Anonymou5
New
I ignored this book/story when I first heard about it because I thought ok cool another NDE story. I don't really care about NDE's and trips to heaven. I care about OBE's and veridical evidence associated with them. Someones claims about what they saw in the afterlife don't provide any value to me. I have no idea what you really experienced so how can I take a position on that?
With that being said, Colton Burpo's story is troubling. It's troubling in such a way that I can't quite put a finger on what's wrong with it. There are so many things about it that just scream BS, but it's hard to come to a definitive conclusion on just exactly why it's BS.
You'd think as someone that is open to the afterlife being a real thing as I am I would be defending this story to no end, but it's just difficult to not sneer at it.
Let me start with the obvious, and you've heard it a thousand times with this case, but I'll get it out of the way before I get to the meat of it.
1. His dad is an evangelical pastor.
2. In case you haven't noticed the "Heaven is for Real" brand is making quite a bit of money. Quite a bit.
Logically speaking, those 2 things don't prevent something from being true. NDE's happen to people, and children of people of many different professions. That it happened to a son of a pastor really isn't that big of a deal to me, as it is to debunkers.
That it made money, is a bigger deal, but doesn't say anything about whether an NDE occurred or not. The money making might just be reason enough to keep telling the story.
Those 2 things don't bother me too much.
These are the things that bother me.
1. Colton visits heaven, and it's exactly like what you would expect a son of a pastor would say it's like. Angel's, halo's, wings, rainbows, pearly gates, etc, they're all there.
2. His dad fights alongside Jesus, and good people, in Armageddon against Satan and the monsters. (Spoiler: Jesus wins).
3. Angels in heaven have swords. At all times, just in case satan and the demons show up at a moments notice.
4. It took years for the full story to come out of Colton. It wasn't like he sat down one day and told his mom and dad everything. No, as he grew older, the story became bigger.
But most troubling of all is this; Colton never died.
I know skeptics always say that NDE'rs never actually died or they would still be dead, thus their NDE was some sort of hallucination. (Surprisingly non-NDE'rs who come back to life and report nothing actually did die. What a surprise huh?)
Yet in this case, it really is true. Colton NEVER died. He wasn't even near death. He had surgery, was sedated, and then woke up. No momentary flatline, no "oh crap his vitals are getting bad, hurry up before things go to shit" panic.
None of that, just surgery.
So you'd think ok maybe the kid really did just have some dream about Jesus and angels and that's that. It wouldn't be too surprising. When I was a kid I had a dream that I was in Jesus' house somewhere in heaven (I assumed), sitting at the table with all his apostles, when Jesus turned to me and said "Welcome to the family". I woke up that day very happy about having seen Jesus.
So I could see dismissing it as just some kid's story, but then there's the part about meeting his dead sister, and his long dead great granddad. Throw in the part about him seeing his Dad yelling at God in the pre-op room, and his mom on the phone, and now you have a head scratcher.
So on the one hand you have a very generic description of Christian heaven where God the father is so big "he can hold the whole world in his hands", "Jesus loves you so much", and "heaven is like earth but without sin", to "I saw my dad in a room doing something no one knew about, and oh yea I met people I had no idea existed before this".
The generic heaven would make this story not even worth paying attention to, but the OBE and meeting dead relatives this kid supposedly knew nothing about makes this story quite not add up.
If Colton really witnessed events he had no way of knowing about via an OBE, really met "Pop" who never knew anything about, and met his miscarried sister whom he allegedly knew nothing about I think we would have a pretty interesting NDE to really look in to. I could even see looking past the generic christian heaven if those things were true, because that would be quite impressive.
But like I said, the kid never died.
So what gives?
It seems to me that there is some sort of fraud being perpetrated here. Either by Colton, the dad, or both. Either on purpose, or by digging a hole too deep to climb out of. Here is why I believe that.
Colton told the story over several years. The story became exaggerated. There was never a time soon after the alleged NDE that colton told the whole story in one take. It was told in bits and pieces over time. And now, he says he can't remember all of it.
Colton over time explained that he met Jesus' cousin, John the baptist. He met Samson, King David, the Archangels Gabriel, and Michael, and the literally a ghost - Holy Ghost.
Unless his dad the pastor said "Well Colton, you know how you went to heaven and all that? Well I've decided you no longer have to go to church, read the bible, or attend sunday school. You've learned it all already", it really seems like Colton added as he learned cool new religious stuff.
No, Colton kept attending sunday school. Kept learning about people like King David, Samson, Jesus' cousin, etc. He kept learning that Jesus sit's at the right hand of the father, and God sits on a throne. It seems that as he told the story he incorporated all these things he started learning.
Unless we accept that at 3 years old he already knew all those things (the trinity, sin, the relationship between John the Baptist and Jesus, the archangels Michael and Gabriel, Armageddon, etc). If he already knew all that at 3 years old then I would be quite impressed. The only other alternative is that he really did learn all these things during his 3 minute not-even-near-death NDE, or he added to his story as he learned more stuff.
Maybe Colton had a legitimate OBE, but subsequently told a story his pastor Dad responded to. Or Maybe his dad is making the OBE and miscarriage part up. Maybe the whole thing is made up.
I have no idea.
With that being said, Colton Burpo's story is troubling. It's troubling in such a way that I can't quite put a finger on what's wrong with it. There are so many things about it that just scream BS, but it's hard to come to a definitive conclusion on just exactly why it's BS.
You'd think as someone that is open to the afterlife being a real thing as I am I would be defending this story to no end, but it's just difficult to not sneer at it.
Let me start with the obvious, and you've heard it a thousand times with this case, but I'll get it out of the way before I get to the meat of it.
1. His dad is an evangelical pastor.
2. In case you haven't noticed the "Heaven is for Real" brand is making quite a bit of money. Quite a bit.
Logically speaking, those 2 things don't prevent something from being true. NDE's happen to people, and children of people of many different professions. That it happened to a son of a pastor really isn't that big of a deal to me, as it is to debunkers.
That it made money, is a bigger deal, but doesn't say anything about whether an NDE occurred or not. The money making might just be reason enough to keep telling the story.
Those 2 things don't bother me too much.
These are the things that bother me.
1. Colton visits heaven, and it's exactly like what you would expect a son of a pastor would say it's like. Angel's, halo's, wings, rainbows, pearly gates, etc, they're all there.
2. His dad fights alongside Jesus, and good people, in Armageddon against Satan and the monsters. (Spoiler: Jesus wins).
3. Angels in heaven have swords. At all times, just in case satan and the demons show up at a moments notice.
4. It took years for the full story to come out of Colton. It wasn't like he sat down one day and told his mom and dad everything. No, as he grew older, the story became bigger.
But most troubling of all is this; Colton never died.
I know skeptics always say that NDE'rs never actually died or they would still be dead, thus their NDE was some sort of hallucination. (Surprisingly non-NDE'rs who come back to life and report nothing actually did die. What a surprise huh?)
Yet in this case, it really is true. Colton NEVER died. He wasn't even near death. He had surgery, was sedated, and then woke up. No momentary flatline, no "oh crap his vitals are getting bad, hurry up before things go to shit" panic.
None of that, just surgery.
So you'd think ok maybe the kid really did just have some dream about Jesus and angels and that's that. It wouldn't be too surprising. When I was a kid I had a dream that I was in Jesus' house somewhere in heaven (I assumed), sitting at the table with all his apostles, when Jesus turned to me and said "Welcome to the family". I woke up that day very happy about having seen Jesus.
So I could see dismissing it as just some kid's story, but then there's the part about meeting his dead sister, and his long dead great granddad. Throw in the part about him seeing his Dad yelling at God in the pre-op room, and his mom on the phone, and now you have a head scratcher.
So on the one hand you have a very generic description of Christian heaven where God the father is so big "he can hold the whole world in his hands", "Jesus loves you so much", and "heaven is like earth but without sin", to "I saw my dad in a room doing something no one knew about, and oh yea I met people I had no idea existed before this".
The generic heaven would make this story not even worth paying attention to, but the OBE and meeting dead relatives this kid supposedly knew nothing about makes this story quite not add up.
If Colton really witnessed events he had no way of knowing about via an OBE, really met "Pop" who never knew anything about, and met his miscarried sister whom he allegedly knew nothing about I think we would have a pretty interesting NDE to really look in to. I could even see looking past the generic christian heaven if those things were true, because that would be quite impressive.
But like I said, the kid never died.
So what gives?
It seems to me that there is some sort of fraud being perpetrated here. Either by Colton, the dad, or both. Either on purpose, or by digging a hole too deep to climb out of. Here is why I believe that.
Colton told the story over several years. The story became exaggerated. There was never a time soon after the alleged NDE that colton told the whole story in one take. It was told in bits and pieces over time. And now, he says he can't remember all of it.
Colton over time explained that he met Jesus' cousin, John the baptist. He met Samson, King David, the Archangels Gabriel, and Michael, and the literally a ghost - Holy Ghost.
Unless his dad the pastor said "Well Colton, you know how you went to heaven and all that? Well I've decided you no longer have to go to church, read the bible, or attend sunday school. You've learned it all already", it really seems like Colton added as he learned cool new religious stuff.
No, Colton kept attending sunday school. Kept learning about people like King David, Samson, Jesus' cousin, etc. He kept learning that Jesus sit's at the right hand of the father, and God sits on a throne. It seems that as he told the story he incorporated all these things he started learning.
Unless we accept that at 3 years old he already knew all those things (the trinity, sin, the relationship between John the Baptist and Jesus, the archangels Michael and Gabriel, Armageddon, etc). If he already knew all that at 3 years old then I would be quite impressed. The only other alternative is that he really did learn all these things during his 3 minute not-even-near-death NDE, or he added to his story as he learned more stuff.
Maybe Colton had a legitimate OBE, but subsequently told a story his pastor Dad responded to. Or Maybe his dad is making the OBE and miscarriage part up. Maybe the whole thing is made up.
I have no idea.
Last edited: