Heaven is for Real

I do not believe in God. This book did not change my mind. If anything, it only cemented the idea in me that people who do believe so strongly are completely unaware of the the realities around them.

I do not understand why the beginning of the book dealt with Todd Burpo's many ailments. It literally had nothing to do with the story and just made this somewhat short book feel hundreds of pages longer than it should have, but I kept going for surely there was a point to it. (There wasn't)

Where the book completely lost me is when the parents decide to make a three hour drive to their tiny town in Nebraska with a child who has been throwing up every half hour for at least 12 hours instead of taking him to a major metropolitan hospital. Because, why would they want good care for their child? God will heal him, right? Their cavalier attitude about their son's condition just kind of bothered me. They take him to this hometown hospital where the doctors completely miss a common and obvious diagnosis. Friends encourage them to take Colton to Colorado's Children's Hospital, but they don't want to go too far from their congregation. It's more important to them to be close to people who will pray from them instead of doctors who can heal them.

Over YEARS Colton starts revealing bits of how he went to heaven (despite never have clinically died) and saw his great-grandfather and dead sister as well as Jesus and other important religious figures. He describes what Jesus was wearing (white with a purple sash) and what he looked like (dark hair and a beard and really pretty eyes) and how he had marks on his hands. And somehow this is all stuff that a preacher's son wouldn't have known. How? The kid got bible stories as bedtime stories and went to Sunday school every Sunday. Added to that, the father would quiz them about things like ‘What is Good Friday?'

The thing is, everything this kid describes heaven to be is everything that every person imagines heaven to be. While I believe he thinks he went to heaven, I certainly don't believe any miracles happened here.