Douglas Duncan's NDE

I was raised in a fundamental Christian home always being told that your name had to be in the book of life or you would spend eternity in hell. Because of both fear and desire I professed to be a Christian around the age of nine but by the time I reached thirteen I told my parents that I did not want to be saved anymore, hoping that I would then be able to join my peers and be “normal”. However by the time I was in my mid twenties I had already started on a path that would lead to fame and riches for all the wrong reasons and after twenty-five years of this I had succeeded in accomplishing most of my goals. The way up the ladder was not always easy nor did my survival have anything to do with my own design. It seemed that my curse was that I was as untouchable as I was unhappy no matter how the stories and wealth accumulated.

Dec.15th 1995 is the time that stands out most predominately among the warnings and callings that God sent to me. While traveling along in morning rush hour traffic at approximately 65 mph and placing a cell phone call, I drifted off the freeway and onto the shoulder When I looked up there was a stalled semi with a large piece of earth moving equipment on its trailer fifty feet in front of me. With no place to go I hit him so hard in a large car that I reduced it to the size of a compact. The spectators could not believe that I was still alive let alone continue to talk to them while the paramedics immobilized me and prepared me for the trip to the hospital. All I could think was that they had no idea who was lying there in front of them and that this was just one more time that I had cheated death. When they wheeled me to the back of the ambulance I got the biggest shock of my life when I suddenly realized that I was about to die and that I had only seconds left to live.

My first thoughts were about how and when my family would find out that I had died and how would my dog get fed and taken care of. Then it got more serious as I realized that it did not matter whether I was wealthy or poor or whether I was driving a luxury car or a junker because I was about to leave this earth. I did not feel qualified to pray for my life at that time however I had a one-way conversation with God and I acknowledged to him that my life had been one of foolishness. I told Him that I no longer had the strength to live and if I was to do so it would take his direct intervention in one way or another because it was now all up to him. At that time I flat lined the monitoring equipment and the call went out to the highway patrol that they were losing me and at the same time and for the first time in my life I had peace and was grateful that dying wasn’t all that bad. Keep in mind that I was totally immobilized and could only look straight up had I still been able to see. However I was soon looking at the paramedics eye to eye and at face level as they tried to restart my heart. Their attempts were futile and I was hoping that they would slow down before they ruined the best thing that had ever happened to me. The next thing that happened was that I was taken up into a large area where I could not see anyone else but could sense life around me. I was then “brought” up to a large table that had a very large book on it that was open but was placed in such a manner so that it could be read only by someone on the other side whom I could not see. I knew that this had to be the Book of Life that I had heard about as a youth and that if my name did not appear in it I would have to go to hell. This was very serious indeed but as I stood there the book closed. That did not seem to be a very good sign and I resigned myself to the fact that I would have to go to hell because I had had plenty of opportunities to change but now it was too late. I knew that it wouldn’t do any good to cry and beg but that I should at least take it like a man because there would be plenty of time to cry where I was about to go.

However before any sort of trap door opened up to send me to hell I was suddenly taken to a second table that was just as the first one except the book on this table was closed. I was somewhat confused as to what this second book was all about when suddenly it was opened up and this scene became a repetition of the first one. This entire scene with a second book made no sense to me at all because as a child in Sunday School I had only heard of one book but at least it seemed to be a delay in what I already knew was about to happen to me. Then all of a sudden my name was found in this second book and I thought to myself “great I get to go to heaven”. Unfortunately before that happened I was suddenly “back alive and in my body” feeling something really good in my throat that I realized was oxygen. I had forgotten that oxygen was one of the first things that they had given to me back at the scene of the accident some miles distant and I thought to myself “well it is about time they gave me some”. All of the above took place while I was still inside the ambulance and when I first opened my eyes there was a man leaning over me who asked me if I was OK. I told him I was fine and looking back I believe that he had been rubbing some oil on my chest that I have assumed to be something they might have used for the conductivity involved with the equipment they used to try and jump-start my heart. (Later when I contacted the ambulance company to extend my gratitude as well as talk to the individuals to find out what they saw happen the dispatcher told me that this man had just joined them in the ambulance after the call had gone out that my heart had stopped. Unfortunately I never did get to thank anyone personally because of a privacy policy the ambulance company adheres to. However I do have the name of the HP officer who headed up the accident investigation and someday I hope to chat with her and get her take on what happened).

When we got to the hospital there were so many people waiting to help that they were getting in each other’s way and one accidentally ran into my foot causing me involuntarily to me say “ouch”. I didn’t understand all the uproar that was going on about me at the hospital. It seemed as if the entire hospital was involved around me and I was worried that somehow they had found out who I was. A couple of hours later the paramedics who had witnessed whatever had happened in the ambulance along with the driver came back with another emergency patient and asked to see me. They all stood in front of me acting and looking at me like I was something they had never seen before. The male driver was babbling incoherently and the one nurse who I had thought was pretty cute back at the scene of the accident suddenly threw her hands up to cover her face and ran out of the room saying how she could not bare to look at me. I never did find out what they saw happen when I came back to life but it was very obvious they had seen something very extraordinary and far beyond someone having their heart stop and then being made able to breathe on their own again through any form of CPR. People kept on asking me if I remembered anything at all while I was unconscious and I told them they were mistaken because I had been conscious the entire time and wanted to know when I could be released. An investigator from the highway patrol showed up and told me that she was there because they had been told that I had died and then awhile later heard that not only was I alive again but that I wanted to go home. She ended up getting rather upset with me and told me I didn’t know how lucky I was because in fourteen years she had never seen or heard of anything like this and how that I should be more grateful.

At first it seemed just like another close call to me but by the next day I started to tell people what I have just shared with you. I couldn’t deal with what I had been through as it had affected me emotionally and when I would try and tell people about it and that there was life on the “other side” they would tell me to go get some more rest and maybe I would be OK. During the following week and despite the pain medication my ankle continued to hurt worse every day. Although the hospital would not release me until a level of some ingredient found in the blood that is produced by the heart came back up to normal they had missed some fractures in my lower leg and ankle. These fractures were finally found about ten days after the fact and then some six weeks later some more fractures were located in my right temple lobe that were causing me a great deal of nausea.

This should have been a turning point in my life but it wasn’t and I remember asking God why he had done this to me. Far better that he had kept me because now I had something else to hide and I decided to do whatever it took to try and put this entire incident behind me and before long it was “business as usual”.

I told this story a few more times over the next five years but nobody ever pointed me to the truth until shortly before I was to go to prison. Right before that happened I had made the news in a big way and this time I started the walk that I had been called to take some forty years earlier. A Christian neighbor that had been present at my recent baptism listened to my story with interest. When I was done he told me that he had heard of other out of body experience stories before this one and that even though they were rare mine was not the first. However this was the first time he had ever heard of anyone speaking about a scene out of the Book of Revelation. This really got my attention since I had always known in my heart that I had been in the presence of God during this experience. It didn’t take me long to find the passage in RE. 20:12,15 where the scripture states exactly what I had been through.

Some people have stated that I am wrong about this because in verse twelve the books appear as plural before the Book of Life is opened meaning that I should have seen more than just two books if where I had been had been the same place where the Apostle John had been. This discrepancy is easily explained since I was present as a participant and not as an observer as was the Apostle John and therefore I did not see the books of other persons works, just my own. Even today and just as back then I still feel that God had shown me that I was acceptable to him through my repentance and confession as a young child but my works were not acceptable as one of his and for this reason he sent me back so that when this scene is repeated when life as I know it comes to an end something might be stated for my benefit.

If you want to hear more of this NDE story or about Douglas Duncan, you should get his book titled Modern Day Prophet. You can contact Douglas Duncan by clicking here.

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