How Deathbed Experiences Point to the Supernatural
Dr. Steve Miller believes that deathbed experiences provide stronger evidence for supernaturalism than the traditional arguments for God. While Near-death experiences have gotten much press lately, little discussion has paid to power of deathbed experiences. In this interview, I talk with Dr. Miller about his latest book.
READ: Deathbed Experiences as Evidence for the Afterlife, Volume 1 (https://amzn.to/3qA3kpI)
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He is biassed. Overlooks the parts of the Bible where God orders genocides & when God ordered Ezekiel to cook bread using human feces.
This happened to my Mother in law and my youngest grown daughter. She was in a nursing home in Vicksburg MS and had just been laying there not recognizing any of the other family or the workers. She was near death and they called the family in. My daughter started asking her to wake up and have a cup of tea with her. The next day they called my daughter and told her that her Grandmother was awake and wanted to see her. She went right away and her grandmother didn't just talk to her in her bed. She got out of bed and spent several hours talking to her and having tea. She finally went back to bed and resumed the coma like stance. She died the next day. This was observed by not just some of the family but the staff of the nursing home did too.
My husband died in December of 23 his last day he had terminal lucidity and clarity all day described meeting my mother my sister and my two brothers and said they were fine he asked for forgiveness from God among other things and call me and talk to me for several minutes and then told me he loved me and 30 minutes later he was dead.
My Mom was saved, 2 months b4 she died she was her mom in a bathrobe standing next to her smiling, it scared her, some demons were coming around, some from upstairs, that scared her, demons told her to let herself get cold and come with them, i did not understand allof it then and tried to defend her,,, i wont tell all details,,,,,,but in the days b4 she died, her dad and mom came and her one of her brothers and she was glad to see her dad but upset they would not let her cross the bridge,,,,,, finally one day she glowed,, her dad was letting her cross, it was a none quiet death, but Jesus is faithful to get his home, many spirits watch humans, but we got divine watching too,
we are spirit, in a temp body we do not die JESUS gives us eternal, by him, he did it all, and we live 4 ever, this is a temp thing we have to do, i died at 29, i hate religion, no truth, love or JESUS in religion, but God loves us,,,,,,,, im dying now, cancer, so i wont come back again, i got testimony up yrs ago but its not complete, and now too sick to redo it,
Folks, we need to fast and ask God for his Armor and also for THE GIFTS OF HEALINGS🙏
Generation "Z" are already Doomed, they just don't know it yet. The Elites know, that's why they are preparing to go to their underground bunkers.
YOU should've gotten off the planet when you had the chance, now your best option is to "Give Your Life to Jesus Christ" so that you can escape the judgments of God by being taken in The Rapture (Rev. 3:10). However, this will take "A Leap of Faith."
Another option is to simply take your chances of surviving to the end and the return of Jesus Christ at the battle of Armageddon, however you may need some "Special Forces Training", good luck 👍
Excellent show guys 👍🙏😎
Have you read about Ps Charles Capp death, ?he also knew ,check it out .
Another interesting pre-death dream is Abraham Lincoln. A couple days before his death he had a dream where he was at a funeral, he didn't know who's it was, he asked one of the people attending the funeral whose funeral it was. The person said, "It's the presidents" There are some things that might prove this wrong like statements saying that the body that Lincoln saw wasn't his own but still, pretty interesting.
Great interview… really enjoyed this. I can see a problem with a secular mindset butting up against the reality that good people and bad end up in heaven…
God loves us all more than we can imagine… he doesn’t only love Christian’s… atheist’s Muslims Buddhists all belong to the same god.
To claim Christianity is the only path to heaven is mean spirited as is much of the Bible. The real god loves all and makes no stipulations
what percentage of people that die have afterlife experiences
Just to sell books😂
How evolution explain that animal dog. Cat etc seem to react long before earthquake happen?,
Near death? So does this mean that your brain cells are what? 50% dead? I thought death was when your brain cells are dead. Does near death mean that your brain cells are still alive, but your body is in distress?
As a nurse I’ve had a handful of strange experiences. Someone died and in the next room a lady said her husband was in her room. I thought her husband was dead or she had dementia (she was a Walky talky so we don’t do much 1 on 1 cares for independent patients and I worked night shift so I never talked to her)
The next day I saw her husband and I was like ohhh my he looks exactly like the guy who died in the next room. And she didn’t have any form dementia. She was of sound mind.
My dad only just told me ab how his mom died and came back the day before she died and she said “next time I’m going and I’m not coming back. Don’t stop me”
There need to be more deep research on this
Maybe stev jobs "wow" was not one of excitement but of fear, unless he repent in the last days of his life…but based on Sean's question its right it doesn't make sense that unbelievers are having the same experience…it can look in some situations something the family said after they passed to make seem they had a happy departure or maybe in instances involment with occult things. I don't know I'm not a 100 % certain on the way he makes it seem that's the same for everyone and also one thing is being on deathbed and another one appearing after they passed that's totally two different things 🤔
When my grandpa unexpectedly died (he was in hospital but he supposedly already recovered and then he died). I knew that night that he was there, I couldn't see him, but I knew he was there and from that I infered that he died. He liked that I played chess as he also liked chess. I was embarrassed how bad of a player I was at the time but he telephatically told me that it didn't matter, he was just glad I was playing chess.
Sure enough, the next morning we heard that my grandpa died the evening before. This happened in 2019, 4-5 years ago.
Jesus allowed him to roam a little bit before going to the heaven.
You can say this is a coincidence, but this never happened to me other then situations when a close relative died. And no, that night no one went to bed expecting my grandpa to die, doctors told us that he was alright.
You can think that I am lying, that's a satisfactory explanation for you, but it is not a satisfactory explanation for me, as I know that I am not lying.
Look into bedside visions. People who aren't dying who see souls depart
Sean, do you have dry eye? You blink a lot.
The night my mother unexpectedly died, I was dreaming that I was putting 3 plants on my dad and brother’s grave. I put plants because they didn’t die like cut flowers. I was awaken by the phone call and while waiting in the ER I remembered my dream and knew she was gone. The dream of putting plants that wouldn’t die gave me peace of knowing that my mother, dad and brother didn’t die either
Excellent you both work so well together as communicators. You should team up again for another topic
Many answers to my questions in this video. I hope to find the book in Greek Thanks for posting this.
For people who believe that NDE is a real thing, why would God make people experience the afterlife through near death experiences as a way to strengthen our faith? It's such an evidence based approach to faith in God that is absolutely unnecessary. It's the sort of proof that Atheists demand from Christians when they pose the question "if God is real, why doesn't he write his name in the sky with the constellation of stars." because faith isn't about evidence. God wants us to believe in him through faith, not out of obligation simply because we were presented with enough "evidence". I'd genuinely like to get a Christian who believes NDE to be real to answer this.
JB Phillips, whose translation of the New Testament is still in use today, said he saw an apparition of CS Lewis shortly after Lewis died:
Many of us who believe in what is technically known as the communion of saints must have experienced the sense of nearness, for a fairly short time, of those whom we love soon after they have died. This has certainly happened to me several times. But the late C. S. Lewis, whom I did not know very well and had only seen in the flesh once, but with whom I had corresponded a fair amount, gave me an unusual experience. A few days after his death, while I was watching television, he ‘appeared’ sitting in a chair within a few feet of me, and spoke a few words which were particularly relevant to the difficult circumstances through which I was passing. He was ruddier in complexion than ever, grinning all over his face and, as the old-fashioned saying has it, positively glowing with health. The interesting thing to me was that I had not been thinking about him at all. I was neither alarmed nor suprised nor, to satisfy the Bishop of Woolwich, did I look up to see the hole in the ceiling that he might have made on arrival! He was just there-‘large as life and twice as natural.’ A week later, this time when I was in bed, reading before going to sleep, he appeared again, even more rosily radiant than before, and repeated to me the same message, which was very important to me at the time. I was a little puzzled by this, and I mentioned it to a certain saintly bishop who was then living in retirement here in Dorset. His reply was, ‘My dear J-, this sort of thing is happening all the time.’ (J. B. Phillips, Ring of Truth)
Loy Mershimer discusses this:
C.S. Lewis had some fascinating thoughts on this, and he himself appeared in one of the most celebrated and redemptive recorded ghost sightings ever: Moments after his death at Cambridge, he appeared in the bedroom of J.B. Phillips at Oxford [a dear friend of his, the one who translated the Bible in the Phillips translation. Phillips also wrote the fabulous little book, Your God is Too Small].
At the time, J. B. Phillips was in a deep depression that threatened his life. He refused to leave his chambers, refused proper food or exercise, and seriously questioned the love and election of God [in his life]. It was in this state of detachment and depression, leading to his early death…that suddenly, a ruddy and glowing Lewis stood before him, entering his room through closed doors — a “healthy Lewis, hearty and glowing” as Phillips was later to record.
In this vision, Lewis only spoke only one sentence to Phillips: ‘J.B., it’s not as hard as you think.’ One solitary sentence, the meaning of which is debated! But what is not debated is the effect of that sentence. It snapped Phillips out of his depression, and set him again following God. After Lewis spoke that cryptic sentence, he disappeared.
Phillips came out of his chambers only to find that Lewis had died moments before the appearance, miles away. He pondered this in his heart, with wonder, and never returned to his depression. Now, was this a case of God giving a detour of a soul on the way to heaven to a special friend, to save him? Who knows? But again, it is recorded evidence of the highest order, by persons of the highest order: Lewis and Phillips. It is a ghost story, a benevolent one, to all appearances – actually, not only benevolent, but redemptive [which I would take as an element of authenticity].
Super interesting. In the cases where people saw a deceased love one, is there a way to distinguish whether it was their actual deceased relative or (say) a demon masquerading as an angel of light, so to speak? I wonder for this reason. I had a close relative die when I was a kid. Shortly thereafter, when I was asleep in my room, I suddenly awoke to see a figure of this relative – at least that's what I initially thought. At first it made me sit right up in bed. However I immediately noticed the figure was completely black and surrounded by a rainbow-like aura. The figure stood in the doorway to my room. Again, I originally thought it was my deceased relative, but I quickly realized it might not be, because the vibe I got was something scary and threatening. This made me duck under my bedsheets. When I peeked again, it was gone. So I don't know what that was that I saw. Was it my deceased relative trying to reach out to me but unable to fully manifest themselves or something along those lines? Or was it a nefarious entity? I still don't know to this day. But I can still see the whole vision or apparition or whatever it was clearly in my mind today.
Love is the BIG thing.
If you can get it
My Hindu grandmother died and came back to life. She saw Gabriel, who spoke to her. She have never heard of Gabriel from the Bible nor the Quran. Gabriel showed her a glimpse of heaven. She said that she remembered that everything shined like the brightest sun in the universe. There was total peace. She saw animals too. Gabriel looked like a man, a young man. He had no wings. In a moment she was brought back to life on earth and was angry.
Since people are sharing (and thank you Sean for doing this video!) my brothers good friend Eddie, was going through pancreatic cancer for months and I hadn’t seen him, thought of him, or had the chance to ask about him in several months. One night I had a dream that I saw him and he looked really great. “I said with a little shock in my voice “Eddie! How are you doing? He smiled at me and said “I’m doing much better, man!” The next day I found out that he had passed.
2 incidents in my family. In the late 1950s or early 1960s, my greataunt was dying. She waited for my mother to make it home from Alaska before dying. Mom got there and I was told my greataunt said "Jesus," indicated she saw Him, and then died.
Then, in 2007, my mother had been unresponsive for several days before she died. We knew the time she passed as I was sitting with her when she took her last breath. All but my older brother had made it to her bedside. When he arrived and was told she had passed, he asked what time. At that time he was waiting for his connecting flight and her mom's voice saying his name. So he wasn't surprised she had already passed.
Whether its an NDE or a deathbed experience, they still happen BEFORE you die.
I know I am a bit late here, but the research done on OBEs is fascinating. It certainly points very firmly at Dualism (if not Idealism) as being far more likely than Physicalism. No Physicalist (Naturalist if you prefer) can point to Consciousness and say what causes it or what it arises from and then point to circumstantial evidence to back their claim. They say that the neuronal network somehow gives rise to consciousness but they have absolutely no idea how, why or even have anything to point to in order to back their claim. It is a hypothesis that is both untestable as well as having nothing associated with it that one can point to during research and say: “see this is why it is possible that neural networks give rise to consciousness.” It is a dead end that physicalists hold to firmly out of complete faith and nothing more.
Dualism on the other hand DOES have circumstantial evidence for it that can be pointed to. The very best evidence is the reports of OBEs. If your brain is inactive during a cardiac arrest and your EEG is flat, how is it possible to see your own body and describe, accurately, how doctors and nurses were working on it in a resuscitation effort? Take the case of Pamela Reynolds who was having a specialized kind of surgery to fix an aneurysm: they ran her blood through a chiller and dropped her body temperature really low (60-70F) and then they placed tape on her shut eyes and a covering over her face and loud noisemakers in her ears (roughly 110 decibel clickers). They stopped her heart, drained the blood from her head while she was cold and started the surgery. Her EEG was flat and the clickers in her ears would click loudly and often to check whether her brain would react (on the EEG). This was all critically important because she must not have any brain activity during the surgery.
Pam then remembers popping out of her body and watching the whole process taking place from above. She also had more experiences beyond that, but that is not important here. While in her OBE she was able to accurately describe the instruments her surgeon was using and everything that took place in that room (including conversations) in great detail – such that her surgeon would later say that it confounded him on how it was possible since she would have no ability to see or hear anything, much less be anywhere near conscious enough to process anything in her brain. She accurately described instruments used in the procedure that she never saw before (because they are sterilized and brought into the room sealed and covered after she is put under anesthesia). These instruments are not your typical bone saw or drill but very similar to the machines that dentists use and she accurately described that without knowing anything about them beforehand. She actually said that it surprised her when she saw the surgeon using a machine that looked more like her electric toothbrush rather than the big saw she expected. If you don’t know the case of Pam Reynolds, it is a MUST research.
Clearly the mind and brain are separate entities that are connected. Also clearly the mind (soul, consciousness or whatever you want to call it) can exist without the brain. Therefore, much like dualists say at the basic level: it strongly seems that mind is not the byproduct of brain but rather is somehow connected to it. Possibly it even evolved alongside of it (or was created that way if you are a creationist) and is something that either is organized and exists in a higher dimension (possibly string theory’s 6 – 7 extra small dimensions) or is something that exists, much like dark matter (if it that is indeed a real “thing”), somewhere else entirely and does not interact with the other fields (forces) like electromagnetism and cannot be seen or measured (outside of possibly gravitational effects). Whatever mind truly is, it is far more logical that it is not a product of brain but rather the opposite. Perhaps one day physicalists will find a better theory, but as for now, it would be VERY difficult to explain OBEs (many which have been verified by the medical staff present themselves) as somehow an effect happening inside of the physical brain. You cannot be aware if your brain is not active and (in Mrs. Reynolds case) your eyes are covered and your ears have extremely loud noises constantly going on in them. Something else is happening here and the dualist ideology fits best for now (possibly forever).
NDEs and DBEs are a whole other creatures. I do not know what to make of them. Some include Jesus, others include spiritual beings, guides or deceased family. There are quite a few commonalities that are shared between all experiencers like the void, the tunnel, peace and love feelings, the light, a life review, unearthly colors and music such that this cannot be hallucinations or delusions (even if the brain was working during the death event). People don’t all have the same hallucinations and delusions, even when they do multiple separate trips on DMT. Therefore saying that MILLIONS of people all experience these similar traits in their NDEs only makes logical sense if, indeed, they were experiencing an actual “place” while their mind was separated from their brain during a death event. It seems, after doing much research in this, that the “other side” if you will appears to be tailored to the person who is going to experience it. Some find comfort in meeting Jesus or their dead mother or perhaps a lovely landscape of bliss and peace and therefore this is what is created for them to experience during this traumatic experience (of dying). The strangest part to me of the NDE event is how those that have had one ALL universally say that they felt like they were back “home” while on the “other side.” Even those whose experiences go to a dark and frightful place all end up eventually calling out to God (or help) and being saved from that place and then taken to another peaceful (and often beautiful) place that they say felt like “home.” As I said previously, I don’t know what to make of NDEs much less of BDEs, but there is a real phenomenon that is NOT physical that is clearly happening here and it is fascinating.
I'm looking at this from a Christian perspective, so here is my question. Regarding Thomas Edison and Steve Jobs. They both rejected Christianity and there seems to be no evidence that they ever accepted it. So why would they see "beautiful things (Edison)" or see something so beautiful to say, "Oh wow!"? If they were non-Christians, wouldn't they have seen something much worse?
Again, I'm asking from a Christian perspective and I'm not pretending like I know their hearts or what private prayers they may have prayed throughout their lives. Also, I have no knowledge of what they may have thought or did (last minute conversion) on their death bed.
Update: I wrote this comment before I watched the entire video (shame on me 😄). Sean addresses this issue starting at the 57:43 mark. Not sure I totally agree with Dr. Miller's answer.
He's a good interviewer
My grandmother said she saw her mom around the time of her death. She also saw her deceased husband and a little girl she called an angel. The little girl would visit my grandmother often several months before she passed. My grandmother did have a few hours of clarity prior her passing but not to say her goodbyes. It was her excitement seeing those she loved who passed over. The little girl i think might have been her 1st daughter Anna, who passed in infancy. My mother claimed she saw her grandmother too. My dad had a really positive experience 10 months after my mom passed. He saw my mom in the kitchen one morning. He said she was opening cupboards and when she saw him she stopped and said, I am just checking up on you. Then she disappeared. Daddy was not into anything Supernatural but he did love the Lord. I knew when he had seen her it was a visit to prepare him for his death. After this experience he literally had lost his spark for life and passed 2 months later. Their deaths were 11 months apart. When my grandmother passed she called me on a hotel phone in Mexico. The phone woke me up around 2am. It rang again just as I was falling back asleep. Both times I answered it but nobody responded. I thought it might be my son trying to reach me so I called the front desk. I said I got 2 calls just now and I think they got disconnected. Do you have any messages for me? They said that the phone didn't ring and they didn't pass any calls to me. There were no messages. Then confused I tried not to worry about my son thinking he might have gotten into some kind of trouble in a cantina. Then I clearly hear, Debbie dear pick up the phone. After returning home to the states, the same thing happened again. This time I heard Debbie dear why don't you pick up the phone? For 2 weeks after her passing we all experienced what seemed to be my grandmother either calling out loud, hello! Knocking on my wall in the middle of the night as she regular did in life to get up and toilet her. I had plaques leap off the wall and land at my feet. My kids alarms would go off at crazy hours. Then everything stopped. So what was it, a failure spirit or my grandma reaching out to us? Nobody felt any fear. We would smile and say grandma mom was here last night. Even in the daytime things would happen. I have lived in haunted houses where the hair on your neck would stand up and shivers would roll through your body. I knew they were demons. But my grandma? I don't know. The word says the dead know nothing. That when we die since the day of Pentecost…. we go to be with the Lord or to hell. In otherworldly ghosts are demonic impersonators. Didn't the witch of Condor raise the spirit or ghost of Samuel? Samuel scolded King Saul for disobeying the command to not connect with the dead. Samuel told Saul he would die for his sin and he passed the next morning if memory serves me well.
What is meant by God? Cause a lot of the evidence i've studied points to there not being a God as believed in Christianity etc, but a divine all-knowing omnipotent being, like a divine light.
My mom passed away 6 days after she told us the Angels were with her we asked her if they were communicating with her and she replied that they were supporting her she was very ill and died peacefully
My sister had a falling out with her best friend and they had not spoken in 15 years. One morning my sister told her husband about her dream that was so vivid. Said her former best friend had come to the front door and my sister was shocked to see her. The former friend said “I’m leaving now and wanted to tell you how much our friendship meant to me before I go.” Then the former friend smiled and walked away. My sister woke up, told her husband then went to work and came home at noon. Husband told her to look at the newspaper online. This former best friend had unexpectedly died the previous day.
How does a vision of a loved one in a casket learn towards proof of an afterlife? I believe in the afterlife, but Mark Twains story didn’t seem to have anything to do with the afterlife.
As a scientifically minded teenager I read this kind of thing in my father's library. My conclusion: the supernatural is real. Sadly it did not lead to Jesus, but to dabbling in the occult. Some of it "worked", some of it didn't. None of it satisfied. After I gave myself to Jesus I faced a level of demonic opposition that I think was a consequence of my dabbling. With this in mind I strongly suspect that the glorious visions that so many non believers have just before their deaths are actually demonic deceptions aimed in large part at family and friends. Why not? "…even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light". (2 Cor 11:14) Their purpose: to encourage universalism and seeking other side experiences. It may have been this kind of thing that led most of Noah's descendants to become pagans. (See Deu 18:10-12)
My take aways: 1. These experiences are a double edged sword for the apologist. They can be useful in debunking materialistic naturalism, but can also be a route to the occult. 2. I hope I am wrong, but I doubt that dying unbelievers will "call upon the Name of the Lord and be saved" (Acts2:21) as a result of the usual positive experiences. Why would they? I think they are much more likely to do that if they see nasty demons coming to get them.
Most nurses and people who work at hospices routinely see "evidence" for the afterlife. In fact, one of the best ways for atheists to accept God is to just volunteer at one. They will accept God after about 3- months. Sometimes shorter.
Sanjosemike (no longer in CA)
Retired surgeon