Over at Apologetics 315, Brian Auten has linked to this podcast from Dr. Gary Habermas. The lecture was delivered to the students and faculty at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo in 2003.
Habermas goes through several examples of corroborative near-death experiences written up in peer-reviewed medical journals. This is scary! And if it’s true that we have non-physical minds that can exist outside the body, then materialism is false, and atheism is disproved again.
The MP3 podcast is here. (72 minutes)
There are two cases that you should really know about, and you can read about them in this London Times article.
Excerpt:
There are thousands of reports of OBEs but the two most famous cases are Pam Reynolds and Maria’s Tennis Shoe. Reynolds, an American singer, watched and later reported on with remarkable accuracy the top of her own skull being removed by surgeons before she moved into a bright glowing realm. But it was Reynolds’s account of the surgical implements used and the words spoken in the theatre that make the case so intriguing.
Maria, meanwhile, underwent cardiac arrest in 1977. She floated out of her body, drifted round the hospital and noticed a tennis shoe on a window sill. It was later found to be exactly where she said it was. The shoe was said to be invisible from the ground and not in any location where Maria could have seen it. Such stories suggest that OBEs should be scientifically verifiable.
Sleep tight, atheists! I’m sure there’s nothing to these stories… nothing at all!
Mu hu ha ha haaaaa!
Note: I would not use this argument in a debate. But I do find it interesting and I am open-minded. I haven’t decided whether these are real or not, although I am a substance dualist and believe in a real non-material soul that survives the body. If anyone has a solid NDE story, send it to me.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
Don’t worry atheists, when it all comes crashing down and the colossal monument you have built to your own ego crumbles we Christians will be waiting here in love.
And only then will you really understand what Jesus meant by “Judge not.” And you’ll wish you’d understood years before.
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It will be interested to see what the results of these studies are.
However, even from the NDE stories, there is no reason to claim they favor Christianity over Hinduism or even Greco-Roman paganism!
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That’s correct, and troubling to me!
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Hello Wintery Knight
Congrats for this suberb blog! I learn a lot with it!
I’m not associated with any religion, for several reasons… but I am a theist, a very spiritual person, a believer in Jesus preaching but still an explorer of the TRUTH. You might see me as similar to Gandhi and an Universalist.
I’m an avid student of NDE experiences! I believe most of them, which are corroborated by doctors and schollars, are true!!
I have to say they don’t trouble me at all! In my search for the TRUTH I’m comming closer to the conclusion that the religion you support is of NO importance… What is VERY important it’s the greatness of the “Kingdom of GOD within you” … to put it in another way: “The Kingdom of LOVE within you”
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I don’t think it should be troubling if you keep in mind the context of the discussion. The discussion is “Is there life after death?” This question does not have anything to do with religion. It precludes a religious discussion. Once you have asserted that there is in fact evidence of life after death, the discussion can move to a more religio-philosophical nature. At this point you have validity to assert that Christ and His resurrection because you have established a base that everyone can agree on. It’s just a step in the process.
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Not all of us hung around the hospital. Furthermore there are NO ghosts. I’m a NDE survivor. No matter who you are, NO ONE wants to remain in this world.
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Hey WK, do you know of any links to the peer reviewed journals with NDE’s in them? I’ve heard about them a lot and I’ve found a few, but the only ones I found cost around 40 dollars to look at. (Do you know where any free ones are?? lol)
thanks
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One of the most impressive articles is this one:
Click to access Lancet.pdf
from the famous Lancet medical science magazine.
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Hi… I have been a Christian since I was five, and for a while I questioned christianity and if the Bible was the real word of God. It was until I started to have a close personal relationship with Our Creator that everything started to make sense. No religion takes u to heaven, but a relationship with God does. In 2003, I had a very serious condition. I was 25 in that moment. During my time in the hospital, my heart stopped beating for maybe a minute or two. I had an experience that anybody would describe as a dream. I saw a beautiful garden, and a door, but I didn’t see what was behind the door. A voice spoke to me and said that it wasn’t my time to go in. It felt real. As real as the electricity coming from the defibrillator, and the pain in all my body. Hope to see u in heaven guys…. I’ll be there! :)
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There’s also astral projection. An out of body experience while you’re alive. For anybody reading this, please don’t ever try it! It’s an occult practice and will open doors to the demonic. There are many testimonies out there that show evidence for this supernatural practice. Here’s my favorite one:
http://carm.org/religious-movements/wicca/my-involvement-occult
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