WHAT IS HEAVEN LIKE?

Christians believe there is a heaven, but most are unsure what it is like. Last week I read "HEAVEN IS FOR REAL," by Todd Burpo, the story of his four year-old Colton who had a near-death experience during surgery, and who later said he had visited heaven. His parents are convinced he really did visit heaven because of three things: 1) His knowledge of what was happening in the hospital during his surgery, 2) His claim that he met a sister he never knew even existed (his mother had miscarried before he was born and had never told him), and 3) His declaration that he met his great-grandfather, a man he'd never met but later identified from photographs of the man at a young age.

What amazed me was that Colton was only four years old when he describes in great detail his visit to heaven. Most four year-olds are just learning to talk in sentences, let alone describe complex scenes. He is certainly a bright child, but there is more to his descriptions than mere intelligence. The other element, witnessed by dozens of medical personnel at the hospital, was the amazing recovery of this boy who was given little chance of survival after living five days with a ruptured appendix.

Needless to say, the book's premise, plus its success (nearly four million sold, three weeks #1 on USA Today's Best-Seller list), has created an enlivened discussion among both believers and skeptics. Even the brilliant physicist Stephen Hawking got into the discussion, saying since there is no heaven or afterlife, the book "...is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.”

I believe there are only two ways one might approach this: 1) Colton's father invented the story about heaven, or, 2) Colton's experience was real and true. Only this family and the Lord know the full story, but a reading of the book could also spark a discussion about the nature of heaven.

What do you think heaven in like? Can we find reliable information about it from sources other than the Bible? Is heaven for most people a compilation of information and imagination? The question for me is can I believe a child's vision of heaven is true? There is a little skeptic in all adults, yet there are so few reliable accounts of heavenly visions that we must look to what others with experience have to say.

I think the boy's vision is true, and therefore I must accept that he was for those few minutes in heaven. What he described could not have been invented by a four year-old child who had never been previously told what he saw and/or described. But it's doubtful many will believe his story. We adults are more content to accept what we know than what others, especially children, tell us.

Yet it was our Lord Jesus who told us, “Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 18:13)

I think I will pray for the Stephen Hawkings of this world.