(This blog was inspired by an earlier blog post on September 15th titled "Heaven is Real")
A lady named Tamara Laroux claims that when she was a teen girl, she died, went to hell, saw heaven, and came back to life. She had been struggling with depression and attempted to commit suicide. She claims that "a voice" told her to shoot herself in the chest instead of in the head. She claims that she died and went to hell where she saw a "sea of people" who could not communicate with each other. In hell she was given perfect knowledge about every one's sins and lives. Everyone was in great agony and no one wanted any other person to experience what they were experiencing. Heaven was visible from hell and there was a known reality that people in hell would never be able to go there. She then claims that because she had cried out to God, He scooped down and took Tamara to heaven. In heaven there were many people who were talking but Tamara was "not allowed" to talk to them. Later she was placed back into her body on earth and faced a miraculous recovery from a gun wound that should have taken her life. to see her story watch the following clip.
A lady named Tamara Laroux claims that when she was a teen girl, she died, went to hell, saw heaven, and came back to life. She had been struggling with depression and attempted to commit suicide. She claims that "a voice" told her to shoot herself in the chest instead of in the head. She claims that she died and went to hell where she saw a "sea of people" who could not communicate with each other. In hell she was given perfect knowledge about every one's sins and lives. Everyone was in great agony and no one wanted any other person to experience what they were experiencing. Heaven was visible from hell and there was a known reality that people in hell would never be able to go there. She then claims that because she had cried out to God, He scooped down and took Tamara to heaven. In heaven there were many people who were talking but Tamara was "not allowed" to talk to them. Later she was placed back into her body on earth and faced a miraculous recovery from a gun wound that should have taken her life. to see her story watch the following clip.
In Dr. Corsini's class, it was said that "just because something is real, does not make it true." Although heaven and hell are real places, it does not mean that Tamara Laroux actually went there. The class has been discussing the material and immaterial aspects of the human. Some of the best evidence (outside of Scripture) for immaterial aspects of a person, is the "out of body" experiences that many people have claimed having after dying and coming back to life.
These experiences are hard for skeptics to argue with because the physical body stops working, and people are able to maintain thoughts and feelings.
These experiences are hard for skeptics to argue with because the physical body stops working, and people are able to maintain thoughts and feelings.
I must admit that I normally take stories like Tamara's with a grain of salt. I tend to be a skeptic. The one major point that skeptics can use to argue for no immaterial person (in regards to these stories) is that every person's story about what happens when they die is different. For Tamara, she went to hell, then to a heaven where she was not allowed to talk to anyone. In a previous posting, a little boy claimed that he was able to talk to his miscarried sister and to his great grandpa. As a Christian I do believe that there is an immaterial part of a person, but I also believe that these experiences of heaven and hell may not be completely real. One possible explanation that I can think of is that these people somehow experienced a type of dream. Throughout Scripture God uses dreams to reveal important things to people. (it is first recorded in Genesis when God reveals information to Abimelech in a dream, and ends in Matthew where God warns Joseph about things in a dream) Is it possible that what Tamala experienced was a God-given dream? This begs another question. Can dreams be part of the immaterial person, and not just part of material thoughts? These are the questions that Tamala's story left me asking.
I do like listening to all the crazy stories of people who have died and come back, but I do agree that there seem to be variances in the stories that make one a little skeptical. I feel that my faith can be boosted by hearing stories like these, but I try very hard not to try and fit God into the Scientific method. Science only works when there are certain variables that are constant. I feel as if God is way too diverse to try and pop inside a test tube and expect consistent results. Some people die and come back but do not report anything, is that evidence against God?
ReplyDeleteI find myself also being a skeptic about these stories, and until this class I never believed any of them because they were too easily disputed. But after learning more and more about the immaterial man, I do think that they are possible, however Im not going to go and believe every one I hear. But you raised some interesting questions about this specific story. While im finding myself to be a huge skeptic about this woman's story. I do agree with you that it could very well have been a dream. I think that our dreams can and do come in some part from our immaterial. All throughout the bible it is told of how Angels have came to prophets in their dreams. We don't have a specific answer to why or how we dream what we do just as we cant fully explain the immaterial part of ourselves so naturally they must be connected some how.
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