Read Heaven Is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back Online

Authors: Todd Burpo,Sonja Burpo,Lynn Vincent,Colton Burpo

Tags: #Near-Death Experiences - Religious Aspects - Christianity, #Heaven, #Inspirational, #Near-Death Experience, #Body; Mind & Spirit, #Religious Aspects, #Christianity, #General, #Religion, #Near-Death Experiences, #Heaven - Christianity, #Christian Life, #Burpo; Colton, #Parapsychology, #Christian Theology, #Eschatology

Heaven Is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back (9 page)

BOOK: Heaven Is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back
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Heaven is for real
Page: 35

I was pretty sure he had never even heard of the book of Hebrews, but there was one way to find out.

Colton, which side of Gods throne was Jesus sitting on? I asked.

Colton climbed up on the bed and faced me on his knees. Well, pretend like youre in Gods throne. Jesus sat right there, he said, pointing to my right side.

The Hebrews passage flashed into my mind: Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.4

Wow. Here was a rare case where I had tested Coltons memories against what the Bible says, and he passed without batting an eye. But now I had another question, one I didnt know the answer to, at least not an answer from the Bible.

Well, who sits on the other side of Gods throne? I said.

Oh, thats easy, Dad. Thats where the angel Gabriel is. Hes really nice.

Gabriel. That makes sense. I remembered the story of John the Baptist and the moment when Gabriel arrived to deliver the news of John the Baptists coming birth.

But the angel said to him: Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. . . .

Zechariah asked the angel, How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.

The angel answered, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news.5

I stand in the presence of God, Gabriel told Zechariah. And now, more than two thousand years later, my little boy was telling me the same thing.

So Id had my glimpse into Gods throne room, but Coltons descriptions had me wondering: if God the Father was seated on his throne with Jesus on his right and Gabriel on his left, where was Colton?

Colton had already crawled underneath his blanket, his blond head nestled against a Spider-Man pillowcase. Where did you sit, Colton? I asked.

They brought in a little chair for me, he said, smiling. I sat by God the Holy Spirit. Did you know that God is three persons, Dad?

Yeah, I think I know that one, I said and smiled.

I was sitting by God the Holy Spirit because I was praying for you. You needed the Holy Spirit, so I prayed for you.

This took my breath away. Colton saying that he was praying for me in heaven reminded me of the letter to the Hebrews, where the writer says: Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses . . . let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.6

What does God look like? I said. God the Holy Spirit?

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Just as I was trying to picture that, Colton shifted course again. You know, thats where I met Pop.

You met Pop sitting by the Holy Spirit?

Colton nodded vigorously, smiling at what seemed a pleasant memory. Yep. Pop came up to me and said, Is Todd your dad? And I said yes. And Pop said, Hes my grandson.

How many times, when I presided over a funeral, had mourners delivered the usual well-meaning platitudes: Well, shes in a better place, or We know hes looking down on us, smiling, or Youll see him again. Of course, I believed those things in theory, but to be honest, I couldnt picture them. Now, with what Colton had said about Pop and about his sister, I began to think about heaven in a different way. Not just a place with jeweled gates, shining rivers, and streets of gold, but a realm of joy and fellowship, both for those who are with us in eternity and those still on earth, whose arrival we eagerly anticipated. A place where I would one day walk and talk with my grandfather who had meant so much to me, and with the daughter I had never met.

With all my heart, I wanted to believe. At that moment, the details of our conversations began to pile up in my mind like a stack of Polaroidspictures of heaven that seemed uncannily accurate from the descriptions we all have available to us in the Bibleall of us who can read, that is. But these details were obscure to most adults, much less a kid of Coltons young age. The nature of the Trinity, the role of the Holy Spirit, Jesus sitting at the right hand of God.

I believed. But how could I be sure?

I smoothed Coltons blanket across his chest and tucked him in snug the way he likedand for the first time since he started talking about heaven, I intentionally tried to trip him up. I remember you saying you stayed with Pop, I said. So when it got dark and you went home with Pop, what did you two do?

Suddenly serious, Colton scowled at me. It doesnt get dark in heaven, Dad! Who told you that?

I held my ground. What do you mean it doesnt get dark?

God and Jesus light up heaven. It never gets dark. Its always bright.

The joke was on me. Not only had Colton not fallen for the when it gets dark in heaven trick, but he could tell me why it didnt get dark: The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.7

NINETEEN JESUS REALLY LOVES THE CHILDREN

For months in late 2003 and early 2004, there was a certain set of things that Colton seemed to fixate on. He talked about death and dying more weirdreally weirdfor a kid his age. He also shared more about what heaven looks like. These details came out in bits and pieces over dinner, while he ran errands with Sonja and me, and during the general flow of life.

He saw the gates of heaven, he said: They were made of gold and there were pearls on them. The heavenly city itself was made of something shiny, like gold or silver. The flowers and trees in heaven were beautiful, and there were animals of every kind.

No matter what new tidbits he revealed, though, Colton had one consistent theme: he talked constantly about how much Jesus loves the children. I mean that: constantly.

He would wake up in the morning and tell me: Hey Dad, Jesus told me to tell you, He really loves the children.

Over dinner at night: Remember, Jesus really loves the children.

Before bed, as I helped him brush his teeth, Hey, Daddy dont forget, hed say, garbling the words through a mouthful of toothpaste foam, Jesus said he really, really loves the children!

Sonja got the same treatment. She had begun working part-time again by then, and on the days she stayed home with Colton, he chirped all day long about Jesus loving the children. It got so that it didnt matter what Bible story she or I read to our tiny evangelist at night, whether from the Old Testament, the New Testament, about Moses or Noah or King Solomon, Colton wrapped up the night with the same message: Jesus loves the children!

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We might have grown weary of Coltons nonstop message about Jesus love for kids, but it did transform the way we approached childrens ministry in our church. Sonja had always been torn between singing on the worship team during Sunday morning services and going downstairs to teach Sunday school for the kids. And while she knew that statistics show most people who profess faith in Christ do so at a young age, it was Coltons passionate insistence on Christs love for children that gave Sonja fresh energy for our kids ministry.

I also became bolder about asking church members to serve in our childrens ministry. Over the years, Id had to fight to get people to sign up to teach Sunday school. They would give me the verbal stiff-arm, saying, I did my turn last year, or Im too old for that.

Now, when I ran into those same excuses, I lovingly reminded people that Jesus clearly viewed children as preciousand that if he loved kids enough to say that adults should be more like them, we should spend more time loving them too.

During that time, Colton had also become obsessed with rainbows. All his talk about the magnificent colors in heaven reminded Sonja and me of the book of Revelation, where the apostle John wrote specifically about the rainbow surrounding Gods throne,1 and where he describes heaven as a gleaming city of gold:

The wall was built of jasper, while the city was pure gold, clear as glass. The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. The first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald, the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, the twelfth amethyst.2

Some of those precious stones are of colors that are familiar to us: the rich violet of amethyst, the brilliant green of emerald, the translucent gold of topaz, the depthless black of onyx. Others are less common: chrysolite, which is light to olive green; jacinth, a transparent red. Beryl occurs in many colors, from light pink to deep green to aquamarine.

With its unfamiliar gemstones, Johns description is so exotic to us that we have to look up the minerals to find out what colors he was talking about; grown-up theologians want to be precise. But if a kid saw all those colors, he might sum them up in one simple word: rainbow.

So when, in the spring of 2004, the most brilliant rainbow wed ever seen appeared over Imperial, we called him outside to take a look.

Sonja was the first to see it. By then, she was just a few weeks pregnant with the baby we now considered definitively as our fourth child. It was a warm, sunny day, and shed gone to open the front door and let the freshness into the house. Hey, you guys, come see this! she called.

From the kitchen, I crossed the dining room to the front door and was astonished to see a rainbow so bright, so vivid, that it looked like an artists painting of the Perfect Rainbow. Or a kid with a brand-new box of crayons illustrating his science lesson: ROY G BIV. Every color sharply divided from the next, and the whole arc blazing against a perfectly blue sky.

Did it rain and I missed it? I asked Sonja.

She laughed. I dont think so.

Colton was down the hall in the playroom. Hey, Colton, I called. Come out and take a look at this.

He emerged from the playroom and joined us on the front stoop.

Look at that rainbow, Colton, Sonja said. There definitely should be a big pot of gold at the end of that thing.

Colton squinted, peering up at colors pouring across the sky.

Cool, he said with a nonchalant smile. I prayed for that yesterday.

Then he turned on his heel and went back to play.

Sonja and I looked at each other like, What just happened? And later we talked again about the pure-faith prayers of a child. Ask and it will be given to you, Jesus said. He put that instruction in the context of a child asking a father for a blessing.

Heaven is for real
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Colton Burpo hadnt seen a rainbow in a while, so he asked his heavenly Father to send one. Faith like a child. Maybe, Sonja and I thought, we had a lot to learn from our son.

TWENTY DYING AND LIVING

The spring of 2004 marked a year since Coltons hospital stay. That year, Good Friday fell in April, and in just another month, Colton would be five years old. I always enjoyed Good Friday because Id do what I called a come-and-go family Communion. That meant that I would hang out at the church for a couple of hours, and families would come and take Communion together. I liked it for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it gave our church families a chance to spend some special time together during Holy Week. Also, it gave me a chance to ask individual families about their prayer needs and pray with the whole family right on the spot.

That morning, I needed to run some errands, so I put Cassie and Colton in my red Chevy truck and drove the few blocks into town. Still small enough to need a booster seat, Colton rode next to me, and Cassie sat by the window. As we drove down Broadway, the main street through town, I was mulling over my responsibilities for the day, thinking ahead to the family Communion service. Then I realized it was a religious holiday and I had a captive audience right there in the truck.

Hey, Colton, today is Good Friday, I said. Do you know what Good Friday is?

Cassie started bouncing up and down on the bench seat and waved her hand in the air like an eager student. Oh, I know! I know!

I dont know, Colton said.

I glanced over at Cassie. Okay, whats Good Friday?

Thats the day Jesus died on the cross!

Yep, thats right, Cassie. Do you know why Jesus died on the cross?

At this, she stopped bouncing and started thinking. When she didnt come up with anything right away, I said, Colton, do you know why Jesus died on the cross?

He nodded, surprising me a bit.

Okay, why?

Well, Jesus told me he died on the cross so we could go see his Dad.

In my minds eye, I saw Jesus, with Colton on his lap, brushing past all the seminary degrees, knocking down theological treatises stacked high as skyscrapers, and boiling down fancy words like propitiation and soteriology to something a child could understand: I had to die on the cross so that people on earth could come see my Dad.

Coltons answer to my question was the simplest and sweetest declaration of the gospel I had ever heard. I thought again about the difference between grown-up and childlike faith.

Driving down Broadway, I decided I liked Coltons way better. For a couple of minutes, I cruised along in silence. Then I turned to him and smiled. Hey, do you wanna preach on Sunday?

Later that month, Colton threw me for another loop. This time, it involved life or death.

Sonja and I have a theory: from the time a child walks until about the first grade, one of the main tasks parents have is to keep their kids alive. No forks in the light sockets. No blow-dryers in the bathtub. No soda cans in the microwave. We had done a fine job with Cassie. By then, she was seven years old and had pretty much ceased being a danger to herself and others. Colton, though, was a different story.

Heaven is for real
BOOK: Heaven Is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back
3.52Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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