ADCs (After-Death Communication) and NDEs (Near-Death Experiences) as Evidence for an Afterlife

[Berserk]

Let me begin with this disclaimer: I am a Christian for whom Christ's atoning death and resurrection are the anchor of my faith. But at their best, the verifications inherent in ADCs (=After-Death Contacts) and NDEs (near-death experiences) replicate by their seemingly "physical confirmations" and other verifications the evidence that persuaded the disciples that Jesus is alive. In my experience of witnessing, NDEs and ADCs can be more effective than any Bible-based apologetics. To demonstrate why, I will share some of the most mind-blowing evidential NDEs and ADCs I have encountered, including some of the most convincing which have not been published.

But first, I will provide some biblical background for ADCs:
(1) Apart from Jesus' resurrection appearances, the most obvious NT example of an ADC is the return of Moses and Elijah to be present with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration (Mark 9:2-9 and parallels).

(2) "After His resurrection, they [deceased saints] came out of the tombs and came into the holy city and appeared to many (Matthew 27:53)."
Whether their bodies were actually resurrected or their spirits simply appeared to the living in Jerusalem, these paranormal appearances qualify as ADCs.

(3) Hebrews 12:1: "Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely and run with perseverance the race that is set before us."
In part this image of "the cloud of witnesses" refers back to the list of OT saints discussed in chap. 11. But in Hebrews, the word "witnesses" (Greek: martyres) always refers to eyewitnesses and the witnesses in 12:1 do not precede the living spiritual athletes, but rather surround them. So "the cloud of witnesses" are alive and are currently monitoring the progress of the spiritual athletes competing in the arena below. Hebrews 12:1 is thus an important prooftext for the affirmation in the Apostles' Creed, "I believe in the communion of saints." We don't need to embrace the Catholic practice of praying to deceased saints to recognize this point.

(4) In the Catholic OT Judas Maccabaeus has a vision of 2 deceased saints, the high priest Onias III and the prophet Jeremiah, whose encouragement and prayer support spur them on to military victory in Israel's decisive battle with the Greeks (2 Maccabees 15:6-19). True, this book is absent from the Protestant canon. But this visionary appearance of Jeremiah inspires speculation that Jesus in fact represents Jeremiah's return from the grave (Matthew 16:14).

(5) NDEs are experienced as a form of OBE. Paul considers his visit to Paradise a possible OBE (2 Corinthians 12:1-5) and Ezekiel describes his visions like ADCs:
e. g.: "Then the Spirit lifted me up (Ezekiel 3:12)."

My next planned posts will document some of the most evidentially impressive ADCs and NDEs. Please share any ADCs or NDEs that you or your acquaintances have experienced and what you think of them.

 

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This thread will initially focus on unique evidence from 5 categories of NDEs (Near-Death Experiences) and ADCs (After-Death Communications):
(1) ADCs in which the Dead Drive a Vehicle to Help or Comfort the Percipient
(2) NDEs with Paranormal Details Shared by Witnesses Present
(3) Artifacts Left as Evidence by the Deceased
(4) Encounters with Unknown Deceased People Whose Identity Is Later Verified
(5) Other Forms of Paranormal Verifications of NDEs

 

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The paranormal evidence doesn't get any better than this for the 2 men who had these ADC experiences.
(1a) You'll recall famed movie and TV actor Telly Savalas from the 1060s and 1970s (e. g. as the tough dec\yective in "{Kojac"). Here is his mind-boggling ADC experience:

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?...8830B507DA76D0D269568830B507DA76D0D&FORM=VIRE

(1b) Next is my friend Leonard's equally supernatural ADC. Leonard was a wealthy retired construction baron and a member of the United Methodist church I pastored in the late 1990s in western New York. We became friends and I sometimes had dinner with him and his wife Helen when I paid him a visit. He was always worried about the health problems of family members, whom I accordingly visited. One Sunday, he asked me if I'd be willing to visit his dying cousin who lived across the highway from him. His cousin was an atheist recluse, who was dying of lung cancer, but wanted no visitors. But he was so depressed that Leonard wanted me to drop by to discuss whether we should intrude on him anyway to show that we about his suffering. When I arrived at Leonard's house, he was absent due to a shopping errand in town.

As I stood, talking to Helen, this thought struck me: Leonard was a real worry wart; yet he never seemed to grieve the loss of his son Jeff, Jeff's wife Karen, and their 2 children in a small plane crash. For some reason, I mentioned this perception to Helen and was intrigued by her reply. She said that Leonard's grieving had been healed by a postmortem encounter with Jeff, adding, "But he doesn't like to talk about it." The next time I met Leonard I was overcome with curiosity and asked if he'd be willing to talk about his ADC. Leonard seemed very uncomfortable with my intrusive request because he thought Id think he was crazy. This is the story he shared with me.

After the funerals, Leonard was about to drive Jeff's old pickup truck to town to do some errands. As he approached the end of his driveway, he saw someone's figure suddenly loom out of the ditch by the highway. To Leonard's dismay, it was his late son Jeff! Jeff walked up to the pickup and asked, "Can I take my old truck for a spin for old times' sake?" A numb Leonard complied and off Jeff drove north down Cty. Rte. 40 towards Rochester, NY. Jeff's conversation with his Dad had at least 2 purposes: (a) to reassure his Dad that he, his wife, and his kids were all together and OK; (b) to give Leonard the information he needed to tie up the loose ends of Jeff's investment history. After driving a couple of miles, Jeff inexplicably turned right onto a less traveled highway. After a few minutes, he stopped the pickup, turned to his Dad, and said, "I'm sorry, Dad, but I'm not permitted to drive any further." Leonard never learned who was orchestrating this ADC. God? An Angel? Then Jeff got out of the pickup, walked towards a clump of trees, and vanished.

This ADC left Leonard in a state of shock. In retrospect, it now seemed like an odd dream and his grief was not assuaged by the experience. In fact, the next day, he was so overcome with grief that he went for a walk down the path in the woods behind his house. At some point, he sat on a log, overcome with sorrow. Suddenly, he heard the sound of a twig or branch breaking. When he looked up, there stood Jeff's wife Karen. She gently scolded him: "Didn't we tell you we are together and OK? You get back in the house with Mom and comfort her!" This second ADC healed Leonard's grief.

After sharing this experience, Leonard had a pained expression on his face as he gazed at my skeptical expression. I apologized that I was just having trouble processing such an incredible story. I felt badly because it was I who had pressed him to share a story he was reluctant to tell. I asked him if he had shared these ADCs with his daughters, and he replied, "No, they'd find it too hard to believe just like you." Leonard later passed away, and I learned that a daughter shared this ADCs at his funeral. So coming out of the closet, as it were, with me seems to have emboldened him to tell his daughters.

Leonard's ADCs are the most supernatural experiences I have ever heard from someone I know well. Yet this story does not inspire me as much as other paranormal experiences I have either had or encountered. I think the reason for this is that these ADCs are far more disanalogous to my ordinary life experience.

 

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(1) NDE researchers like Dr. Raymond Moody are now writing books about shared NDEs, which are generally far more evidential than most conventional NDEs because the doctors, nurses, and family members witnessing the apparent deaths actually experience key elements of the NDEs, including the OBE, the dying person's past life review, and the encounter with the Being of Light! See. for example, Raymond Moody, "Glimpses of Eternity: An Investigation into Shared Death Exerperiences."

(2a) Watch this brief interview with Dr. Moody for a summary of this type of afterlife evidence:

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q...5FEC&FORM=VIRE

Elsewhere Dr. Moody describes his own shared NDE at his mother's deathbed. The shared nature of these NDEs is somewhat reminiscent of Jesus' resurrection appearances.

(2b) For a gripping personal account of a shared NDE, watch Dr. Scott Taylor's testimony:

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q...E67B&FORM=VIRE

Such shared NDEs refute the claim of skeptics that NDEs are delusions caused by oxygen deprivation in a dying brain.

 

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Roger B. recently retired from his top executive position is the federal HUD department. He is an agnostic, but developed an openness to the claims of Christ through the NDEs and ADCs that I am describing in this thread. He even invited me to his vacation home in Fort Erie, Ontario. A fellow employee referred Roger to a book "Lighted Passage," written by his relative, a Presbyterian minister named Howell Vincent. The book is primarily about Vincent's daughter Rea, who was killed in a car accident on her honeymoon. The ADC cited below was a source of great comfort to the family:

(2c) "On at least 2 occasions this radiant mother had come to Rea in visible tangible form and talked with her...I was privileged to be present at one of these heavenly visits by Mother Nellie. Together with Rea I talked with Nellie, fully recognizing her face and form and voice. I saw her place her hand on Rea's head in blessing, and I saw her give Rea a flower, a calendula, which we pressed and kept. At that time 3 other members of our family were present, including Rea's second mother, Agnes, and they all saw Nellie and talked with her, as Rea and I did. We were all wide awake and walked around the room with Nellie."

From an evidential perspective this testimony rivals the Gospel resurrection stories and, for that very reason, lends them added credibility. Rev. Vincent's testimony certainly opened my agnostic HUD executive friend's heart to the Gospel and the possibility that Jesus really did rise from the dead. This ADC is similar to Jesus' resurrection appearances--e. g. Nellie's interaction with several family members, the experience of her blessing touch, and her provision of a supernaturally created keepsake.

 

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FOOTNOTE ON THE ADC IN THE LAST POST: The book quoted in the prior post was mailed to me by an agnostic friend, Roger, who works for a large Federal government agency. Roger in turn received the book from a co-worker who is a relative of Rev. Howell Vincent. Though he remains an agnostic, Roger's skepticism was shaken to the core by this book.

Roger and I became friendly on another website and he is the only poster I have met personally. I drove up from Buffalo, NY, to Fort Erie, Ontario to spend an afternoon with him. He took me to a wooded area where, as an 8-year-old, he had an experience very similar to an ADC. He and his young friend were looking for pollywogs near woods, when a stranger approached them, wrapped his arm in a choke hold around Roger's neck, and began dragging him into the woods. Just then, a women in a red dress appeared out of nowhere nearby and asked, "Is there a problem here?" She spooked the man and he released his grip and ran to his truck. When Roger turned to thank the woman, she had vanished, apparently dematerializing It was a long walk from her convertible to Roger; so she didn't have time to span that distance and get in her car. Roger feels compelled to view this as a guardian angel sent to save his life. What frustrates me is that this experience and Howell Vincent's ADC seem insufficient to dislodge Roger from his agnosticism.

 

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(2d) A UNIQUE SHARED NDE:

Albert Baldeo was a friend of my Uncle Larry. Perhaps he was also the most universally respected pastor in Kelowna, BC, Canada--so well respected that he was given a weekly column in the local newspaper. In one column he shared this shared NDE, an NDE which I confirmed in a private conversation with him. Albert died a few years ago.

Albert's father lay dying in a nursing home. Suddenly he sat up, gazed intently at some invisible person, and shouted, "Hurry up, brother! Hurry up!" Within a few seconds he passed away. Albert noted the exact time of death--11:45 AM on Tuesday. Unknown to Albert, his Dad's brother was also dying in a nursing home 10 miles away in the presence of loved ones. Just before he died, he sat up and shouted, ""Wait for my, brother! Wait for me!" When he then passed away, loved ones noted the time--11:45 AM, Tuesday. Yes, both brothers died at the same time and had a conversation which only makes sense and can only be pieced together when family members shared notes from both nursing homes. Apparently, as these brothers were detaching from their bodies, their center of consciousness was in a nonspatial realm which allowed them to converse, even though they were physically 10 miles apart.

 

[George-ananda]

To me ADCs and NDEs are very strong evidence suggesting life after death which I believe in. The strength of many of these cases is very impressive.

Religiously though, they lead me to believe love and a good heart/mind are what matter more than your religious belief system.

 

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(3) ARTIFACTS LEFT AS EVIDENCE BY THE DECEASED

In the shared ADE in (2b), Nellie gave her family an etheric flower, a calendula, which they kept and preserved. So now I will share other accounts of such materializations.

(3a) Dr. Lermer shared this experience with us. He was at a female patient's deathbed in Houston, when he witnessed a light over her body and heard her talking to some etheric being present to take her away. But before she passed, she cupped her hands to receive something and beckoned Dr. Lermer to come and take it. It was a 4-leaf clover, reminiscent of Nellie's calendula. After he received this, the woman passed away. Curious, Dr. Lermer put the 4-leaf clover inside a jar and kept it under observation. To his astonishment, he observed it slowly dematerialize over a 2 week period, evidently because it was made of etheric matter.

In my former 2-church UMC charge in western NY, I once preached a sermon on the Transfiguration. At the sermon's conclusion, I found myself saying, "And some of you will have a mountaintop experience very shortly. I was surprised to hear those words come out of my mouth and immediately regretted them.

But the next day, John, a parishioner and a Kodak executive , contacted me to discuss a strange discovery he had made on a tiny ledge well up the mountain, a nice ring that fit him perfectly. While I was pondering the unlikelihood of this discovery, my worship chairman, Bob, called to tell me that his mother's ring, which had vanished 30 years ago, suddenly materialized on the bedspread of his made bed. Bob had just moved into this house 4 years ago. He set the ring aside to show me, but it dematerialized the next day. To his astonishment, his friend later told him that a family ring had suddenly materialized in his home as well!

It struck me that John's discovery of the ring high up on a mountain ledge was the fulfillment of my prophecy of an immediate mountaintop experience. But the materialization and later dematerialization of the ring owned by Bob's late mother was apparently intended to cast John's discovery in the light of another mountaintop experience. I had just preached on the Transfiguration, during which Moses and Elijah suddenly materialize to be present with Jesus, Peter, James, and John, and then dematerialize. I had recently preached a sermon on the Parable of the Prodigal Son in which I stressed the symbolism of the ring of sonship that the Father gave his returning son. I wondered if Nellie's etheric canlendula had also dematerialized from the scrap book. I have no way of finding the answer now.

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