HeavenVision Unveiled
Author’s note: We have just passed through the 2025 celebration of our Lord’s death, burial, and resurrection. I am, I believe, prompted by Heaven’s nudge to follow up by again testifying to my cardiac arrest and going to somewhere on the periphery of Heaven three times on Good Friday of 2011.
I remember sitting with my great friend Dr. Tim LaHaye at a breakfast table while in Dallas many years ago. It was just Tim and myself, and perhaps Mike Hile, my friend who drives us or flies with me to conferences and who is as close as a family member in my life.
Tim said that he had asked—as did Dr. Jerry Falwell ask regarding his own life—that God give him fifteen more years of living.
As I recall, that was the approximate number of years Tim lived following that breakfast conversation. Dr. Falwell went to be with the Lord after only a few years following his own request.
In my case, I haven’t asked the Lord for a particular number of years. But He has brought me to the fourteenth anniversary of that Good Friday of 2011 trip into somewhere in Glory.
I realize the stigma of disbelief and even scorn sometimes attached to relating such a thing as I experienced. I, too, have always cast a wary eye when hearing such experiences. But the Lord took me there for His own good reasons, and He brought me back to testify of that heavenly trip. So I can do no other than continue to relate it to whatever audience opportunity permits and the Lord directs.
On remembrance of our Blessed Lord’s resurrection and what it means to each and every one of us, I believe it is altogether fitting to do so again now.
An intensively documented hospital record of those heartbeat stoppages proves the reality of the clinical situation that Good Friday.
The following, considerably longer-than-usual commentaries, is a chapter from the book, HeavenVision: Glimpses into Glory, which Angie Peters, my daughter-close editor of many years, and I wrote following that tremendous event in my life.
HeavenVision Unveiled
There are no coincidences in God’s dealings with His children. And, the only children He has, in terms of human family, are those who are born again, as Jesus explained. Jesus said: “Ye must be born again.” (Read John 3:1-21 for the full explanation of what it means to be born into God’s family.)
As mentioned previously in this book, God’s Word says further in regard to God’s dealing with His Family: “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God” (1 Corinthians 2:9-10).
So it was that God, my Heavenly Father, has dealt with me through the clinical death I experienced Good Friday, April 22, 2011. I went through that ordeal, and I am here, now, writing about it for purposes He has determined. It is not a coincidence that brings me to this point of writing what I am about to write and your being here at this point reading what I have written. God has shown me, without the slightest doubt in my spirit and mind about these matters, exactly what the near-death experiences when my heart stopped three times mean. Therefore, without any reservation whatsoever, I am putting down for the record the message I know my Father in Heaven wants me to deliver at this time–in this book.
I write these things with a profound sense of humility, however. I am nobody special, other than a child of God through the shed blood of my Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ.
On second thought, I guess that does make me someone special in God’s holy eyes, but only because of what Christ did for me on that old rugged cross. Like the Apostle Paul framed his own relationship with God, the same applies to my case. Terry James would be the chief among sinners, if not for the righteousness God the Father sees when looking at His Son, Jesus the Christ, in evaluating my life now that I am His child.
Believe It or Not
There is a Scripture that many who major in teaching and preaching miracles and wonders today use to launch into stories of great ecstatic pronouncements:
“And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions” (Joel 2:28).
The time spoken of by Joel the prophet, as recorded in this passage, has not yet been reached. The word for when this era will be reached is in the Hebrew achar, “afterward” in English. This prophecy of miraculous visitations, when old men will dream dreams and young men and women will see visions, is scheduled for after Israel, God’s chosen nation, will as a people recognize that God is their strength and their provider. The people of Israel today do not look to the God of Heaven. They haven’t received reconciliation through repentance yet. This prophesy is for when King Jesus rules and reigns upon the throne of David atop Mount Zion during the Millennium. (The Millennium—the thousand-year reign of Christ—is in view in Revelation 20:1-5.)
The world certainly hasn’t reached the time of the Millennium. Jesus is still at the Father’s right hand upon the throne. So, I did not have a dream or vision because we have reached that spectacular future time prophesied for the millennial reign of Christ. However, the Lord can and does reach into any and all time-frames (dispensations) He desires to reach into, and God, the Holy Spirit, did so on April 22, 2011.
I could, in order to sound self-deprecating, tell you that the Lord just on the spot decided to use my widow-maker heart attack, when it happened, to say through my experience what He wants to say. But I can’t tell you that was what really happened. It was much more specific and preordained than that. God reached down and took my spirit into…where, I’m not certain, but for sure from this earthly dimension, and stood me in front of those young, beautiful, wildly cheering, jubilant young beings. It was no coincidence of timing. It was done for an absolute divine purpose. God chose the likes of me–a blind, aging sinner saved by His grace—to go through this extremely brief but spectacular visit to the fringes of Heaven.
Some of what this all means came to me almost immediately upon being hooked to wires leading to monitors and tubes while in the cardiac intensive care unit. Other aspects of what the heart stopping those three times and being instantly in the presence of those heavenly beings is all about were, in some cases, revealed much later, while thinking in directions totally unrelated to the experience. It has been confirmed in my spiritual heart that it was the voice of the Holy Spirit I heard, almost audibly, on each and every occasion.
Believe me, I am among the most reluctant of people to embrace in any sense metaphysical, experiential expressions of the Christian faith. By that, I mean stories of supernatural intervention by God into the lives of believers today through such things as dreams, visions, and miraculous healings—like missing limbs being replaced, or…well… people brought back to life after being dead and embalmed.
Do I believe God performs miracles today? Absolutely. He performs them every hour of every day. But they are very rare in the truly spectacular sense of performing miracles. For example, I have never read or heard of a single case in modern history—a documented case—where someone whose arm was totally withered, atrophied to the point that it was a useless blob of flesh, was restored to full size and use like the person’s other arm, simply by a faith-healer or other person touching it and praying over it. I’ve never seen documentation verifying that one born without a leg, foot, or eyes suddenly has those miraculously added to that person’s body through a faith healer’s touch.
I’ve heard a lot of stories about this happening, told by those who teach and preach miracles as the centerpiece theology of their belief systems. But not one case has been recorded by medical documentation or through scientific empiricism. I’m a believer and trust my Lord implicitly. But I’m also a rational being who finds it prudent to, when it comes to dealing with human beings, do what President Ronald Reagan said about dealing with the Soviets. “Trust, but verify.”
So, with spectacular miracles from on high being rare to the point of being almost undocumentable in these days, why should you–or anyone—believe me and my recounting the wondrous visit to that heavenly dimension on Good Friday of 2011? All I can say is that I know it happened because I was there among that throng of heavenly beings each time I heard the computer-like blip and my heart stopped. The Lord has told me in the deepest reaches of my spirit to report to you that visit. He has also given me what it means–and in remarkable detail, considering the brevity of the trip to and from that realm.
Believe it or not. Do with it what you will. The following is my faithful execution of the commission I’ve been given–that of reporting what my HeavenVision means to this generation.
HeavenVision–The Interpretation
Near the end of the year 2010, two projects came into my thought processes. The first was for our raptureready.com website—a series of articles I soon gave the title “Scanning a Fearful Future.” The second project that came into my mind was, as stated earlier in this book, a book on Heaven my mother and her sister wanted me to write.
I began writing the series for our Nearing Midnight column—ten articles in all—the last one which I completed and we posted January 24, 2011. Sometime in late December of 2010 or early January 2011, I decided to soon start the book project. My subsequent notes indicate I actually named the book HeavenVision: Glimpses into Glory. The date in my notes for beginning the book project was February 4, 2011.
I also made the note to consider building the HeavenVision book around near-death or clinical-death experiences of individuals–if we could find some that rang true, according to what the Bible has to say about life, death, and Heaven.
One of the primary reasons I wanted to write the “Scanning a Fearful Future” series was to try to help provide answers from the prophetic Word because so many who visit our raptureready.com website were concerned about where the national and worldwide economic upheaval was leading. Also, we were getting an increasing number of emails accusing us of being heretics who were leading people to Hell with our pre-Trib teaching. Christians should be prepared to face the coming Tribulation and Antichrist, we were told in the scathing diatribes. By not preparing Christians to face the beast of Revelation 13, they would not know to reject Antichrist’s mark and number. We were leading people to Hell with our false teaching of the pre-Trib Rapture.
As a matter of fact, we were already in the Tribulation, many of the quite excoriating emails were telling us.
Along with the two projects going through my mind were the thoughts, which became persistent prayers: Lord, I know what your Word says. The pre-Tribulation view of the Rapture is the correct one, I believe. But, nonetheless, please give me absolute confirmation of this truth. We don’t want to lead people astray.
The second thought was: I have written the “Scanning a Fearful Future” series. I would also like to have affirmation in my spirit that what I believe you gave me to write, I have faithfully written.
These were matters I took before the throne constantly. One other was in my thoughts, if not my prayers. I’ve mentioned it before in this book. It went something like: Wouldn’t it be interesting to have a near-death or clinical-death experience myself? Just die briefly, then be brought back to tell the story of a spectacular experience the Lord allowed. That would really give the book credibility!
The Lord has a sense of humor–I now have no doubt. The old adage, “Be careful what you wish for,” definitely applies.
The fact that I clinically died not once, but three times—on Good Friday, no less—was in that other place with the cheering young people, then was “resurrected,” in a manner of speaking, was the Lord making a statement, I’ve been shown.
The first thought to penetrate my realization while lying in the hospital bed was that the throng of beautiful, joyful, cheering young people that greeted me each time my heart stopped was–and is—the “cloud of witnesses” of Hebrews 12:1-3.
The second thing that pierced my spiritual understanding, several days later, was that the cheering that greeted me in that heavenly setting was approval of my writing and teaching Bible prophecy in these end of days. But it was burned deeply into my understanding that all of this cheering was affirmation from the Heavenly Father not just for me but for all of His children who believe and disseminate Bible prophecy in these last of the last days before His Son calls His Church to Himself (Revelation 4:1, as He promised [John 14:1–3]).
My commission, it was seared into my realization, is to pass along that God, through the cloud of witnesses I saw, was giving His nod of approval to His people for getting out His prophetic truth whenever and in whatever way opportunity is presented.
Later, over the weeks and months of recuperation, I’ve been given deeper understanding of those Good Friday glimpses of Glory.
My series of articles “Scanning a Fearful Future,” which concluded with the January 24, 2011 article, is key to the HeavenVision the Lord continues to impress upon my spiritual understanding. The articles were begun to, I prayerfully hoped, help allay the fears that were coming to my email inbox fast and furiously around the time when national and global economic collapse looked to be imminent.
The question in every email on the topic of the “coming economic collapse” was based upon a well-known TV pundit’s declaration that Americans could awaken on any morning and find that the world had changed completely. The US dollar would be no longer of any value. Worldwide depression would quickly bring changes that would, in its course, bring martial law and imprisonment for all who didn’t toe the mark of what Big Brother demanded.
I was prompted by the Holy Spirit to write the series, examining carefully what the Bible prophesies for the end of the age.
Most all emails at the time expressed fear that Christians in America would be put in FEMA internment camps—which were said to be proliferating around the country, according to many blogs and conspiracy-laden websites.
Would Christians in America face martyrdom–maybe even have to face the Antichrist regime? Maybe the pre-Trib Rapture view wasn’t prophetic truth after all. Maybe we were already in the Tribulation!
The series covered ten weeks, so there isn’t room in this section of the book to put all that was presented over the course of those articles. However, the bottom line in answer to the fear-filled emails was and is the following—the conclusion to which the series came.
Jesus Provides Answer
The series of articles, “Scanning a Fearful Future,” in examining truth about where the apparent building economic cataclysm will lead, and what will cause the world-shattering bubble to burst, brought me, in the final analysis, to the words of the greatest of all prophets–the Lord Jesus Christ.
“And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed” (Luke 17:26-30).
Another Gospel account expounds further upon Jesus’ prophecy about conditions that will be prevalent at the moment He next intervenes in human history.
“But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come” (Matthew 24:36-42).
The conclusion reached in the series–based upon the above prophecy by Jesus—was that there will be no catastrophic man-made or natural event that will throw the nation and world suddenly into the time of apocalyptic chaos. It will be Christ’s sudden call to His Church–His Bride—that will bring on God’s judgment.
It will be business as usual, according to Jesus’ words in this prophecy, with people buying, selling, building, marrying, etc., right up until the moment when born-again believers instantaneously go to be with their Lord, when He calls them in the Rapture.
Jesus could not have been prophesying about the time of His Second Advent (Revelation 19:11). At the time He returns, as Armageddon is raging in the valley of Megiddo, it will not be business as usual, as is indicated by Jesus’ words in Luke 17:26-30 and Matthew 24:36-42. At the time of Armageddon, as many as two-thirds of humanity will have been killed by the events of the Tribulation era (the last seven years of human history before Christ’s Second Coming).
I have had confirmed in my spirit through the cheering of the cloud of witnesses that what I wrote in “Scanning a Fearful Future” is the way things will unfold. The Lord of Heaven, Himself, is preventing the total collapse of the world economic system, as He is keeping all-out war from breaking out in the Middle East.
When Christ steps out on the clouds of Glory and shouts, “Come up here!” (Revelation 4:1), judgment will begin to fall upon America and the world that very day.
HeavenVision Afterthoughts…
Not long after Angie and I began writing this book, I was totally engrossed in listening to a television program. I don’t remember what the program was about; it was probably a ballgame of some sort. Out of seemingly nowhere, the inner voice spoke almost audibly.
“Terry, you remember praying all of those months, before the Good Friday experience, asking to have confirmed in your spirit that the pre-Trib view of the Rapture is the absolute truth from my Word? Well…what do you think that cheering group of youngsters was all about?”
It was all I could do to keep myself from leaping through the ceiling from my sitting position, even without any assistance from the Rapture experience! The epiphany was stunning! I could almost hear the smile of holy amusement in that revelation.
The next moment brought the humbling realization that the Lord of all creation would be so loving as to spend such an intimate moment with someone like me.
I was being cheered for teaching, specifically, the pre-Trib Rapture view. The pre-Tribulation Rapture, I was thus assured, is the true meaning of the Apostle Paul’s prophetic writing to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 15:51-55 and to the Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18.
Again came the prompting in my spirit that the cheering wasn’t for me alone but for all who hold to and teach and preach the pre-Trib Rapture in these final hours of the age.
Some time before that, another Holy Spirit epiphany had illuminated my spiritual understanding of my Good Friday visit to what I believe must have been somewhere near the portals of Heaven.
While standing before that throng of vibrant, cheering young people each time my heart stopped beating, one face stood out from among them. Her smile was wide, her face beaming with joy, while she was thrusting her arms upward as if celebrating victory at a sports event. On the third and last visit to that otherworldly place of stunning beauty and absolute peace, the young woman looked over at me while we were all running as if in a race, her hands raised in victory. She was laughing, her beautiful facial expression bursting with unbridled exultation.
That face was constantly with me for more than a month following the trip to that realm. The image never left my conscious thoughts. The identity of the young woman emerged suddenly into my mind at a rare moment when I wasn’t thinking about my near-death event.
While the last vestiges of my eyesight were in the process of fading to darkness, I had begun my first book of Bible prophecy. I called it Storming toward Armageddon. During that time, I became friends with an elderly woman who could no longer attend our church because she had reached the advanced stages of osteoporosis.
She was a great Christian lady who loved Bible prophecy, and she also was a very good poet. Many of her poems involved prophecy from God’s Word, as a matter of fact.
Additionally, she taught several classes of young women each week in her home. They would sit on the floor surrounding her while she taught the Bible studies.
We talked on a regular basis by phone, and I visited her at her home from time to time. She was excited about the fact that I was about to become an author of a prophecy book. I asked her if we could use one of her brief poems in that book. She readily agreed, and we put the poem at the beginning of Storming toward Armageddon. We also put her poems in my next two books, and she lived to see them in print.
My friend began to lose her ability to see, so we could commiserate over our mutual eye problems. Her health declined quickly, and she died before she lost her eyesight totally.
The Lord has confirmed in the deepest reaches of my spirit that the dynamic, joyfully cheering young woman of my visit to the outskirts of Glory, whose beautiful face continues to be etched in my mind’s eye, is Arbra Carman–my wonderful friend and Christian sister.
—Terry
The Most Popular View of the Rapture is Unbiblical
Today’s most popular view of the Rapture combines it with the Second Coming. Many who deny Jesus’ thousand-year reign on the earth must make it a part of Jesus’ end-of-the-age return to the earth to inaugurate the eternal state.
Those who believe that Jesus will come for His Church after a seven-year Tribulation also claim that the Rapture and Second Coming are the same event.
The Rapture is a biblical event that’s described in passages such as 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, 1 Corinthians 15:50-55, Titus 2:11-14, and Philippians 3:20-21, but is it possible to combine it with Jesus’ future return to the earth? No, it is not.
Those who say these two key events of biblical prophecy happen at the same time fail to recognize how Scripture distinguishes between the two.
The Timing of the Resurrection of the Dead
When Jesus appears to take us to glory, He will immediately raise the “dead in Christ.”
“For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first” (1 Thessalonians 4:15-16).
Please note the emphasis of verse 16; Jesus will “first” resurrect those who died as believers in Christ for salvation. Paul affirms, via a direct “word from the Lord,” that “the dead in Christ will rise first.” We also see this order of events presented in 1 Corinthians 15:51-53. The resurrection of the “dead in Christ” happens the instant Jesus appears.
With the Second Coming, we see something entirely different, as many events occur before Jesus raises the Tribulation saints from the dead. The world watches as He parades across the sky (Revelation 1:7), fights against the armies of the world and wipes them out (Zechariah 14:4), captures and destroys Antichrist and the False Prophet (Revelation 19:20), and sets up thrones. All these things happen during His return to earth and before He raises the dead Tribulation saints (Revelation 20:4).
At a minimum, several hours will transpire between the time Jesus first appears in the sky and the resurrection of the dead Tribulation saints. It may not even be the same day!
By itself, the sequence of the two resurrections convinces me that the Rapture and Second Coming are separate events, but there’s much more evidence that supports this conclusion.
Identifying Those Jesus Raises from the Dead
At the time of the Rapture, the Lord will raise the “dead in Christ” (1 Thessalonians 4:16). This includes all those who have put their trust in the Savior since the Day of Pentecost and have since died.
This is not, however, the group that John identifies in Revelation 20:4. He refers to them as “Tribulation saints” who make their appearance earlier in the book as those martyred because of their faith in Jesus (Revelation 6:9-11, 7:9-17). It’s this group that Jesus raises from the dead after His return to the earth.
Here’s the key difference: at the time of the Rapture, Jesus raises all the “dead in Christ.” After His Second Coming, He raises a subset of believers, those who “had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God” (20:4).
The identity of those whom Jesus brings back to life also tells us that the two events cannot be the same.
The Destination of the Saints
At the Rapture, we go to Heaven. Jesus made this clear when He introduced our expectation of His appearing in the Upper Room:
“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John 14:2-3).
In the above verses, He promises to take us to where He now resides; He doesn’t say He is coming to be where we dwell; He tells us that we will go to where He’s at in Heaven.
The words of Paul in Colossians 3:4 also reveal that Heaven will be our destination at the time of the Rapture: “When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” Glory is not a place on earth.
In all the numerous references to the Second Coming throughout Scripture, the destination is always planet Earth. The writers never mention a return to Heaven, such as we see in the texts concerning the Rapture. In all the accounts of Jesus’ return to the earth, the feet of all those alive remain earthbound.
The Presence of Sin During the Millennium
Those who combine the Rapture and Second Coming can’t reconcile this belief with how the Bible describes life in Jesus’ thousand-year reign. Scripture tells us that during the Millennium, people will continue to sin and, at the end of that period, rebel against the Lord. If everyone receives an incorruptible body at the Second Coming, these things become impossible.
If everyone receives incorruptible bodies at Jesus’ return to the earth, no one would refuse to participate in the Feast of Booths during Jesus’ reign, as described in Zechariah 14:16-19. No one would die during this time, as Isaiah tells us will happen during this time (Isaiah 65:20). Who would rebel at the end of Jesus’ reign if everyone enters His Kingdom without the ability to sin (Revelation 20:7-10)?
At the time of His appearing, Jesus will give all believers—whether alive or dead—glorified, gloriously transformed bodies (Philippians 3:20-21; 1 Corinthians 15:51-55). If we place this at Jesus’ Second Coming, no one would enter the millennial kingdom in natural bodies. That would make both sin and reproduction impossible during the thousand-year reign of Jesus, which negates what God’s Word tells us about His rule over the nations.
There are many other significant differences between the Rapture and Second Coming, but these suffice to negate the widespread belief that combines the two events. The contrasts between the two also confirm that there must be a significant period of time between the two events to allow for many to come to saving faith during the Tribulation, somehow survive, and enter the Millennium in their natural bodies.
These differences don’t by themselves verify a pre-Tribulation Rapture, but they tell us that there must be a significant amount of time between Jesus’ appearing and Second Coming. Other biblical texts confirm that it must happen before the seven-year Tribulation.
-Jonathan
