06 January 2009

90 minutes in heaven

My GF bought a book titled 90 Minutes in Heaven and so i decided to read it. It turns out to be a fairly good read. It is about a Baptist minister from Alvin TX who is in a very horrendous auto accident. The paramedics declare him dead on the scene and move on to other victims. Another Baptist Preacher shows up and starts singing and praying over Don's body and Don started singing with him. The Preacher jumped out of the car was shocked. The paramedics then extricate Don from the wreckage and take him to the hospital. He apparently survives as he wrote the book.

Don talks about being outside Heaven and being greeted by all the people he knew and had passed. He met people who influenced him and helped him become a Preacher and a Christian. He devotes a whole chapter to being right outside the gates of Heaven and looking in. This is what got me to thinking....

As a Catholic, we believe that upon our death we will meet Jesus and be judged. After the judgement we will then go to Heaven, Hell or Purgatory. What struck me as odd was that when Don died, he never met Jesus or was inside Heaven. Why is this? We will come back to it.

My understanding is that most Christians believe that upon their death they meet Jesus and are judged. I have looked into Near Death Experiences and all of the ones who claim to have gone to Heaven never met Jesus. Either Christianity is wrong or they never actually died. One has to be the right answer wouldn't you think?

Then i started looking at it from a Catholic perspective. As a Catholic, we believe that very few people are sinless enough to go straight to Heaven without a purification period, thus purgatory. We also believe that upon your death, you are judged by Jesus. Now we know that the Near Death Experience people and Don never met Jesus so did they really see Heaven?

Could it be that God decided he needed Don and the NDE people to work a little harder and brought them to Heaven just to see that it really exist? Maybe these people were about to commit some grave sin that would keep them from Heaven so God woke them up to what they might be missing. I find it impossible to believe that God would make a mistake by taking these peoples lives and then saying sorry and send them back to Earth. Believing that God doesn't make mistakes, we must assume they saw Heaven for another reason. I wonder if they ever thought about it like that?

If this happened to me, i would do an in depth conscious examination and try to find out what he was trying to tell me.

2 comments:

canivalpo said...

How?? Do you ever find the time to go into such deep thought over things like this and still squeeze in work, college, GF, and church?? Not to mention making time to argue with me??
By the way, I had such a crazy dream about you the other night. I don't think you're gonna like it but I believe it to be very true--foreshadowing :-)
Either that or my flu medication is making me hallucinate again.
Chao baby.

Ray said...

Unlike you slacker, i utilize all of my time effeciently. Now, stop having dreams about me or your husband may get upset.