Heaven is for Real

There's an old riddle that asks what is the same on Earth as it is in Heaven? The answer is somewhat obvious, at least from a certain point of view if you look at it with a simple and childlike faith; the wounds of Christ. That is one of the things posed in Todd Burpo's book Heaven is for Real after a talk with his son about how Jesus had markers on his body. It took a while to get out what the kiddo meant, but it was marks on the body in color different than what He had for the rest of His skin.

This book is the story of a young boy, three at the time it happened, who had a near death experience after having had a ruptured appendix for five days before it was realized and they went from their hospital to another one who rushed their boy to surgery right after the CT scan. What follows is pretty incredible, and I approached it at first as I always do with private revelations, a great degree of skepticism. But time after time, what the boy said lined up with Sacred Scripture.

When little Colton woke up from the anesthesia he was yelling for his dad. When he got his dad back, one of the things he told him was that Jesus had sent him back to his dad to answer prayer. He then talked about how his mom had been in one room on the phone and praying, and how his dad had been alone in a side room crying and raging at God. Yes, you do have the right to be creeped out as a parent when your son who nearly died on the operating table tells you in perfect detail what you were screaming at God that no one else was present for.

Things continued to get creepier as the weeks passed, with Colton talking about missing his sister. His parents told him she was in the other room; he shook his head and he said that he missed the one in Heaven, the one who died in mommy's tummy. Now the Burpos it seems, are like a lot of parents, and don't discuss their miscarriage with their three year old; I know I was 18 before I ever learned my mom had one.

When probing about sitting with God that he mentioned, Colton was enthusiastic about His love for us. Colton's dad asked where Jesus was, was He there too? Colton enthusiastically replied with something we read in Revelations, he was seat on the right side of God the Father. Well, pointed to the side because he didn't know right from left.

He also mentioned, aside from his unborn sister, meeting his grandfather in Heaven; Pop. Pop died when Colton's dad was six years old, and the only photo they had of him in the house was from when Pop was 61 years old. When they showed him that photo, he said it didn't look like Pop. But the thought kept gnawing at Todd, the dad, and he called his mother to see if she could send him a copy of a photo when his dad was younger. She found one in a box that hadn't been opened since two years before Colton was born and sent a copy and an attached note as to who was who in the photo. When they showed Colton the photo without the note, Colton pointed out his 29 year old Pop immediately, but couldn't recognize anyone else, including his still living grandmother who was in her 20s in the photo.

One thing that may make those who believe in the saints feel vindicated in this book, is that Colton describes how people in Heaven pray for those on Earth at times. He described how he prayed for his dad, and others were too, that he have the strength to endure the trials that the family were going through as Colton laid on the operating table.

Throughout the book, Colton is shown different images of Jesus and he always says something is wrong with them. At age seven however, his dad calls him down after watching a CNN piece on an eight year old painter named Akiane Kramarik, who was raised in an Atheist home, who painted visions she had of Heaven. He was waiting for his son to tell him what was wrong with the picture like he had all the others, but when Colton came down the stairs and looked at the paused image on the computer, he was stone still and silent. His dad asked him what was wrong, and he said, "Dad, that one's right."

That painting is Prince of Peace: The Resurrection.


Asked by some if Colton ever saw Mary in Heaven, the reply was yes. That she sometimes knelt before Him and others stood with Him, "she still loves Him like a mom".

In the end, life goes on for the Burpo family as it always did, just with some speaking engagements now in addition to church, teaching, coaching, volunteer firefighting, and garage door installation. Colton has never claimed to visit Heaven again, just that one time while the doctors struggled to save his life from five days worth of poison from the ruptured appendix. The book title itself came from a meeting in 2009 with their editor as the Burpos wrote the book and had conflicting ideas for a title. The editor asked simply, "What do you want people to know about your story?" Colton's reply was the simple one of a child, "I want them to know that Heaven is for real."

I'm a skeptic as I said before; it's part of what I like about Catholicism. It makes you use your brain and encourages a person to know why they believe what they believe. That said, skeptical as I tend to be about private revelations, this book has left me with an unerring sense of peace. Periodically I suffer an intense fear of death, panic attacks that leave me crippled; I tried to induce one about three-fourths of the way through this book. I couldn't.

There are only two things I've found in this world that render me unable to have one of those panic attacks about death, be they intentionally brought on to test a theory or not. The first is Adoration of the Eucharist; I just can't be afraid when I'm in His presence. The other was reading this book. I think, from the fact that it took me beyond that fear is proof enough, Heaven is for real.