When my father passed on in 1994, I experienced a strange occurrence in his hospital ward as he lay on his bed. He ordered me to rush down the corridor and call Katakwe who had come to see him. He sounded so excited.
Saturday Dialogue with Ropafadzo Mapimhidze
When I ran to check on the man, there was nobody along that corridor. I asked the nurses at the reception whether they had seen someone who had gone past my father’s ward. They all shook their heads. That is when it dawned to me that the person he had seen died when we were young – in the 1970s. My dad unfortunately died hardly two weeks later after succumbing to prostate cancer.
While we may argue that the dead have no connection with the living, this incident really confused me. I asked many people about it, but no one gave me a satisfactory answer. In Christianity, the dead have absolutely no relationship with the living.
But we have heard of stories about dead doctors visiting hospital wards and administering medication that actually brought life to patients who were dying. I have also heard of countless similar stories that have no tangible explanation.
I found a story on a CNN website about CL Steve who said: “For those that experience it, a deathbed vision can be a miracle that carries a person though the transition of death.
“Throughout my years of working with the dying and the bereaved, I have noticed commonly shared experiences that remain beyond our ability to explain and fully understand. The first are visions. As the dying sees less of this world, some people appear to begin looking into the world to come. It’s not unusual for the dying to have visions, often of someone who has already passed on. Your loved one may tell you that his deceased father visited him last night, or your loved one might speak to his mom as if she were there in the room at that time.”
He added: “It was almost 15 years ago that I was sitting at the bedside of my teacher, Elisabeth Kübler Ross, when she turned to me and asked, ‘What do you think about the deceased visiting those on their deathbeds to greet them?’
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“I replied quickly, showing my knowledge back to her: ‘You’re speaking of deathbed visions, most likely caused by a lack of oxygen to the brain or a side effect of morphine.’ She looked at me and sighed: ‘It will come with maturity’.”
Steve says that when he started compiling examples to include in his book, Visions, Trips and Crowded Rooms: Who and What You See before You Die,’ he was surprised by how similar they were. In fact, it was hard to pick which ones to use because they were all so much alike.
Here are some of the few interesting and unexplainable items about deathbed visions: visions people experience at the end of life are remarkably similar, the dying are most often visited by their mothers, hands reaching upward to some unseen force are witnessed in many deathbed encounters, visions mostly occur toward a corner of the room, family members at a deathbed are not able to see the vision or participate in the conversation and visions usually occur hours to weeks before death.
A colleague in Texas, in the US, Shuka Mutape had this to say: “Many books have been written about the possibility to communicate with the spirit world. Is this okay and is this without danger? Many may feel that involvement with the spirit world is harmless, even beneficial.
“They may speak of so-called friendly ghosts or claim that spiritistic practices can lead to enlightenment, riches or happiness. This could not be further from the truth.
In Ecclesiastes 9:5, 6 and 10, the Bible says: “For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing . . . Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun . . . Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all you might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.”
But the people who see these visions are sometimes very strong Christians who are born again. I have also heard testimonies by people who died and were sent back to life again after being told by God that their mission on earth was not yet complete.
What explanation can we give to such visions or dreams? Feedback:[email protected]
