the ones who had visions of the Virgin Mary, not usually Protestants.  Perhaps that “side” of heaven is shown to them because that is what they resonate with, and is what they would expect to see.  Ironically, Burpo’s book does mention the Virgin Mary, and indicates that she still treats Jesus like a mom would behave.

So, I think this begs the question, are heaven sightings tailor-made to conform (to some extent) to the like-minded ideas of the people who experience them?  If so, what would it be like if the filters were completely taken off?

The apostle Paul tells the story of a heaven experience in II Corinthians 12, where someone (presumably he) “was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.”  That further begs this question of, “What aren’t we being told?”  How might Paul’s repeating of these forbidden words have changed our perception of God or the afterlife?  I guess I don’t suggest a malevolent tone to the lack of information, but it does make one wonder – both about the details of heaven stories, as well as what really are the behind-the-scenes details.  I do have a suspicion that if there were parts of Colton’s story that didn’t fit the Burpo’s belief system, that those parts might just sort of filter themselves to the back burner of their minds, and not get included in the story.  I can’t prove that, but knowing human nature, I’m not sure that I really believe that there might not be parts of the story that have been neglected.

2.  I note that in Colton’s story of the coming war, men are required to fight, while women and children stand back and watch.  My feminist friends who make a big deal of the concept of “in Christ there is neither male nor female” might have a bit of a problem with that.  I’m just thinking.  Are women not good enough to be included in the battle?  What gives?  Would that part of the story have been depicted in a different manner if the experience had happened to an adult liberal female believer instead of a conservative evangelical boy?

3.  Colton says that we get wings when we get to heaven.  That’s a little off the beaten path.  In my recollection of Protestant evangelical stories of this sort, usually even angels don’t have wings, let alone saints.  Colton’s version, that we get wings when we get to heaven, is a departure from that.  Interesting.

4.  There is a reference in the book to halos.  Halos are not usually a big part of the Protestant experience, whereas in Catholic artwork, every holy person has a light shining above their head.  I once saw a photo of a Pentecostal singing group who had lightning bolts above their heads while they ministered in song.  The woman who claimed to have taken the picture, Kay Garrison, was an instructor at the Bible College I attended.  The photo had been taken years earlier, and Sister Garrison said that she had not seen the group halo in person, but that it had appeared on the photo when it was developed.  In any event, in Burpo’s book, the halo seems to be indicative of folks who have a strong child-like trust in God, and folks who constantly try to figure out the nuts and bolts of their belief system tend not to have such a light above them.  While I find these questions fascinating, as I grow older I tend to more and more lean on a simple trust of my heavenly Daddy.  Based on this account, I think that’s a good tendency.

So, I don’t have “problems” with the book, per se.  I suspect that it’s an accurate account of what Colton saw, and that (for all intents and purposes) it is honestly told.

You have to back up a level or two and get a broader perspective before I begin to have problems with all of this.  As I mentioned in Item #1, I find some suspicion in the fact that faithful Protestant Christians have one sort of Near Death Experience (NDE), Catholic Christians have a slightly different sort, “unrighteous” folks – who nevertheless come from a Christian culture – have a different sort, metaphysical folks have a different sort, Jewish folks have a different sort, etc.  Not everyone who has a NDE sees heaven or hell.  Sometimes it’s more nebulous than that.

I read and watched several accounts of NDEs in the last couple of weeks.  Predictably a lot of them told of heaven or hell experiences, but many did not.  Even the ones that told of a hell experience, for instance, sometimes told of being “rescued” from hell as soon as they begged God for a second chance. That kind of messes with the whole “last breath” theory, which says that after you take your final breath you can no longer alter your final destiny.

Here is my fundamental point:  If we as evangelical Christians are prodded by our leaders to accept the testimony of Colton Burpo (primarily because it confirms our theology) then by extension we must also give some level of credence to the larger body of NDE stories, even if they deviate from our theology.  If we think Colton’s story has inherent validity, we must also review other similar and dissimilar stories, and examine common elements and themes that may present themselves.  If heaven is truly trying to get any message or messages to us, we have some obligation to look at stories that might challenge our status quo perspectives.

I know, I know, evangelicals have a real tendency to dismiss anything that deviates as “deception” or “demonically inspired.”  The problem is, the majority of NDE stories do not have demonic overtones.  To a large extent, they confirm many of the basic beliefs – in an afterlife, in God, in love, in a future home filled with bliss, etc.  If they were designed to deceive us, why would they confirm so many basic concepts?  Why wouldn’t they just try to drag the disembodied soul off to hell instead of encouraging it and sending it back to earth?  So I tend to reject the idea that there is intentional deception going on in most of these NDE stories.  There could be exceptions, or interpretations of NDEs that are a bit “out there” and one does have to be careful, but basically if we choose to let Colton’s story stand, we’re obligated to examine the others as well.

One recurring theme in NDE stories seems to be the overwhelming sense of unconditional love that emanates from God (or the being of light) that is encountered on the other side.  In almost all cases, that love is described as being “unconditional”.  I mean really unconditional.  There does not seem to be any sort of holdout on the love, regardless of the person’s race, religion, sexual orientation, beliefs, or any other distinction.  Over and over again, I see the theme of “they don’t care about our religious dogma on the other side.”  One story of a Baha’i woman particularly caught my attention.  Quoting from her story:

The world will experience tremendous upheaval. Great suffering will occur because humans are breaking the laws of the universe. Like a man arrogantly defying the law of gravity, humanity will experience great suffering as a result breaking these laws. Humanity is being consumed by the “cancers of arrogance, materialism, racism, chauvinism, and separatist thinking.” A cleansing of the Earth will result for the purpose of education. Humanity will become “born anew.” It will be a painful process, but humanity will emerge humbled, educated, peaceful and unified.

First of all, her statement (and many statements of other NDE folks) tend to conform to the basic story line that leads to a new heaven and a new earth, after a period of tribulation.  That part fits very nicely into my evangelical template.  It is her mention of “separatist thinking” however, that especially caught my eye.  That is an element that was so prevalent in my experiences of evangelical Christianity, and one of the major elements that caused me to begin to search elsewhere for more inclusive answers.  The evangelical (and perhaps more so “fundamentalist”) tendency to shun folks who are not in sync with one’s own beliefs (or behaviors) is, to me, a huge issue that must be overcome.

I was shocked when I began to be instantly dis-fellowshipped from various churches and groups, simply because I had questions that challenged their perspective, or my lifestyle began to deviate from their expected norms.  For folks who claimed to “love sinners” they seemed very eager to treat me in a manner that I didn’t consider loving at all.  They liked my money and my sweat equity as long as I appeared to be in agreement with their beliefs, but wobble a little, and you’re history.

Taking that a bit farther, however, I began to question my own role in all of this.  Granted, I was hurt and angry after some of my experiences – and I had a lot of sincere questions about why I believed what I had believed.  Some of those have been journaled on this blog site, and opportunities have been provided for anyone to respond with encouragement or a contrasting opinion.  Few have made any comment, and no one has taken exception to any statement I’ve made.  But eventually you get over the hurt feelings, and then you begin to wonder if your own reaction to how you were treated is perhaps contributing to the problem, not helping solve it.  Me pointing out to evangelicals that they are judgmental and standoffish won’t carry much weight if I am (in turn) being judgmental toward them in making my observation.  What goes around comes around.

So, perhaps it is time to take a bit of a new direction. Perhaps instead of focusing on my questions and annoyances in regard to the evangelical world, I need rather to begin building bridges.  If arrogance and separatist thinking are a big part of the problem, then humility and reaching out toward others would seem to be a corrective action.  Understand, however, that it won’t only be bridges to evangelicals.  There seems to be a larger need for folks of all faiths and all religions and all perspectives to come together.  We humans aren’t playing nice together, and I get the impression that heaven would like us to correct that before it is too late.

Does this resonate with anyone else?