Our Christless Heavens

Five years ago, a book hit store shelves claiming to be a true account of a young boy dying, going to Heaven and then coming back to life on Earth. The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven quickly became a New York Times bestseller. In the story, six year old Alex Malarkey related his heavenly vision of angels, etc., after supposedly dying in a 2004 car accident. Alex and his father, Kevin, are the book's co-authors. In January of this year, Alex, now a teenager and a Christian with a guilty conscience, confessed that he made the whole thing up. He said he didn't die, though he was left paralyzed and was in a coma for two months, and he didn't go to Heaven. He said he lied back then to get attention, something not unusual for a six-year-old. The amazing thing is the number of people who were willing to believe the story.

A few days after Malarkey said his story was...well...malarkey, Colton Burpo, who had a similar experience when he was four, said his story was true. Burpo said he visited Heaven when he was undergoing an appendectomy. His story was told in the book Heaven is for Real, and like Alex Malarkey, Colton's father also authored it. To this day, the Burpos maintain the experience was true, an experience where Colton said he met Jesus, saw Mary and some angels as well as deceased relatives he was too young to have ever met.

There are many other books whose authors claim to have died, gone to Heaven and come back again and they've been around for years. The heavenly tourism industry is a big one and it continues to thrive today. Knowing this, I rolled my eyes recently when I was asked to interview Don Piper, a Baptist pastor and author of the book 90 Minutes in Heaven. This book was first published in September of 2004 and depicts Piper's experience of being in a car crash, visiting Heaven and then waking up in the wreckage wishing he had stayed dead and in Heaven. The story is receiving some renewed interest because 90 Minutes in Heaven, the movie, hits theatres on September 11 this year.

Not knowing quite what to expect from Pastor Piper, I welcomed the opportunity to talk about his experience and was also glad his wife, Eva, was part of the interview. They were both very nice which made it harder for me because I had some questions that weren't so nice. I asked them anyway and was relieved by the graciousness with which they answered them. For instance, I asked him if what he experienced could have been just a cultural hallucination, that is, a dream sequence of his life experiences and religious knowledge brought on by a bodily shock. He said it was possible and then he really impressed me when he said he wouldn't have believed the story if it hadn't happened to him. He said that as an ordained Baptist minister, things like this weren't a part of his theology. Good answer, I thought. I then asked him if he saw Jesus in addition to all the dearly departed friends he said he met and he said yes, but not as a man. He said Jesus just filled the place and said that he believes if he had met Jesus face to face, he would not likely have returned to his earthly life. Then he really stole my thunder when he said all proceeds from the coming movie are going to charity. Don Piper speaks in a mild-mannered way with a confidence that is not afraid to acknowledge people's difficulties in believing his story.

It is obvious he experienced something. Exactly what, I don't know but this man is no flake or charlatan out to make a buck on a sensational tale. Still, this doesn't make what he saw Heaven. As for the other stories, the stories of the heavenly trips that come out once a month or so, I don't believe them. Most of them don't include Jesus and there is no Heaven without Christ, for He is Heaven. In this day of biblical illiteracy in the Church and widespread ignorance of the Bible outside the Church, many people will believe anything.

Pastor and author John Piper (no relation to Don as far as I know) wrote these words in his book God is the Gospel: Meditations on God's Love as the Gift of Himself. “The critical question for our generation—and for every generation—is this: If you could have Heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on Earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with Heaven, if Christ were not there? ”

This is an important and penetrating question. A Heaven without Christ is Hell and there are many who want to tell you about such a Heaven. Be careful. It's an ignorant and misguided world out there.