The older I get the more I long for heaven. The more people I know who die and leave this earth, the more I long to see them again and to understand what they are now experiencing. I know that we all will have to wait until our time comes to really fully understand what heaven is like and what eternity will be like. We have scripture that assures us it will be beyond anything we can think or imagine but still we are inquisitive and want to understand.
There was a time, not too long ago that I wouldn’t have given this or any book like it a second glance because I just didn’t believe they were true. But, after reading several accounts like this one I am convinced that God is a BIG God and He does as He pleases. Who is to say he wouldn’t allow some people to see things like Crystal explains in her book, for many and varied reasons.
Honestly, I have faith in what I have read and studied. That God is creator of the universe and that he created all of us and desires to be in relationship with us. I would love to have an experience where God would allow me to see beyond the veil so to speak but if he doesn’t this side of heaven, I still believe in Him.
Every book I read on this subject leaves me with some encouragement and some questions. We just have to take them for what they are. Crystal isn’t trying to sell us anything. You can choose to believe or disbelieve, it is still her account of what happened to her.
The first half of the book is about Crystal’s life and the hard times she came through. I don’t know that they are any harder than what a lot of people com through but they feel that way when you contain them in just a few chapters of a book. She explains her life to explain that she doubted God’s existence and she shares the circumstances and answers to her doubts that brought her to faith in a loving God.
It is a great story, a well written book. One that I am glad I took the time to read. Here are a few of the nuggets I gleaned from the book.
Ronnie
“In heaven, there are no minutes or hours or days. In heaven, there is no such thing as “time.”
“I wasn’t so much meeting God as I was recognizing Him.”
“And you know, back on Earth, I had so many questions for God. “If I ever meet Him,” I’d say, “I’m going to ask Him how He could let someone molest me when I was a child. How could He allow such evil to exist in the world?” Why, I would ask Him, was he such a punishing God? But in heaven, all those questions immediately evaporated.”
“In His presence I absolutely understood that in every way God’s plan is perfect. Sheer, utter perfection. Does that mean I can now explain how a child being murdered fits into God’s plan? No. I understood it in heaven, but we aren’t meant to have that kind of understanding here on Earth. All I can tell you is that I know God’s plan is perfect. In His radiance, it all makes perfect, perfect sense.”
“THE QUESTION IN HEAVEN, ALONGSIDE GOD, ALL THE QUESTIONS I HAD for Him no longer needed answers. How could He abide evil in this world? Why was He such a punishing God? In His presence, I knew in an instant that God’s plan for us is perfect, even when bad things happen and we don’t understand why.”
“Now, some of you may say, “Hold on a minute, weren’t you thrilled to be back with your husband and your children?” Some of you may even wonder, How could you choose to stay in heaven when you knew your family would be so crushed to lose you? Those are good questions, and I’ve thought about them a lot in the last three years. And the answer I come up with is always the same: more than anything, I wanted to be with God.”
“Believe me, before this happened I could not understand how it was possible to love anyone or anything more than your own children. But that was before I found myself in the presence of God.”
