Free Heaven Is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back by Todd Burpo, Sonja Burpo, Lynn Vincent, Colton Burpo Page A
Tags: Religión, General, Christian Theology, Inspirational, Christianity, Parapsychology, Body; Mind & Spirit, Christian Life, Religious aspects, heaven, Near-Death Experiences - Religious Aspects - Christianity, Near-Death Experience, Near-Death Experiences, Heaven - Christianity, Burpo; Colton, Eschatology
flashed through my mind in an instant, but I remained noncommittal.
A light, huh? was all I said.
Yeah, and they have yellow from here to here, he said, making the sash motion again, left shoulder to right hip. And white from here to here. He placed his hands on his shoulders, then bent forward and touched the tops of his feet.
I thought of the man who appeared to the prophet Daniel: On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river, the Tigris, I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist. His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze.6
Colton then made the sash motion again and said that people in heaven wore different colors there than the angels did.
By now my New Information Meter was nearly pegged, but there was one more thing I had to know. If Colton really had been to heaven and really had seen all these thingsJesus, horses, angels, other childrenand was up there (was it up?) long enough to do homework, how long had he left his body, as he claimed?
I looked at him, kneeling in the kitchen chair with his towel-cape still tied around his neck. Colton, you said you were in heaven and you did all these things . . . a lot of things. How long were you gone?
My little boy looked me right in the eye and didnt hesitate. Three minutes, he said. Then he hopped down from the chair and skipped off to play.
FOURTEEN ON HEAVEN TIME
Three minutes?
As Colton began to set up for an epic plastic-sword fight with an unseen villain, I marveled at his answer.
He had already authenticated his experience by telling me things he could not otherwise have known. But now I had to square his answer, three minutes, with all the rest. I stared down at my Bible, lying open on the kitchen table, and turned over the possibilities in my mind.
Three minutes. It wasnt possible that Colton could have seen and done everything hed described so far in just three minutes. Of course, he wasnt old enough to tell time yet, so maybe his sense of three actual minutes wasnt the same as an adults. Like most parents, I was pretty sure Sonja and I werent helping that issue, promising to be off the phone, for example, or finished talking in the yard with a neighbor, or done in the garage in five more minutes, then wrapping it up twenty minutes later.
It was also possible that time in heaven doesnt track with time on earth. The Bible says that with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.1 Some interpret that as a literal exchange, as in, two days equals two thousand years. Ive always taken it to mean that God operates outside of our understanding of time. Time on earth is keyed to a celestial clock, governed by the solar system. But the Bible says there is no sun in heaven because God is the light there. Maybe there is no time in heaven. At least not as we understand it.
On the other hand, Coltons three minutes answer was as straight up and matter-of-fact as if hed told me hed had Lucky Charms for breakfast. As far as our clock goes, he couldve been right. For him to leave his body and return to it, he couldnt have been gone long. Especially since wed never received any kind of report saying Colton had ever been clinically dead. In fact, the postoperative report was clear that even though our sons prognosis had been grim, the surgery had gone just fine:
OPERATIVE REPORT
OPERATIVE DATE: 3/5/2003
Heaven is for real
Page: 28
POSTOPERATIVE DIAGNOSIS: Perforated appendicitis and abscess
OPERATION: Appendectomy and drainage of abscess
SURGEON: Timothy OHolleran, M.D.
DESCRIPTION OF THE OPERATION: The patient was placed in a supine position on the Operating Table. Under general anesthesia the abdomen was prepped and draped in a sterile fashion. A transverse incision was made in the right lower quadrant
A light, huh? was all I said.
Yeah, and they have yellow from here to here, he said, making the sash motion again, left shoulder to right hip. And white from here to here. He placed his hands on his shoulders, then bent forward and touched the tops of his feet.
I thought of the man who appeared to the prophet Daniel: On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river, the Tigris, I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist. His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze.6
Colton then made the sash motion again and said that people in heaven wore different colors there than the angels did.
By now my New Information Meter was nearly pegged, but there was one more thing I had to know. If Colton really had been to heaven and really had seen all these thingsJesus, horses, angels, other childrenand was up there (was it up?) long enough to do homework, how long had he left his body, as he claimed?
I looked at him, kneeling in the kitchen chair with his towel-cape still tied around his neck. Colton, you said you were in heaven and you did all these things . . . a lot of things. How long were you gone?
My little boy looked me right in the eye and didnt hesitate. Three minutes, he said. Then he hopped down from the chair and skipped off to play.
FOURTEEN ON HEAVEN TIME
Three minutes?
As Colton began to set up for an epic plastic-sword fight with an unseen villain, I marveled at his answer.
He had already authenticated his experience by telling me things he could not otherwise have known. But now I had to square his answer, three minutes, with all the rest. I stared down at my Bible, lying open on the kitchen table, and turned over the possibilities in my mind.
Three minutes. It wasnt possible that Colton could have seen and done everything hed described so far in just three minutes. Of course, he wasnt old enough to tell time yet, so maybe his sense of three actual minutes wasnt the same as an adults. Like most parents, I was pretty sure Sonja and I werent helping that issue, promising to be off the phone, for example, or finished talking in the yard with a neighbor, or done in the garage in five more minutes, then wrapping it up twenty minutes later.
It was also possible that time in heaven doesnt track with time on earth. The Bible says that with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.1 Some interpret that as a literal exchange, as in, two days equals two thousand years. Ive always taken it to mean that God operates outside of our understanding of time. Time on earth is keyed to a celestial clock, governed by the solar system. But the Bible says there is no sun in heaven because God is the light there. Maybe there is no time in heaven. At least not as we understand it.
On the other hand, Coltons three minutes answer was as straight up and matter-of-fact as if hed told me hed had Lucky Charms for breakfast. As far as our clock goes, he couldve been right. For him to leave his body and return to it, he couldnt have been gone long. Especially since wed never received any kind of report saying Colton had ever been clinically dead. In fact, the postoperative report was clear that even though our sons prognosis had been grim, the surgery had gone just fine:
OPERATIVE REPORT
OPERATIVE DATE: 3/5/2003
Heaven is for real
Page: 28
POSTOPERATIVE DIAGNOSIS: Perforated appendicitis and abscess
OPERATION: Appendectomy and drainage of abscess
SURGEON: Timothy OHolleran, M.D.
DESCRIPTION OF THE OPERATION: The patient was placed in a supine position on the Operating Table. Under general anesthesia the abdomen was prepped and draped in a sterile fashion. A transverse incision was made in the right lower quadrant
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