Proof for the Afterlife: John Burke on NDEs, Heaven, and Hell (Full Episode) John Giftah

0:01 Speaker 1: Do you ever look around and think, Wow, the world is a crazy place and it just seems to get crazier and crazier. Ease your mind and take a break. This is Fuel for the Soul with John GIFTA. We're a hub for inspirational Christian sermons, practical keys for Christian living, and Christian discussions and interviews. You'll be inspired to live the life that you were created for. Your host is a top ranking podcaster, best selling author, world record holder, aerospace engineer, life coach, evangelist and founder of John GIFTA International.

0:41 Speaker 1: Welcome to Fuel for the Soul with John GIFTA.

0:49 Speaker 2: Hey, God, Vichuel, it has a joy for me to be with all of you today. Thank you so much for dropping by. I have a very special special session today and you'll be a pastor John Bug all the way from the United States of America who's joining with us. And some of you might have already heard about him, seen him, and you know, he's been a great voice and he's been such a blessing in my life. I'm going to talk about it in just a minute. He's not only a best selling author, including a New York Times best selling book which just came out imagine the God of Heaven, and he's been an important voice, especially in near that experiences people who have literally died and seen heaven or hell and come back if you didn't know what that is all about.

1:32 Speaker 3: And he also has.

1:34 Speaker 2: A growing podcast and YouTube channels through which he shares these messages. And the best thing about him is that not only do we share the same first name, John, both of us had the same first name, but both of us are engineers.

1:48 Speaker 3: I'm an aerospace.

1:49 Speaker 2: Engineer and he's also an engineer and minister of the gospel. So it's so awesome to have you with us. Fastor, thank you so much for joining in.

1:57 Speaker 4: Hey John, I'm so glad that you invited me because I love India, have been there many times and we have very good friends in India.

2:08 Speaker 2: That's so good. Can't wait to have you here in person again. Pastor, thank you so much. And I just want to quickly start off by sharing a quick testimony on how I came to know you in the first place. The Lord uses me a lot in the aspect of, you know, the political situation in the United States of America to intercede. Have had a lot of encounters like there were moments when the Lord took me in the spirit into the White House to pray over President Trump, and you know, he let me lay my hand on his right shoulder and pray.

2:40 Speaker 2: And two days later I came to know there was another profits in India who had the same encounter on the same day as I did. You know, a lot of these kind of encounters where the Lord was clearly leading me in the prophetic to intercede. Even recently we had the elections in the US and the Lord led me to intercede, raised and says a spray. And because of that, I came to know of something that I was actually dealing with for the past a couple of months where I would suddenly wake up in the night and I would have panic attacks.

3:13 Speaker 2: I'm just sharing this because this is a personal testimony where even though I'm a minister of the Gospel, I've seen glimpses of Hell. I've had a lot of encounters and miracles out of the blue that were these attacks, panic attacks in the middle of the night where I would wake up with that fear of like what if everything I believed was wrong? What if Christianity was not the truth? Like people in apologetics would just say that you know what, this is the truth because I'm a Christian, or somebody else would say the same about Islamic apologists.

3:44 Speaker 2: But that was the moment when I was having these panic attacks and I was like, God, if I tell.

3:50 Speaker 3: Somebody else, they'll say you're not fit to be a preacher.

3:53 Speaker 2: But that was when I was like, God, I want you to reveal yourself to me because I know that my heart is in the right place. I want to minister to you through you. And while I was doing that, and I was following the situation about the US political scene, I came to know about your interview with Sean Ryan. And I don't usually watch such long episodes. That was a four hour long episode. And I'm telling you a pastor, God is my witness. Ever since then, I didn't have any panic attacks. I've been completely free, like I knew without a shadow of doubt that what I preach is not theory or I've been more convincing in the preaching of the gospel now talking about heaven and Hell, and now more people are getting saved through my ministry now because I've been more fervent in preaching about Heaven and Hell.

4:47 Speaker 2: So that's the way what you shared in that interview really changed my life. And that's why I was determined to have you here because I believe there are so many people who have these quests since or they may even have these kind of panic attacks. So I'm so glad that your ministry and your words helped me, and it is helping so many people today. And I believe that, you know, as you continue to walk in this calling, it's going to be a blessing to more people. I think you also have a story of being an agnostic where you doubt it, you know, if you were on the right track.

5:24 Speaker 2: Can you just speak a word to somebody who may be in a similar spot, maybe they're anagnostic or they may be having these kind of doubts like am I really following the right path? Or is this you know, just because I'm a Christian I believe in Christianity.

5:40 Speaker 4: Yeah. Well, first of all, what a blessing to hear that. John. Wow, you know, sometimes you just you just never know, right. Sean and I have become friends, and you know, he just became a follower of Jesus, Yes, you know, and just the way the Lord is connecting us all over the world. And that is why I'm doing what I'm doing now. But I didn't start there, like you said. And I'll just give you a little background. So I was trained as an engineer. I worked in engineering for a number of years. I was, but my mind has always been very analytical, you know.

6:24 Speaker 4: So you know, I grew up in the United States hearing about Jesus, just like if you grew up in India, you grow up hearing about Vishnu or Kali or Durga or you know, you know, many many others. Right, But I always ask a question, well, how do you know? You know? How do you know Jesus is the son of God? How do you know there is a God? I mean? And I would ask people, and I wasn't getting good answers. I wouldn't get much of any answers, I think because not enough people really search, really seek. And I concluded, you know, you just can't know.

7:03 Speaker 4: And I was an agnostic, so I believe Jesus was probably just a legend, you know, maybe a good teacher. But the whole son of God thing is just like mythology and that God. You just can't know if there's a god or not. And then my dad was dying of cancer and someone gave him This is almost four decades ago, and someone gave him the very first research on what is now called near death experiences. And this is when someone clinically dies so literally their heart stops beating, they have no brain waves, and yet either modern medicine or just miracle resuscitates them.

7:45 Speaker 4: They come back, and they come back talking about being more alive than they've ever felt before, in a place more real than this has ever been, and many times in the presence of this God of light and love that they never wanted to leave his presence. And I see this book on his bedside table and I start reading it and I couldn't put it down. And by the end of the night, I'd finished the book, and I said, oh, my gosh, maybe this is the evidence I've been looking for that this is real. And because so many of them were talking about this God of light and love, and many of them saw Jesus and knew he was Jesus, like he was this man of light, brighter than the sun.

8:38 Speaker 4: And because of that, it opened my mind to consider and I started to read the Bible, and I ended up coming to faith in Christ a year after that or so, but I was always still wanting to understand, Okay, well, what are these near death experiences and how do they relate to the Bible, and how do they relate to the other world's religions. So over the last I mean, it's been thirty five forty years that I've studied close to fifteen hundred, one thousand, five hundred near death experiences. I've interviewed people from all over the globe.

9:19 Speaker 4: I ended up leaving my career in engineering because of what I was learning as I was studying the Bible and studying these and how it fits together. And I ended up leaving my career in engineering to go into ministry. And my wife and I started a church, Gateway Church twenty seven years ago, four skeptics so and we've seen people from every religious background come and explore faith, and when they're open to really seeking, they find And so in twenty fifteen, I wrote a book, like you said, called Imagine Heaven.

9:59 Speaker 4: In Imagine Heaven, what I was doing is I was taking these at that time, over over a thousand near death experiences i'd studied, and you know, the way my engineering mind works, I would I would hear another or interview someone and I'd go like, oh, I heard that over here, and I heard that over and I started to map the commonalities and then look at how how has that been revealed through the Bible throughout history. And I found about forty commonalities of what people having these near death experiences described in the Life to Come.

10:34 Speaker 4: And this is on every continent. And so I was writing about those commonalities and what the life to come is going to be like. That's Imagine Heaven. And then recently I actually passed the baton of leadership of the church that my wife and I founded, and I wrote, I wrote a new book called Imagine the God of Heaven. And that's where I interviewed seventy new people from all over the planet in India. You know, on every continent literally except Antarctica, there are no penguins having near death experiences, but every other continent.

11:16 Speaker 4: And I'm showing that the God they are encountering in their near death experience is the God of history who revealed himself through the Jewish prophets and ultimately through Jesus. And interestingly, you know, I trace how in the Old Testament all the way back, you know, four thousand years ago, before the founding of any of the of the world's religion sacred scriptures. God says that this isn't recorded in Genesis twelve. He raises up two people, Abraham and Sarah, and he says, I'm going to make you into a nation, and through you, I'm going to bless all nations.

12:00 Speaker 4: And that is a common theme you see throughout the Jewish prophets. What Jesus said. The last thing he said after his death on the cross and his resurrection, he said, tell this message to all the nations. There's forgiveness offered in my name. And then the very last book of the Bible, John, one of jesus disciples, who was taken in a vision to heaven, sees people from every every nation, tribe, language, and people group. They're around the throne of God, worshiping God. So if you look at and I have now studied and read a good portion of much of the world's sacred scriptures, in the world's religions, you won't find another deity who is consistently speaking to all people, to all nations.

12:59 Speaker 4: This is the God of all nations, and that's what near death experiencers are revealing. That's what they're testifying to, that that they are experiencing, not the God necessarily that that they would have expected, but this God of light and love, who is personal, knows them intimately, and so I'm tracing that in imagine the God of heaven.

13:25 Speaker 3: Okay, okay, it's.

13:27 Speaker 2: So good, like because like you said about you know how God can X. First of all, it's amazing because I don't know if you heard of someone called Megan Kelly.

13:38 Speaker 4: I was on her show.

13:40 Speaker 3: You were on her show too? Yeah, okay, okay, yeah.

13:44 Speaker 4: I just I just sent I just sent her my new book.

13:51 Speaker 2: So I was following her and it was Sean Dryana was interviewing her and told her to take out your videos and because she was doubting or something like that. And then that see see the way God connects right like you just shared about how you know God has been so consistently speaking and how God is connecting. It's it's amazing because guys, even if you do have doubts or questions, don't feel bad on yourself. You may go through seasons like that. Like the reason I wanted Pastor to share his stories, I want you to understand that you know, there is a lot of evidence.

14:28 Speaker 2: There is a lot of proof, but don't even if you go through questions and doubts, don't feel bad on yourself. You know, you can be a minister, you can be a Christian, you can go to church, but you can still go through questions and doubts. So that's why you're here, and that's why I want you to stay tuned. There's one aspect in the Chena and interview where you spoke about you just shed light about you know, there was some kind of study made on people where if you put some kind of pressure on certain parts of the reign, you know, I think the soul of the spirit says, you know, I want to come out.

15:05 Speaker 3: Of the body. You know, there's like some kind of study.

15:09 Speaker 2: Do you have more evidence or more information on that, like to prove to people that you know what life after death is actually true?

15:18 Speaker 4: Yes? Yeah. And in the new book in Imagine the God of Heaven, I mean I have I have the evidence that convinced me in both books and Imagine Heaven. And by the way, in the very first podcast that I do on the Imagine Heaven it's called Imagine Heaven Podcast, with John Burke. But I let you hear from these people, and I'm trying to show the reasons that I became convinced that there was life after death and that it points to the God who revealed himself through Jesus. That's why that's being testified to from people having near death experiences all around the globe.

15:59 Speaker 4: So I'll give you I put ten points of evidence in imagining the God of Heaven, but I'll just give you three of them and you can you can see this in my first podcast. But the first one is verifiable observations. So this, this is what got my attention when I was still a skeptical engineer, and I was like, Okay, how do I know these aren't just these near death experiences aren't just hallucinations, or maybe it's a trick the brain's plane. You knows, as you're dying, it's flooding with neurotrans you know, neurotransmitters, the chemicals that flood your brain.

16:35 Speaker 4: Maybe it's just happening in the brain, but that does not you can't explain it that way when you look at the evidence. And the first one is when people die clinically, they say that they leave their physical body, but they still have a body, they have a spiritual body. And they say, you know, it's it's not a body of just five senses. It's more like they have fifty senses. And so what you know, what I explain is the best way to understand it is imagine, is that I think these people are moving into dimensional realms that are all around us already, but we can't see because we're limited to three finite dimensions of space and one dimension of time.

17:26 Speaker 4: Right, that's our that's humanity. But imagine if we're living on a flat black and white painting in your room, right, and death means separation. So at death, then this two dimensional self, because remember the self can go up and down and side to side and two dimensions, but there is no in or out. There's no third dimension in your world if you live in a two dimensional world, So death means separation. So imagine at death, your flat self is peel off that flat painting and suddenly brought out into this room of three dimensions, and you're experiencing three dimensions.

18:07 Speaker 4: And you can also look back and see your old world because it's contained within this greater dimensional reality. So you would be able to see and describe what is going on there, but you're also experiencing three dimensions and color. And then imagine getting resuscitated, press back into your flat world, and now you have to describe three dimensions and color, but in two dimensional black and white terms. Got And that's what as I've interviewed, you know, over a thousand people, they've said, oh, that's exactly what it's like.

18:45 Speaker 4: There aren't words in our language. But it also explains why people have verifiable observations. So they say they're out of their body, but many times they're still in the room where their resuscitation is happening. And as a result, when they're brought back, even though they might have been dead twenty five minutes. One guy that I interviewed, he has the hospital records. He was dead an hour and forty five minutes. A spine surgeon I interviewed who's kayak got pinned under a waterfall. They couldn't find her body for thirty minutes, you know, so she was dead thirty minutes.

19:25 Speaker 4: And yet they're able to watch what's happening in their resuscitation, so when they come back they can describe and verify things that were actually happening in our realm, in our reality, and this grounds these experiences in our realm. I'll give you one example, a guy in Holland. So many doctors, medical doctors, cardiologists, on coologists who were skeptical just like I was as a skeptical engineer, have been convinced there is life after death when they have interviewed their patients. So one of them is a doctor Pym van Lommel.

20:06 Speaker 4: He's a cardiologist in Holland. And there was a man brought into a Dutch hospital that he was at and the man had been found in a park with no heartbeat, and it took thirty minutes to get him to the hospital, so he'd been dead at least thirty minutes. They were going to shock his heart and they had to intubate him, and the nurse found dentures in his mouth, so she took the dentures out, put him in the lower drawer of the crash cart, and then they shocked him, got his heart going, but he never came to He was coma tose the whole time in the er room.

20:46 Speaker 4: They took him to another room and he came out of coma one week later. Okay, so when he comes out of coma, he's complaining, you lost my dentures, You lost my DNTs. Where are my dentures? And then he he's a nurse, and he says, that nurse knows where my dentures are. And then he describes how he was up above his body. He described every doctor and nurse in the er and what they were doing, and how he was trying to get their attention and they couldn't hear him. And that nurse that took his dentures and put him in the lower drawer of that cart with all the bottles on it, and they went and sure enough, that's where they found his dentures.

21:28 Speaker 4: Now, things that connect what these people are saying to real life, verifiable observations have actually been studied. So doctor jan Holden did a study of close to one hundred patients having a near death experience, and each one may make five or ten observations right, and then she was able to check out how accurate their observations from out of their body, how accurate these observations were. She found that ninety six percent of their observations were completely accurate. Another six percent some of their observations might have been a little bit off.

22:11 Speaker 4: Only two percent of the observations, which turned out to be one patient in the study, were inaccurate. So this is, I mean incredible. You can't explain how these people could know things when they had no brain waves. You know, if this has just happened in the brain, what was that.

22:34 Speaker 3: It's not like the setting of a computer.

22:38 Speaker 4: No. No, And what they consistently say is my soul survived my body's physical death. Now that's just one of the reasons. The second, the second reason that I became convinced is that when people blind from birth have a near death experience, they can see and they just seeing and they report the same things that they saw in their near death experience that cited people do. And in this first p podcast episode, I interview Brad Burrows, and he was eight years old. He's been blind from birth, you know.

23:18 Speaker 4: He he died for four minutes when he was eight years old. They resuscitated him. He's still blind today. So he's never had a visual memory. And he talks about this. You can hear him talking about he's never dreamed in pictures. He only dreams in touch and in smell and in sound. But he doesn't dream in pictures. He has no visual pictures. And yet when you hear him describe things like the light of heaven. And I've interviewed other other blind people having near death experiences, and here's what's fascinating, John.

23:56 Speaker 4: They described the light of heaven and they just scribe that, like VICKI this other blind person, and Brad said, you know, the grass and the trees, and the flowers, and the birds and the and even the people. Everything, there was this light that was different than the light of the sun. And this light was love, and this light was life all together, and it was coming out of everything. It was giving life to everything. Well, think about it, a blind person on earth would have heard that light shines on things, not out of everything.

24:32 Speaker 4: Right. And yet the prophet Isaiah riding in seven eighty BC. Okay, so seven eighty BC. This is before the bog of Igita, right, I think that was around five hundred, wasn't it. I remember? Actually the Vedas I know were more like fifteen hundred BC. But he writes that in heaven there is no sun or moon, for the light of God is its light. And then John, one of Jesus' disciples, who was taken to see heaven, writes the Book of Revelation. In Revelation twenty one, he says he notices in the city there's no sun or moon.

25:15 Speaker 4: The glory of God is its light, and the lamb referring to Jesus is its lamp. And the nations will walk, he said in that light. He said that they will walk in that light. Well, that's what blind near death experiencers all around the globe report. And it's the same thing that Indians report having India experience, same thing Australians and chin in China that I reported. So how do you explain that if this is just in the brain, because a blind person would never have visual images of light coming out of everything, and they wouldn't have heard that on Earth.

25:59 Speaker 4: Third reason that convinced me is really what I wrote this new book, Imagine the God of Heaven about. And that's because people from every religious background, every cultural background, having near death experiences, many of them see not only the reality of heaven and the reality of hell, but they also see and experience God. And they experienced this same God of light and love. He's not an impersonal force. He's the most personal loving the love they talk about all of them is something that our word love just doesn't do justice for.

26:48 Speaker 4: They say things like, imagine taking all the love you've ever felt or had for a spouse, from a parent, from a grandparent, for your children, ldren, you know, for you know, your girlfriend and her boyfriend, all of that, put it into one and you have to multiply it by thousands of times. And that doesn't even express the feeling they have in the presence of this God. And what I'm showing in imagine the God of heaven is that they are not experiencing the god or gods they would have expected. So for instance, Rajiev, doctor Rajiev Parti, he grew up in India, he became a medical doctor.

27:39 Speaker 4: He lost all faith in God. God's all that, and he was just interested in money. But he was a very good antithesiologist. In fact, he became the chief aniseesiologist in California's Bakerfield Heart Hospital. He's the highest of his profession in anthesiology. He brought many people back from death and he had heard them talk about these things about these near death experienced commonalities of being out of their body, of traveling through a portal or a tunnel to this place of exquisite beauty, with this light that is otherworldly light, and having this welcoming committee of people who had died before them, and then this presence of this god of light and love.

28:26 Speaker 4: He thought it was all bogus. He thought, there they're psychotic, and he would give them an antipsychotic drug.

28:36 Speaker 4: And then he had a near death experience himself. Now this is wild if you think about it. He had a near death experience. And he told me, he said, you know, I had not I had not become a good person. He said, I saw my patience as a way to make money and and get a bigger house and a nicer car. I didn't treat them well. He had had a very abusive father, and he had started to be abusive, you know, verbally toward his son. He had become addicted to do different opioids because of this chronic problem that ultimately led to his near death experience.

29:20 Speaker 4: But in his experience, he begins in experience of hell, and he describes it just like and by the way,

29:32 Speaker 4: in some studies, twenty three percent of people coming forward reporting near death experiences report hellish near death experiences. So many report heavenly but they also report the reality of this hellish place. Now, he called it naraka. That's the Hindu word for the Hindi word for hell. Right, And he said, you know what is my karma? Why am i? Why am I here? And he heard, you have not been a very loving person. And he told me, he said, I was repenting. I was asking God to forgive me. He said, I realized my sins and I realized I hadn't pursued God.

30:13 Speaker 4: And he said, I was repenting. And then he said, these two angels from the Bible come and rescue him and take him through this tunnel to this place of exquisite beauty. And there in this place he experiences this God of light, he describes, and this is the same as people all around the world, This God of light, brighter than the sun, like a thousand times brighter, and yet not hard to look at, mesmerizing. You just wanted to be in his presence and look at him. And he says, he says to him, I'm going to regieve.

30:56 Speaker 4: I'm going to send you back, but first I want you to understand your life better. And he gives them a life review. Now, a life review is another commonality that people get all around the globe, and because time does not work the same way on the other side. And I'm showing how all these things are biblical. Like in Second Peter three to eight, Peter says, and he's actually quoting one of the Old Testament prophets to the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like a day. That's exactly what near death experiencers say.

31:30 Speaker 4: I don't know if it were was minutes or years that I experienced it, because time doesn't work the same on the other side. So they re experience their lives. They see and they experience it all over again. But they experience not only from their own perspective, their own thoughts and feelings and what was happening. They experience the thoughts and feelings of the people they interacted with. And they see how every act of kindness, how it how it affected that person, and how it even rippled through humanity.

32:04 Speaker 4: And also how their mean acts or their you know, unjust acts, how that affected that person and rippled through humanity. It's exactly what Jesus said in Matthew twenty five. He said, one day every single person will stand before the King of the universe. And then he will say, you know, to the unrighteous to my left, to the righteous to my right, you know, And and he'll say to the righteous, he'll say, you know, enter my kingdom. For when I was hungry, you fed me. And when I was naked, you clothed me.

32:38 Speaker 4: And when I was hurting, you visited me. When I was in prison, you came to see me, and all these things. And they'll say, when did we do that for you, Lord? And he'll say, you did it to the.

32:48 Speaker 5: Least, the least of these brothers or sisters, the least deserving person, right, the outcast on the streets.

33:00 Speaker 4: When you did it to one of these, you did it to me. And in these near death experiences in the life review, they see that how they treated others affected the Lord himself. It's wild. So all these things that are biblical they are testifying to. So Rajiev has this near death experience and he comes back and he is seeking and he's saying, who was this God of light and love and such compassion and mercy? I thought he was going to send me back to hell. I saw my sins. I knew that's what I deserved. And yet he gave me such love and such mercy and kindness.

33:44 Speaker 4: And this was not like the Hindu gods I knew. And so he's seeking. And another point in time, his friend Naresh was dying of cancer about a year later, and he's sharing about this god of life and love who had mercy and forgiveness, and he had actually, interestingly, Rajiev had actually ended up going to a church and getting baptized. Now, actually I don't know if it was before or after this event, because what happened is the night Naresh died of cancer, Rajiev wakes up, he is completely awake, and then he sees the heavens open and there is Naresh, with the same god of light and love.

34:34 Speaker 4: Wow. And he asked, Lord, who are you? And he said, Rajiev said to me, out of the light steps a man with shoulder lengked hair and a beard, and this majestic glowing robe who holds out his arms and says, I'm Jesus your savior, and he drops to his knees. And I think it was after that that he he went and was baptized. Now I report on people all across the globe. Another another one who became a good friend of mine from India was Santosh a Karchie. He was also an engineer, and he has and I want to go into the whole the whole thing.

35:24 Speaker 4: You can actually hear Santosh. I interviewed him on my podcast, so you can hear it and see him say it there, and you can also read his full story in Imagine the God of Heaven. But he thought, when I die, it's either just unplugged the computer nothing, or maybe I'll come back as another life form. You know, he grew up in India. That's all he knew. And he said, but that's not what happened. He hears code blue. His heart had stopped. He was he was his heart had stopped for many minutes and he was in a medical induced coma for three days.

36:01 Speaker 4: He said, this brilliant god of light comes to him. He said, I knew this was a divine light, and I fell in love with this divine light because I knew he was for me. Then he takes him to this place and and Santosh describes looking out over what he said, what he called what he described to me as a giant compound. Okay, so I've been to India, so I know, you know it was it was a giant gated compound. Well there, you know, there are many gated you know, complexes or compounds in India, right or at least I've been many times to Hyderabad or Raja Mundri and anyway, they are there, and that's what he was describing.

36:48 Speaker 4: But he said, but thousands of miles in a square shape and just gorgeous inside. He said, I was up above looking into it, and and there were gardens and fountains and beautiful landscape and mansions, these buildings of he called it otherworldly building material. And he said, I long to go into this place. He's describing the new Jerusalem. He's describing this holy city of God, exactly like John did in Revelation twenty one. And Santosh said, there were twelve gates. I counted them. He said. Now the other thing you have to realize, and this is a commonality, is your ice sight is like telescopic on the other side, like you can see for miles, for thousands of miles, as if right up close, which again Christians might not realize, is actually biblical.

37:47 Speaker 4: Now, when I first heard this, I was like, oh, that's kind of weird and then God shows me. In Revelation twenty one, when John is describing the Holy City, he said, the spirit takes him up to a very high mountain that's above the city. Now, interestingly, you can also hear in my podcast I interview a commercial airline pilot doctor I mean Captain Dale Black, and he said he sees the same city, describes it and there were mountains more majestic than the Himalayas that were up above and around the city.

38:26 Speaker 4: John says, he's up on one of those mountains, and yet he reads the names on the foundation stones of the city. How well, because you have telescopic eyesight's and Paul described all this. By the way, you know, Paul may have had a near death experience. In next chapter fourteen, it says that he was stoned to death in Listra and left for dead, and then he gets back up and goes back into the city, and the believers were praying for him, and he gets back up, and then he says in Second Corinthians twelve fourteen years ago, whether I was in my body or out of my body, I don't know, but I was taken up to Paradise.

39:16 Speaker 4: I was taken up to the third heaven, and I saw and heard things inexpressible. So I think he might have had a near death experience when he was stoned to death in Lystra. So he describes a lot of these same things. And he says that when our bodies die, they're buried in natural body, but they're raised a spiritual body. They're buried in weakness, but they're raised in Dunama is the Greek word power, the word dynamite. We get our word dynamite. So these new powers of telescopic vision and things like that.

39:51 Speaker 4: So Santosh perfectly describes the Holy City of God. And then he's like, where am I? And he looks down to his left, and he said, he sees this abyss, this abyss of darkness, that if he falls down there he will drop into and a lake of fire. And he said, I knew that is hopeless. He's describing a vision of hell. He said, I didn't want to go there. I wanted to go in the city, but I wasn't given I wasn't given the option of reincarnation, and I didn't know what to do. And then I turn and I look, and he sees a throne and this giant who he knows is God, but in the form of a man.

40:42 Speaker 4: And he looks up at his face, and he said he had eyes like lightning, and he had feet like glowing metal, glowing bronze. Santage said, well, he's describing the risen Jesus, just like Daniel did chapter seven, and just like John does in Revelation chapter one. And as soon as he looks into his eyes, his whole life flashes before him and he realizes, I have sinned so badly. I deserve hell. And he falls to his knees and he says, Lord, please forgive me, Please forgive me. And then when the Lord speaks to him, he shocked because he said, I'm Santash.

41:31 Speaker 4: I'm sending you back to the Earth. And when I send you back, you must love, love your family, love your children. And he said there was such mercy and compassion and tenderness and love from the Lord. He thought, I deserve hell. Why is he not sending me there? And yet he felt this compassion from God. And then they have this incredible conversation where Santosh sees a very narrow gate. So he sees these twelve gates and they're all closed to him. But then he sees a very narrow gate right next to this throne, and it's open to him into the Kingdom of heaven.

42:19 Speaker 4: And because the Lord was so compassionate and tender to him, he says, Lord, when I come back, I want to go through that narrow gate. Show me. Tell me how do I go through that narrow gate. The only thing the Lord said to him is I you know. And Santosh was thinking, which religion? Which you know, God? What religious practices do I do? And the Lord said, I want to see how honest you are with me. How honest is your relationship with me? Not one day a week, but three hundred and sixty five days a year.

42:58 Speaker 4: Walk with me in complete surrender. So Santosh comes back and he too is seeking. He's like, who is this God? I knew he was God, but he was not like the gods I've learned about in the of a Gita or the Vedas, or you know. He knew me inside and out. He loved me so much, and yet I knew I deserved to be sent to hell. And so he's wanting to know who is this God of compassion? And he's praying every day. Now you have to remember John you know, God tells us in the Old Testament, if you seek Me with all your heart, you will find meure right.

43:42 Speaker 4: And he is the God who searches the hearts. It says in Chronicles, he searches the hearts. His eyes roam about the earth, searching for hearts who are completely his. So if someone is seeking the True God with all their heart, they're going to find him. And that's what happened with Santash. Two years later, his daughter is invited to sing in a choir with a friend at a church. He goes to hear her and the message that day. He first he walks in and he feels the same loving presence that he felt in the light of God.

44:21 Speaker 4: The message that day is on is Matthew seven, where it says you must enter the Kingdom of Heaven through the narrow Gate. And John ten, where Jesus says, I am the Gate for the sheep. Yes, I am the gate. Whoever enters in through me will be saved. The thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, But I have come to give them life abundantly. And so you know, and those are just those are just two of the of the people from India but I also interviewed a Muslim woman in Tehran who describes the same God of Light who it comes as a man and says to her, I am he who is.

45:15 Speaker 4: And she's back in her body, but with a peace and a joy she's never felt before. She's like, who is this God? Who said? I am he who is? And by the way, he spoke this in Persian, and she spoke it to me in Persian because she doesn't know English, it was translated to me in English, I am he who is. When she had this near death experience, and she starts seeking and realizes, oh my gosh, the same God of Light appeared to Moses on Mount Sinai and said, I am the one who I am, the self existent one. I am who I am?

45:53 Speaker 4: Or I am he who is?

45:59 Speaker 4: So I interview people professors, spine surgeons, commercial airline pilots, doctors, lawyers, people who have nothing to gain making up these wild stories, and yet consistently they're giving verifiable observations. They're talking about common elements that they didn't know existed. And they're also meeting the same God that has revealed himself throughout the Jewish prophets and through Jesus. None of that. None of those three things alone cannot be explained if these are just in the brain.

46:46 Speaker 2: True, Well, you shared a lot and we just have like hardly fifteen more minutes. So I just want to be more quick in the next couple of things I want to talk to you about. There's so much to think, and many of the stories I already listened. So the minute you said about Santos, I think I've listened to it a couple of times, and even the Persian story. And I was also reminded of that Rwanda case. A boy I think he died and he came back after a or two yes, and then I think he there have been like some seven or eight attempts on his life, including his dad wants to stop him because he's a preacher.

47:33 Speaker 2: So this is one thing, guys, I want you to understand that. You know, the reason I wanted to talk about these stories is to let you know that people have different faiths, different nationalities, different backgrounds. I've all come back with one commonality that whom they saw was the God of you know, the Bible. See, when you were talking about this, I want to know, like like I said, you know, I have also had moments when a lot took me the spirit, you know, into places. There are people who have those kind of encounters, so it's just similar.

48:01 Speaker 2: Like I've also had encounters where the Lord took me in the spirit and showed me glimpses of hell. Is that similar to an indie experience? Or is this something totally different?

48:12 Speaker 3: I mean, maybe you can be as chief as.

48:15 Speaker 4: You know, John, I don't know for sure. Okay, I don't know, but here's what I do know. I know that God did that for Old Testament prophets. For instance, Isaiah was taken in the spirit to the throne of God. Daniel as well saw a vision of heaven and he saw you know, and this is of course, way before Jesus came. He sees a son of Man who is given by God, the Father authority over all the nations. So he sees the triune God, you know, five hundred years, four hundred something years before Jesus ever came.

48:58 Speaker 4: And so I do know that God does this. Is it a vision or is he actually taking people, for instance, in their sleep in He's actually taking their spirit to that place. I don't know, And but I will say there have been many people that have shared similar things to what you said, and they have described a lot of the same commonalities, like if they were taken to heaven in the spirit they've reviewed, they've shared a lot of the same commonalities that near death experiencers also share.

49:37 Speaker 2: Okay, Like maybe you could just share, like what is heaven like to a person who has no clue what heaven is like.

49:45 Speaker 4: So I think one of the big misconceptions of heaven is that it's somehow less real than this place. And that is the opposite of what every near death experience tells me. They say, no, this is the shadow, that's the real thing. And by the way, interestingly, in Hebrews chapter eight, it says that it says that that God had Moses construct the tabernacle out of something real in heaven, and the tabernacle was just a shadow, a copy of the real thing in heaven. So imagine. So this is the best way, and this is what I'm trying to get people to do through the books I've written and the podcasting and all that, is to imagine Heaven more accurately.

50:36 Speaker 4: Right, So imagine all the beauty, all the wonders, all the pleasurable enjoyable experiences we've had on this earth, well they're all. We enjoy them, and they are pleasurable because God created us to be able to right. And all the beauty we see is a gift from God. And yet this world is marred. Romans chapter eight says, all creation is groaning. It's laboring, like in childbirth, under the birth pangs of disease and death and famine and misfortune. So sin has entered, and God remains somewhat hidden, and he lets human free will rule.

51:25 Speaker 4: And as a result, we experience a tiny taste of heaven and a tiny taste of hell, and both are far greater in wonder and far greater in horror than you can imagine. So the best thing when you think about heaven is think about all the things you love here, but magnified. And that's what people have told me. So like doctor Mary Neil, this spine surgeon who's kayak was pinned under the waterfall. Hear her story in the podcast as well. She said, I went from alive to even more alive, from conscious to more conscious.

52:12 Speaker 4: And several of them, doctor Neil, this Captain Dale Black, the airline pilot. I asked them at one point, I said, so do you realize you're dead? And they both kind of chuckle and go, well, at that point I kind of thought, I guess I'm dead, because they didn't feel dead, they felt more alive. And Jesus said this, by the way, you know, Jesus last night on Earth and John chapter fourteen, he says to his close friends, you know, I'm going to prepare a place for you. Trust in God, trust also in me. I'm going to prepare a place for you.

52:51 Speaker 4: There are many rooms in my father's home, right, and I will come and get you, and you will always be with me where I am. And Jesus said, God is not the god of the dead, He's the God of the living. Right And when people so some of the commonalities when people die is they go they enter into paradise, which, by the way, your death experiencers say, what Jesus said to the thief on the cross today, you'll be with me in Paradise is actually the outside the suburbs, outside the holy city of God. It's the place most like Earth, and we many of many come there first to kind of acclimate, but it's very much like Earth.

53:40 Speaker 4: It's beauty, it's mountains, it's trees, it's streams, it's valleys, it's you know, it's water, animals, people. There are hugs. There's this great reunion, this welcoming committee, usually of friends and relatives who have died before us, and they come to us and we hug. We remember, we have we still have our memories, we still have our humor. We are ourselves in fact, you know, John, One of the things is just most amazing to me is how themselves people feel in the presence of Jesus or this God of Light, the Father.

54:22 Speaker 4: And they describe how in heaven you don't think of them as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They're just one. Even though still they see Jesus and they see the Father on the throne, and they know the Holy Spirit is with them always. They experience the Trinity. But there is a there is an understanding that of there's just one God that isn't confusing there like it is here. And and the thing that they say most commonly is that it is life, but it's life without all that's wrong here. And so Jesus said all these things.

55:12 Speaker 4: He said, there's gonna be responsibility. Some of you are going to govern nations. You know you're his disciples. You're gonna sit on twelve twelve thrones, ruling over, governing over the twelve tribes of Israel. But others are going to govern nations. Some are going to care for animals, others they're Maybe you're creative, you're going to create songs that are going to be sung in heaven. There's music that people talk about is like music on an otherworldly dimension. They talk about the colors of heaven and how vivid everything is.

55:48 Speaker 4: So it's it's like, imagine the greatest beauty you've seen on Earth, but multiply it by a thousand. Color is beyond our color spectrum. Dale Black said to me, you know, we have like green and blue and red and yellow, but now take blue and imagine a thousand shades of blue and you can see them all clearly, vividly, and that's the color spectrum, but far beyond colors we can't even describe on earth. And they consistently say this and then a life to all of nature. Interestingly, you know, Christians in America have kind of pushed away this idea of oneness, right, and that's more of a Hindu concept.

56:46 Speaker 4: But the truth is there is truth God has left. God has left evidence of truth all around the globe for everyone who will seek him, right, I mean even in the Vedas. I've read in the Vedas about the parush Prajapati who had come in the form of a man too to die for the for the remission of karma, get off the cycle of sam Sara. M m, well, that's salvation, right. So I mean there there are traces of the One True God everywhere.

57:20 Speaker 2: Can you just describe the hottest of health, like, I mean, with all the hellish experiences, the most carriers or something like that, to remind people the reality of health, because sometimes people say God is a loving god. I mean, he won't send people to hell, you know. I heard Christians teach that. So maybe a quick thing on that.

57:41 Speaker 4: Yeah. One thing that studying near death experiences will also convince you of is that hell is real. It's it's a reality. And what they commonly say, like I interviewed this atheist, Howard Storm, and he was a professor, but when he came back, so he had this hellish experience and he is led by these people that if at first are nice, but they deceive him and they lead him into this outer darkness, just like Jesus described, and they turn on him and just maul him. And in that place he remembers hearing that Jesus saves, and he, in desperation, cries out to Jesus and says, into this darkness, then these people were just mauling They were doing the worst things you can imagine to him and enjoying it.

58:38 Speaker 4: And what he realized is that hell is the place where God gives the free willed creature what he or she wants. If what he wants is God, stay out of my life. I've got this, I know what's best for me. You just leave me alone, or I'm just going to pretend you don't exist. And then God in his great sadness, and I report on the sadness of God as well, because we're all created to be his children. Imagine if your children like rejected you forever, that's the way God feels. But because love is God, God is love, and love is what He created us for.

59:22 Speaker 4: But love can't be forced. Love must be free to choose. And so if someone says God, stay out of my life, he says, okay, I will give you what you want, and that is Hell, and many near death experiencers have said to me what C. S. Lewis, famous author, also said that hell is really locked from the inside. It's people locking God out. It's not God locking people out. It's a choice they're making so no one has to go there. And what Jesus did was to make a way for all all people of all nations who simply turn their heart back to God wanting his forgiveness, wanting his leadership.

1:00:09 Speaker 4: That's all, that's all they need. And he takes us back as his as his own children. And yeah, so hell is real. But that's also why God did what he did through Jesus to offer grace and forgiveness to all people.

1:00:29 Speaker 3: Amen.

1:00:29 Speaker 4: Amen.

1:00:31 Speaker 2: Because of lack of time, I'm going to be very quick, guys, i encourage you to check out past this books, check out is podcast, is YouTube channel, like putting all the details in the description.

1:00:40 Speaker 3: Whether it's on YouTube you're checking.

1:00:41 Speaker 2: Out, I want you to check out my books which are also available also my YouTube channel. If you're checking this out on YouTube, subscribe, let it, let the message go forward, Let it be a blessing to a lot of people. I want to quickly pray for you, Pastor and then I encourage you to pray for me, the ministry and any words you want to share for the ministry right now, anything that you want to share towards me, the ministry and the podcast before.

1:01:06 Speaker 4: That, well, I would just say this that I believe God is doing something unique in our day. I mean, think about it. You're in India. I know it's forty hours to get over there. I've been right, We're a long way away. And yet look how God is connecting all of us together. I believe in these last days. So you are in such an important place, to the Lord and share what you know, share John's podcast with all your friends who don't know the uniqueness of Jesus and that he has done these things in history and he's continuing to for the sake of all his children coming home one day.

1:01:53 Speaker 2: I just pray for you, and then I request you to pray for me in ministry and all of us. Right sure, Lord, I pray for past in the name of Jesus. I thank you for the way you've been using in I pray that you'll continue to use Him as a mighty vessel for you across the globe. Right now, I see a vision of you traveling more and more. I release that vision over you that you will travel more to the ends of the world and share what you God has been showing you revealing to you. And I release that word over you.

1:02:22 Speaker 2: I speak also, I see a vision of protection and coverage over you, specifically as you go into certain pockets. I release that anointing over you that you will be protected from dangers in unexpected ways. I release that word also over you. You and your family will receive the blessing of the Lord and your ministry as well. In Jesus name, I pray, Amen, Amen.

1:02:45 Speaker 4: And Lord, I pray for John and for all that you have raised him up to do. I thank you for every person who is listening to this right now. God, You have put us all here for a reason and a purpose. We know people who need to know of your great love of how you see us all as your children, and we are meant to know you through Jesus. We are meant to be confident that you have not condemned us, You have not judged us for our wrongs, even though it deserves that. But you have forgiven us, and you've taken us to be your children in your eternal home and So God, I pray your protection on John and the word as it goes out through his ministry.

1:03:32 Speaker 4: And I pray for every person hearing this, that you would protect and guard and guide them, and that this word would go to many people all across India and around the world. In Jesus' name. Amen.

1:03:46 Speaker 3: Amen, God bless you guys.

1:03:48 Speaker 4: God bless you too.

1:03:50 Speaker 1: Thanks you've been listening to Fuel for the Soul with John Gifda, we hope you were blessed and inspired to live the life that God has for you. Make sure to subscribe to the John Gifta YouTube channel for regular uploads of sermons, skits, interviews and more. Follow John Gifta on Instagram for regular inspirational posts, and don't forget to check out the best selling books written by John Gifta, Who Am I which will help you understand your identity and the latest number one best seller Unveil your Purpose, helping you discover your purpose and to start walking in it.

1:04:26 Speaker 1: Make sure to leave a rating and review and be sure to share it with your friends and loved ones. If you'd like to donate, you can find the PayPal link in the description, and if you'd like to invite John Gifta to speak at your event or to get more details, go to the website at www godjoongifted dot com. See you on the next episode of the Fuel for the Soul with John Gifta. God bless you.