It’s usual for people who have a near-death experience to say they “saw the light” or “saw heaven” after their experience. Well, one pastor has studied over 1,000 accounts of near-death experiences with a mission to help people understand these allegations. John Burke, author of the bestselling book, “Imagine Heaven: Near-Death Experiences, God’s Promises, and the Exhilarating Future That Awaits You,” recently told “The Pure Flix Podcast” he’s a firm believer of evidence and reason and believes accounts of near-death experiences are authentic. Burke says he wrote “Imagine Heaven” to explore the parallels and similarities in near-death experiences across the globe.

Burke also said that people who go through these experiences often have a hard time putting what they’ve experienced into words. They can’t explain something that exceeds our current world, all while being restricted to the experiences and semantics of this realm. He compared our present existence to a flat, two-dimensional, black-and-white photo. According to Burke, people who have a near-death experience are “ripped off that two-dimensional plane and brought out into three dimensions of color.”

Unexpectedly, these individuals try to explain the new dimension to people who have only experienced the two-dimensional realm, which has its difficulties. Burke says they always interpret their experiences in their worldview, which is crucial because not every interpretation will align with the Bible. However, he adds that the similarities all point to the God of the Bible and no one else. Burke thinks that near-death experiences are a gift from God in a world when modern medical resuscitation can allow people to come back from the brink of death. He adds that’s it fresh evidence that God is real.

According to Burke, hundreds of scholarly articles have been written about near-death experiences in medical journals. During the experiments for these articles, researchers recorded all the observations among people with near-death events who claim to have outside their bodies. There was also a control group that didn’t claim to have a near-death experience and imagined what might have been happened in the room of their resuscitation.

Astoundingly, the control group got almost none of them right. The control group got 10 to 15 percent of their proclamations correct. In comparison, the near-death experience group was reportedly 92 percent right, with an additional six percent being at least somewhat accurate with their details. In “Imagine Heaven,” Burke also discusses three people who are blind. Despite never seeing beauty with their own eyes, they observed incredible sights during near-death experiences. Burke says the ultimate goal of “Imagine Heaven” is to guide people towards Christ.

Seeing heaven after a near-death experience isn’t a new concept. The 2014 film “Heaven Is for Real” is based on the story of Colton Burpo, who had a near-death experience at 4-years-old. When he emerged from emergency surgery, he told his parents that he had gone to heaven and back. Of course, his parents had a hard time believing him. It can be challenging for those who haven’t experienced that second realm to believe someone who says they’ve been to heaven. Still, Burke’s book, “Imagine Heaven,” hopes to break down that barrier and show that there may be some validity to the stories of seeing heaven. Watch Pastor Burke’s interview on “The Pure Flix Podcast” below: