Chapter 21

Distressing NDEs — Hades, Demonic Deception, and What the Bible Really Teaches About Hell

Introduction: The Dark Side of Near-Death Experiences

We need to talk about something difficult. Throughout much of this book, we have explored the beautiful, awe-inspiring dimensions of near-death experiences — the brilliant light, the overwhelming love, the encounters with Jesus, the heavenly landscapes that leave experiencers forever changed. But there is another side to the NDE phenomenon. A darker side. And if we are going to be honest researchers and faithful Christians, we cannot look away from it.

A significant minority of people who come close to death — or who are clinically dead and then revived — report experiences that are not beautiful at all. They are terrifying. Some describe plunging into utter darkness. Others report encountering malevolent beings who mock, threaten, or torment them. Still others find themselves in landscapes of desolation — barren wastelands, pits of despair, realms of suffocating isolation. These are the distressing near-death experiences, and they are every bit as real and as vivid as the positive ones.

I want to be very clear at the outset: I do not take these experiences lightly. They represent some of the most profound suffering a human being can endure. When someone tells you they glimpsed what they believe was hell, they are not exaggerating for effect. The emotional and psychological impact of a distressing NDE can last for decades. Some experiencers develop post-traumatic stress. Others live in quiet terror, afraid to talk about what happened to them because they fear judgment from others — or because the memories are simply too painful to revisit.

So what do we make of these experiences? Are they genuine glimpses of the afterlife? Are they hallucinations produced by a dying brain? Are they demonic attacks? Are they warnings from God designed to prompt repentance? I believe the answer is more nuanced than any single explanation allows. In this chapter, I want to walk us through the research evidence on distressing NDEs, develop a comprehensive theological framework for understanding them, and show how they relate to the Bible's teaching about Hades, Gehenna, and the intermediate state. Along the way, we will discover something remarkable and counterintuitive: distressing NDEs, far from undermining the Christian faith, actually confirm it — and they often produce some of the most dramatic spiritual transformations on record.

What the Research Tells Us About Distressing NDEs

Before we develop a theological framework, we need to look carefully at what researchers have actually found. Several major scholars have studied distressing NDEs in depth, and their findings give us an essential foundation to build on.

Nancy Evans Bush: The Definitive Scholarly Treatment

Nancy Evans Bush is the foremost authority on distressing NDEs. Her book Dancing Past the Dark (2012) remains the definitive scholarly treatment of the subject. Bush herself had a distressing NDE, which gives her work a personal dimension that purely academic treatments lack. She experienced beings who heckled and mocked her, telling her authoritatively that nothing was real — that her life, the world, everything had been a cruel joke. The experience was devastating.¹

From her extensive research, Bush identifies three major types of distressing NDEs:

The first type is what she calls the inverse NDE. This has the same basic features as a positive NDE — leaving the body, moving through a tunnel, seeing a light, encountering beings — but the entire experience is terrifying rather than peaceful. The same elements that produce awe and comfort in a positive NDE produce fear and panic in this type. It is as if the experiencer is seeing the same reality but responding to it with dread instead of peace.²

The second type is the void — an experience of dark emptiness, isolation, and nothingness. People who have this type of NDE describe floating in an infinite blackness with no sensation, no contact, no presence. It is not violent or painful — it is the absence of everything. Some describe it as an eternal nothingness that feels worse than any active torment could. The loneliness is absolute.³

The third type is the hellish NDE — the kind that most people think of when they hear the phrase "distressing NDE." This involves fire, darkness, torment, and encounters with demonic beings. People report scorched landscapes, pits of flame, creatures that mock and attack, and overwhelming sensations of dread and despair.⁴

Bush's research reveals something else that is crucial for our purposes. She found that the long-term outcome of distressing NDEs is overwhelmingly one of seeking. People who have distressing NDEs do not, as a rule, sink into permanent despair. Instead, they begin searching — searching for God, searching for meaning, searching for spiritual truth. The experience shakes them so deeply that they cannot go back to their old way of living. They have to find answers. And many of them find those answers in a relationship with God.⁵

Barbara Rommer: Blessing in Disguise

Dr. Barbara Rommer's Blessing in Disguise (2000) provides another critical window into distressing NDEs. Rommer, a physician, studied dozens of people who had frightening experiences during clinical death. What she found confirmed and extended Bush's work. Her title says it all — distressing NDEs are often, paradoxically, a blessing in disguise.⁶

Rommer identifies four distinct types of distressing NDEs, which overlap with but expand upon Bush's categories:

Her first category is what she calls misinterpreted positive NDEs. In these cases, the experience itself was not actually negative — it had the same elements as a positive NDE. But the person was so frightened by the unfamiliarity of what was happening — leaving their body, rushing through a tunnel, seeing a blinding light — that they experienced the whole thing as terrifying. Fear of the unknown turned a beautiful experience into a frightening one.⁷

Her second category is the void — similar to Bush's second type. Her third category involves hellish landscapes. And her fourth involves explicitly demonic elements — encounters with beings that are clearly malevolent, deceptive, and intent on tormenting or misleading the experiencer.⁸

Like Bush, Rommer found that the long-term outcomes of distressing NDEs were overwhelmingly positive. Experiencers reported profound spiritual transformation, repentance, a thirst for knowledge about God, and dramatic life changes. Many became deeply committed to spiritual seeking. Some became Christians. The distressing experience, as painful as it was, became the catalyst for the most important transformation of their lives.⁹

Maurice Rawlings: The Forgotten Distressing NDEs

Dr. Maurice Rawlings, a Christian cardiologist, was one of the first researchers to draw serious attention to distressing NDEs. His books Beyond Death's Door (1978) and To Hell and Back (1993) made a provocative claim: many more people have distressing NDEs than the research literature suggests, because these experiences are rapidly suppressed by the mind.¹⁰

Rawlings' argument was based on his own clinical experience. As a cardiologist who resuscitated patients from cardiac arrest, he sometimes interviewed patients immediately after reviving them — within minutes of the event. In those immediate interviews, he found that distressing experiences were far more common than researchers who interviewed patients days or weeks later would have guessed. Rawlings argued that about half of the NDEs reported immediately after resuscitation contained hellish elements — but that many of these were forgotten or suppressed within hours or days.¹¹

Now, I should note that Rawlings' methodology has been questioned by some researchers. His claim of a 50% rate of distressing NDEs is significantly higher than what other studies have found. The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences reports that twelve different studies involving 1,369 subjects found that roughly 23 percent reported NDEs ranging from disturbing to terrifying or despairing.¹² Jeffrey Long's NDERF data suggests that approximately 1 percent of NDEs shared with the database are hellish, though Long acknowledges that shame and the fear of negative judgment likely cause underreporting.¹³ The actual incidence probably lies somewhere between these figures. But Rawlings' core insight — that distressing NDEs may be underreported because people suppress or forget them — is widely accepted as having merit.

J. Steve Miller's Treatment

Miller provides both research data and a rich theological framework for understanding distressing NDEs across several chapters of Is Christianity Compatible with Deathbed and Near-Death Experiences? He carefully catalogues the range of distressing NDE reports and notes how they align with biblical descriptions of the afterlife for the unrighteous. Miller observes that both positive and negative NDEs should lead to seeking God and doing good — that even the dark experiences, when rightly understood, point people toward the same God of love who appears in the positive ones.¹⁴

Miller also presents the specific content of distressing NDEs and compares them to biblical descriptions. Researcher Margot Grey describes the common features of distressing NDEs: extreme fear or panic, emotional and mental anguish, a great sense of desolation, the brink of a pit or the edge of an abyss, a sense of being dragged down by an evil force, visions of wrathful or demonic creatures, intense cold or unbearable heat, sounds resembling the wailing of tormented souls, and fearsome noises.¹⁵ Miller notes that none of these descriptions are inconsistent with the biblical teaching about Hades and judgment, since the Bible's descriptions are themselves varied and selective.¹⁶

What NDErs Actually Report

Before we move to theological analysis, let us hear from a few NDErs themselves, because their words bring the research to life in ways that statistics cannot. Miller catalogues several accounts from Bush's research and other sources:

One experiencer reported entering a dark, dreary area filled with what appeared to be lost souls — hundreds of them — shuffling, moaning, looking downward, utterly dejected.¹⁷

Another described arriving at a place of darkness with fire, what the person called "outer darkness," insisting it was as real as anything they had ever encountered in life.¹⁸

A third described a cold, dark, watery descent, arriving at what resembled a cave entrance, hearing cries, wails, moans, and the gnashing of teeth.¹⁹

A nurse who attempted suicide reported encountering terrifying creatures — horrible beings with ugly, twisted teeth and bulging eyes, dozens of them swarming all around her in the darkness. She later reflected that although she had never believed in hell before, she now believed in it absolutely.²⁰

These accounts — and there are many more like them — describe a place where the deceased are living conscious, miserable lives in dreary settings. This underscores the biblical teaching that life continues after death for both the righteous and the unrighteous, with the experience being either bliss or misery.²¹

Are Distressing NDEs Real Encounters with the Other Side?

This is a question we need to face honestly. Not everyone agrees that distressing NDEs represent genuine glimpses of the afterlife. Several hypotheses have been proposed, and we should examine them fairly before developing our own framework.

Hypothesis 1: Distressing NDEs are merely hallucinations caused by guilt or fear. Some researchers, including P. M. H. Atwater, have suggested that distressing NDEs are typically experienced by those who have deeply suppressed or repressed guilt, fears, and angers, or who expect punishment after death.²² Against this, Bush offers a devastating response: a century of psychology indicates that virtually everyone has deeply suppressed guilt, fear, and anger. Since Atwater did not compare a control group of positive NDErs — asking whether they too had suppressed guilt — she lacked sufficient evidence to support her claim. Moreover, many people who expect judgment report blissful NDEs, and many who expect nothing at all report distressing ones. The expectation hypothesis simply does not hold up.²³

Hypothesis 2: They are hallucinations caused by physical distress. While triggers like oxygen deprivation (anoxia) have been examined in the general NDE literature, these physiological explanations have been largely ruled out as adequate explanations for NDEs — positive or negative. As we discussed in earlier chapters (see Chapter 3 on methodology and Appendix B on naturalistic explanations), the veridical elements of many NDEs — including verified observations made while clinically dead — cannot be explained by brain chemistry alone. If positive NDEs are not hallucinations, then distressing NDEs are unlikely to be hallucinations either.

Hypothesis 3: They represent genuine spiritual encounters. I believe, along with Miller, Bush, and many other researchers, that at least some distressing NDEs represent genuine encounters with aspects of the spiritual realm — specifically, with the intermediate state of separation from God that the Bible calls Hades. But I also believe that not all distressing NDEs have the same explanation. Some may involve genuine glimpses of Hades. Some may involve demonic interference. Some may be God's warning to prompt repentance. And some — as Rommer's research demonstrates — may be positive experiences that the person misinterpreted as negative because of fear and unfamiliarity. We need a theological framework capacious enough to account for all of these possibilities.

A Theological Framework for Understanding Distressing NDEs

Now we come to the heart of this chapter. How should Christians understand distressing NDEs? I want to propose a four-part theological framework that I believe accounts for the evidence while remaining faithful to Scripture.

Part One: Hades, Not Gehenna — The Critical Distinction

This is perhaps the single most important theological point in this entire chapter, and I want to make it as clear as I possibly can: distressing NDEs correspond to Hades — the intermediate state of the unrighteous dead — not to Gehenna, the final Lake of Fire.

As we explored in detail in Chapter 19's treatment of the afterlife geography, the Bible distinguishes sharply between Hades (ᾅδης, Hadēs) and Gehenna (γέεννα, Geenna). These are not the same place, and confusing them leads to serious theological errors. Hades is the temporary intermediate state where the unrighteous dead await the final judgment. Gehenna — the Lake of Fire — is the final state that comes into existence only after the last judgment. The final judgment has not yet occurred. Therefore, no one currently experiences Gehenna. Not yet.

The key text here is Revelation 20:11–15, which this chapter is tasked with examining in depth. Let us look at it carefully:

"Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." (Revelation 20:11–15, ESV)

Let us unpack the Greek terminology here. The word Hadēs (ᾅδης) in the New Testament corresponds to the Hebrew Sheol (שְׁאוֹל) in the Old Testament. As we explored in Chapter 19, Sheol in the earlier Old Testament texts was the general abode of all the dead. By the intertestamental period and into the New Testament, a distinction had developed: the righteous dead go to Paradise (also called Abraham's Bosom), while the unrighteous dead go to the unpleasant side of Hades. Luke 16:19–31, the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (discussed in depth in Chapter 19), illustrates this two-part intermediate state vividly: Lazarus rests in comfort in Abraham's bosom, while the rich man is in Hades, in torment, separated by a great chasm.²⁴

The word Geenna (γέεννα) is entirely different. It derives from the Hebrew Gē-Hinnōm (גֵּי הִנֹּם), the Valley of Hinnom — a ravine south of Jerusalem where, in ancient times, children were sacrificed to the pagan god Molech (2 Kings 23:10; Jeremiah 7:31–32). By Jesus' day, it had become a symbol of divine judgment and destruction. Jesus uses Geenna as the term for final, eschatological punishment — a reality so terrible that it is worth any sacrifice to avoid it: "And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to Gehenna, to the unquenchable fire" (Mark 9:43, ESV).²⁵

Why does this distinction matter so much for understanding distressing NDEs? Because it means that no one who has a distressing NDE is visiting the final hell. The final judgment has not happened yet. The Lake of Fire does not yet contain anyone. What distressing NDErs encounter — if their experiences are genuine glimpses of the spiritual realm — is Hades: the temporary intermediate state of separation from God. This state is real, and it is genuinely unpleasant. It involves conscious awareness, suffering, and separation from God's blessing. But it is not final. It is not the last word. The final judgment is still future.

This is enormously important for pastoral ministry. When someone reports a distressing NDE, we do not need to tell them, "You visited the eternal Lake of Fire and you are damned forever." We can tell them something much more biblical and much more hopeful: "You caught a glimpse of the intermediate state — a real place of separation from God. But you are still alive. You have come back. And the God who allowed you to see that place is the same God who stands ready to receive you, forgive you, and give you life. The final judgment is still ahead, and you still have the opportunity to turn to Christ."

As Miller observes, distressing NDEs do not reveal people's final destiny — they reveal a present reality in the spiritual realm that serves as a wake-up call. The person has been sent back. They have not died their final death. Whatever they saw, they saw it as visitors who were given a glimpse — not as permanent residents.²⁶

Part Two: Demonic Hijacking

Not all distressing elements in NDEs necessarily reflect a genuine encounter with Hades. Some may be the result of demonic interference — what Shaun Tabatt, in The NDE Conspiracy, calls Satan's "hijacking strategy."²⁷

Tabatt's argument is straightforward and biblically grounded. Satan's consistent strategy, from the Garden of Eden to the present day, is to take what God intends for good and twist it for deception. In Genesis 3, God had given Adam and Eve a clear command. The serpent did not deny God's existence or even deny that God had spoken — he simply twisted God's words: "Did God actually say...?" (Genesis 3:1). Satan took truth and subtly distorted it — just enough to deceive, not so much that the deception would be obvious.²⁸

If God is using NDEs to reveal Himself to people and draw them toward repentance and faith — and I believe the evidence strongly suggests that He is — then we should fully expect Satan to attempt to corrupt this channel. As Tabatt writes, Satan's goal is to hijack these experiences to lead people away from God. He does this by introducing fear, confusion, false theology, and terrifying encounters into what might otherwise be genuine spiritual experiences.²⁹

The case of Bryan Melvin illustrates this vividly, though it is treated in greater detail in Chapter 25 where Tabatt's full discernment framework is developed. Melvin, during his NDE, was greeted by what appeared to be a welcoming committee — beings who seemed friendly and inviting. But something was wrong. The welcome felt too scripted, too polished. Melvin discerned that these beings were not what they appeared to be. They were demonic imposters, masquerading as benevolent guides in order to deceive and ultimately harm him.³⁰

The Bible explicitly warns us about this kind of deception. As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 11:14: "And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light" (ESV). If Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light in positive-seeming NDEs (a concern we address in detail in Chapter 25), he can also disguise himself in negative ones — appearing as a terrifying tormentor when his real goal is not punishment but deception, not justice but despair. The point of such demonic interference would be to crush the experiencer's hope, drive them away from God, or leave them so traumatized that they never seek spiritual truth again.

However, as we will see in the next section, the fact that distressing NDEs consistently produce positive transformation — repentance, conversion, spiritual seeking — suggests that even when demonic interference is involved, God remains sovereign. Satan may intend the experience for evil, but God uses it for good (cf. Genesis 50:20).

Part Three: Not All Distressing NDEs Have the Same Cause

One of the most important things I want to emphasize in this chapter is that we must resist the temptation to offer a single, neat explanation for all distressing NDEs. The evidence will not support it. There appear to be at least four distinct causes — and in any given distressing NDE, more than one may be operative simultaneously.

First, some distressing NDEs may be genuine glimpses of Hades — the intermediate state of separation from God. When someone dies without being in a right relationship with God, the soul enters a state of separation from God's blessing. This is not annihilation. It is not unconsciousness. It is conscious existence without the life-giving presence of God. And if an NDEr catches a glimpse of this reality, we would expect it to be deeply distressing — because separation from the source of all goodness, all love, and all light is inherently terrible.

Second, some distressing elements may involve demonic interference. As we just discussed, Satan has both the motive and the ability to corrupt genuine spiritual experiences. Encounters with mocking, tormenting, or deceptive beings may reflect demonic activity rather than the character of the place itself.

Third, some distressing NDEs may be God's warning to prompt repentance and spiritual change. This is not the same as punishment. A warning is an act of love — it says, "Look at what is ahead if you continue on your current path. Turn back. There is still time." The fact that so many distressing NDErs respond with repentance and conversion suggests that this is precisely how many of them function. They are wake-up calls from a God who loves the person too much to let them sleepwalk toward destruction.

Fourth, some distressing NDEs may be the result of the NDEr's own fear and resistance to the experience. This is Rommer's "misinterpreted positive NDE" category. Some people are so frightened by the unfamiliarity of leaving their body, rushing through a tunnel, or encountering a blinding light that they experience what would otherwise be a beautiful encounter as a terrifying one. The experience itself is not negative — but the person's response to it is. As Bush notes, the inverse NDE contains the same elements as a positive NDE but experienced as terrifying rather than comforting.³¹

Each distressing NDE must be evaluated individually. There is no one-size-fits-all explanation. This requires discernment — the same kind of discernment we discuss in detail in Chapter 29's biblical evaluation framework.

Part Four: The Paradox of Positive Outcomes from Distressing NDEs

Here we come to what I consider one of the most remarkable and counterintuitive findings in the entire NDE literature. If distressing NDEs were purely demonic, purely destructive, purely evil — then we would expect them to produce consistently negative outcomes. We would expect experiencers to spiral into despair, to become hardened against God, to retreat into nihilism or self-destruction.

But that is not what the research shows. Not even close.

The research consistently shows that distressing NDEs produce profound positive transformation — repentance, conversion, spiritual seeking, moral transformation, and an intensified desire to know God. Rommer documents case after case of people whose distressing NDEs became the turning point in their lives.³² Bush emphasizes that seeking is the primary long-term outcome of distressing NDEs — not despair, but an urgent, relentless search for truth and for God.³³ Miller notes that both positive and negative NDEs should lead to seeking God and doing good — and the evidence confirms that they do.³⁴

Think about what this means. If distressing NDEs were purely the work of Satan, they would not consistently lead people to repentance and faith. Satan does not produce genuine conversion. Satan does not inspire people to cry out to Jesus and then actually find Him. What we see in the outcomes of distressing NDEs is the fingerprint of a sovereign God who can take even the darkest experience and redeem it for good.

Howard Storm: A Case Study in Distressing NDEs and Divine Rescue

No discussion of distressing NDEs would be complete without the story of Howard Storm. His case is one of the most dramatic and well-documented in the literature, and it belongs in this chapter because it illustrates virtually every element of our theological framework.

Howard Storm was a committed atheist and an art professor — chairman of the art department at Northern Kentucky University. He had no use for God, no interest in religion, and no expectation of an afterlife. In June 1985, while leading a study tour in Paris, France, Storm suffered a perforation of the duodenum and was rushed to the hospital in excruciating pain. When it became clear that he was dying, something extraordinary happened.³⁵

Storm found himself separating from his body. He could see his wife and the hospital room, but he was no longer in his physical body. Then he heard voices calling to him from the hallway — friendly, inviting voices that said, "Come with us. We've been waiting for you." Storm followed them. The beings led him farther and farther from the hospital room, down a hallway that grew progressively darker.

As the darkness deepened, the beings' demeanor changed. They became menacing. They began to taunt him, push him, claw at him. What had appeared to be a welcoming committee turned into a mob of malevolent creatures. Storm describes being attacked, torn at, and bitten by these beings in a nightmarish scene of escalating violence. The pain was intense. The terror was absolute.³⁶

Storm lay on the ground in this darkness, broken and despairing, surrounded by malevolent beings. And then, from somewhere deep within his memory — from a Sunday school he had attended as a very small child, decades earlier — a fragment of a song surfaced: "Jesus loves me, this I know..." Storm, the committed atheist, the man who had mocked religion his entire adult life, found himself whispering a prayer. "Jesus, save me."³⁷

What happened next transformed him forever. A pinpoint of light appeared in the darkness and expanded rapidly. A being of overwhelming light and love approached him — and Storm knew it was Jesus. The malevolent beings fled in terror. Jesus reached down and picked Storm up, embracing him like a parent comforting a terrified child. Storm describes Jesus rubbing his back, radiating pure love, communicating without words that he was safe now. Storm wept with relief and joy.³⁸

Jesus carried Storm upward, ascending through space at tremendous speed toward a vast center of light in the distance — a world of light that Storm understood to be heaven, what he described as "God's house." But Storm, overwhelmed with shame as he remembered all the years he had scoffed at God and used His name as a curse, felt too unworthy to approach. "I am a terrible piece of garbage," he thought. "They should put me back where I belong." Jesus responded directly to his thoughts: "We don't make mistakes. You belong here."³⁹

Storm was given a life review, experienced the overwhelming love of God, and was eventually told that he needed to go back. He did not want to return. But he was sent back to his body, revived miraculously after the doctors had given him up, and over the following years, this avowed atheist professor left his tenured position, entered seminary, and was ordained as a pastor. He spent the rest of his career ministering to others — including many people who had their own distressing NDEs and needed someone who understood.⁴⁰

Can Christians Have Distressing NDEs?

This is a question that troubles many believers, and we need to address it directly. The short answer is: yes, some Christians have reported distressing elements in their NDEs. And this does not mean they are unsaved.

Sabom, in his Atlanta Study, found that the religious background of people who had distressing NDEs showed no obvious pattern. Among nine experiencers in one major study, there was a mix of Protestants, someone with no religious background, a Jew, and a Unitarian background. "In other words," Sabom observed, "there appeared to be no obvious relationship between religion and 'hell.'"⁴¹

This finding is consistent with what the Bible teaches about the spiritual life of believers. Faithful Christians are not immune to spiritual attacks. Consider the evidence from Scripture:

The apostle Paul — who wrote more of the New Testament than any other author, who was caught up to the third heaven and received visions of surpassing greatness — also had what he called "a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me" (2 Corinthians 12:7, ESV). Notice the language: a messenger of Satan. One of the most faithful Christians who ever lived was attacked by demonic forces, with God's permission.⁴²

Job was a man whom God Himself called "blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil" (Job 1:8, ESV). Yet God permitted Satan to attack him with devastating losses, physical agony, and psychological torment. Job's suffering was not evidence that he was unsaved — it was evidence that the spiritual realm is complex and that God sometimes permits trials for reasons we do not fully understand.

Jesus Himself experienced profound anguish. In Gethsemane, Mark tells us that Jesus "began to be greatly distressed and troubled" (Mark 14:33, ESV). The Greek here is striking — ekthambeisthai (ἐκθαμβεῖσθαι) and adēmonein (ἀδημονεῖν) — words that convey shock, alarm, and deep mental distress. If the incarnate Son of God experienced this level of anguish, we cannot assume that a distressing spiritual experience automatically reveals the spiritual condition of the person experiencing it.⁴³

A distressing NDE experienced by a Christian may be a spiritual test, a demonic attack, or a deepening of faith through adversity. It may also — and this is important — be something the person misinterprets. An overwhelming encounter with the holiness of God might initially be experienced as terrifying by a believer who suddenly becomes acutely aware of their own sinfulness. Isaiah's response to seeing God in the temple was not peaceful comfort — it was "Woe is me! For I am lost" (Isaiah 6:5, ESV). The experience of God's holiness can be simultaneously beautiful and terrifying.

Do NDE Descriptions Match Biblical Descriptions of Hell and Hades?

Let us now address a question that many readers will be asking: do the things that distressing NDErs report actually match what the Bible describes? The answer is both yes and no — and the nuance is important.

Some NDErs report fire. This is consistent with several biblical passages. Mark 9:43–48 describes Gehenna as a place where "the fire is not quenched." Luke 16:23–24 portrays the rich man in Hades, in torment, asking for water because "I am in anguish in this flame." Matthew 13:42 speaks of a "furnace of fire." Sabom documented a case from his Atlanta Study in which a patient named Beau reported going to a place that was "hot" and "uncomfortable," which seemed "lower down."⁴⁴

Others report darkness and isolation. This is consistent with the biblical imagery of "outer darkness" (Matthew 8:12; 22:13; 25:30) and separation from the presence of the Lord (2 Thessalonians 1:9). Bush's "void" category — the experience of infinite blackness with no sensation, no contact, no presence — corresponds strikingly to the concept of separation from God, who is the source of all light and life.

Still others report encountering demonic beings — malevolent creatures that mock, taunt, attack, or deceive. This is consistent with the Bible's teaching on spiritual warfare and the reality of demonic forces. Miller notes that reports of evil sentient beings are so common in distressing NDEs that some researchers include them in their very definitions of negative NDEs.⁴⁵

However, the correspondence between NDE descriptions and biblical descriptions is suggestive rather than exact. Not every distressing NDE includes all the elements the Bible describes. Some include elements the Bible does not specifically mention — the cold, the watery descent, the cave-like entrance. Should this concern us?

I do not think so, and here is why. As Miller observes, the Bible never claims to give a complete, exhaustive, literal picture of every aspect of the afterlife for the unrighteous.⁴⁶ The biblical descriptions are themselves varied and, in many cases, likely figurative. Consider the range of descriptions Scripture offers for the destiny of the unrighteous: outer darkness (Matthew 8:12), unquenchable fire (Matthew 3:12), a furnace of fire (Matthew 13:42), separation from the presence of the Lord (2 Thessalonians 1:9), a bottomless pit (Revelation 9:1), a lake of fire and brimstone (Revelation 19:20), and outside the gates of the New Jerusalem (Revelation 22:15).

Where are the wicked? In fire that should generate light — or in outer darkness where there is no light? In a lake — or a pit? These descriptions are not easily harmonized if taken with wooden literalism. As Miller points out, this is why many theologians — both conservative and liberal — understand at least some of these descriptions as symbolic or figurative. They are communicating something real and terrible, but they are doing so through metaphor and imagery, not through precise topographical description.⁴⁷

This means we should not expect NDE descriptions to match biblical descriptions with photographic precision. What we should expect — and what we find — is a general correspondence: distressing NDEs describe a reality that is characterized by separation from God, darkness, suffering, and sometimes the presence of malevolent beings. This corresponds well to the biblical picture of Hades as a place of conscious, unpleasant existence apart from God's blessing.

The Significance of Revelation 20:11–15 for Understanding Distressing NDEs

Since this chapter has primary ownership of Revelation 20:11–15, I want to give this passage the careful exegetical attention it deserves, because it is foundational to our entire understanding of how distressing NDEs relate to biblical eschatology.

The passage describes what theologians call the "great white throne judgment" — the final, universal judgment of all the dead. The Greek phrase thronon megan leukon (θρόνον μέγαν λευκόν) emphasizes both the majesty and the purity of this judgment. The throne is "great" (megas, μέγας) — this is no ordinary courtroom. And it is "white" (leukos, λευκός) — symbolizing absolute holiness, purity, and impartiality. The one seated on the throne is so majestic that "earth and sky fled away" from His presence (v. 11).⁴⁸

Verse 12 tells us that "books were opened" — records of human deeds — and another book, "the book of life," was also opened. The dead are judged "by what was written in the books, according to what they had done." This is a universal judgment: "the dead, great and small" stand before the throne. No one is exempt.

Then comes verse 13, which is critical for our purposes: "And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them." Notice: Death and Hades give up their dead. The Greek verb edōkan (ἔδωκαν), from didōmi (δίδωμι), means "to give, to hand over, to deliver." Hades does not retain its inhabitants forever. It is a holding place, a waiting room, a temporary state. At the final judgment, Hades releases its occupants so they can stand before the throne of God.

Verse 14 drives the point home: "Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire." Death and Hades are themselves destroyed — cast into the Lake of Fire, which John identifies as "the second death." Hades is not the final state. Hades itself comes to an end. It is a temporary holding place that ceases to exist after the final judgment.

Verse 15 then describes the fate of those whose names are not in the book of life: "And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." The Lake of Fire — Gehenna — is the final state. It is what comes after Hades, after the judgment, after Hades itself has been emptied and destroyed.

The implications for understanding distressing NDEs are profound:

First, no distressing NDEr has visited the Lake of Fire, because the Lake of Fire does not yet exist in its eschatological fullness. Whatever distressing NDErs encounter, it is Hades — the intermediate state — not the final hell.

Second, Hades is temporary. It has an end point. It will be emptied at the great white throne judgment. This means that the suffering of the unrighteous dead in Hades, while real and terrible, is not their eternal destiny. Their eternal destiny will be determined at the final judgment.

Third — and this connects to the author's theological convictions about postmortem opportunity — the fact that Hades is temporary opens a profound question: is it possible that during this temporary intermediate state, some of the dead encounter Christ and respond to Him? As we explore in Chapter 23, there are biblical hints that Christ Himself was active in the intermediate realm after His death (1 Peter 3:18–20; 4:6; Ephesians 4:8–10). If Christ preached to the dead, was it merely to announce their condemnation — or was it an offer of salvation? I believe the evidence supports the latter, but that discussion belongs in Chapter 23. For now, the key point is this: the temporary nature of Hades, confirmed by Revelation 20:13–14, means that the situation of those currently in Hades is not yet final.⁴⁹

Counterarguments and Responses

As with any significant theological claim, there are important counterarguments we need to address honestly. Let me engage several of the most serious ones.

Counterargument 1: "Distressing NDEs prove that all NDEs are hallucinations"

Some skeptics argue that the existence of distressing NDEs undermines the credibility of all NDEs. If NDEs can be negative, they reason, then the positive ones are just as likely to be brain-generated hallucinations as the negative ones. This is a version of the broader skeptical argument treated in Appendix B.

The response is straightforward. The existence of both positive and negative NDEs does not undermine their credibility — it actually enhances it. If all NDEs were mere wish-fulfillment or dying-brain hallucinations, we would expect them to be overwhelmingly positive, reflecting the nearly universal human desire for a pleasant afterlife. The fact that a significant minority are deeply distressing — and that these distressing experiences have the same hyper-real quality as positive ones — suggests that NDErs are encountering something real, not generating pleasant fantasies. Reality includes both pleasant and unpleasant dimensions. An afterlife that includes both beauty and danger is exactly what the Bible describes.

Counterargument 2: "If God is loving, why would anyone experience Hades?"

This is a variation of the classic problem of evil, applied specifically to distressing NDEs. Why would a loving God allow anyone to experience separation from Himself?

I believe the answer involves both divine love and human freedom. God does not force anyone into His presence. Love, by its very nature, requires the freedom to choose — including the freedom to choose rejection. C. S. Lewis famously wrote that the doors of hell are locked from the inside — that the people in hell are there because they have chosen to be there, preferring their own will to God's.⁵⁰ Hades, in this framework, is not a place where God actively torments people. It is a place where people experience the natural consequence of separation from the source of all goodness, all beauty, all joy, and all light. If you remove yourself from the sun, you experience darkness. If you remove yourself from God, you experience the absence of everything He provides.

At the same time — and this is crucial — the Bible presents Hades as temporary. It is not God's final word. As Revelation 20:13–14 makes clear, Hades will be emptied. The dead who are in Hades will stand before the throne. Their final destiny has not yet been decided. And as we explore in Chapter 23, I believe there are strong biblical reasons to think that even in Hades, the mercy and opportunity of God may still be available.

Counterargument 3: "Distressing NDEs are all demonic"

Some Christians, particularly those who are suspicious of all NDE phenomena, argue that distressing NDEs are entirely the work of demons — designed to frighten, deceive, and ultimately lead people away from God.

As we discussed earlier, demonic involvement in some distressing NDEs is entirely plausible and biblically supported. But the claim that all distressing NDEs are demonic fails for a simple reason: consistently demonic activity does not consistently produce genuine repentance, conversion, and deep Christian faith. If Satan is behind every distressing NDE, he is remarkably bad at his job — because his work keeps producing passionate followers of Jesus. Howard Storm became a pastor. Countless others turned to Christ. Bush and Rommer both document case after case of distressing NDErs who emerged with a deeper, more serious faith than they had before. This is not what demonic activity looks like. This is what divine warning looks like — painful, yes, but ultimately redemptive.

Counterargument 4: "Distressing NDEs contradict the Bible because the details don't match"

As we addressed above, some people expect distressing NDEs to match biblical descriptions of hell with precise, literal correspondence. When they do not find a classic lake of fire in every account, they conclude that either the NDEs or the Bible must be wrong.

This argument fails on both ends. It misunderstands the Bible, which presents varied and likely figurative descriptions of the afterlife for the unrighteous. And it misunderstands NDEs, which represent glimpses of the intermediate state (Hades), not the final state (Gehenna). We should expect general correspondence, not photographic precision. And general correspondence is exactly what we find.⁵¹

Sabom's Atlanta Study: Distressing NDEs in Clinical Context

Michael Sabom's Atlanta Study provides valuable clinical context for our discussion. While the study found relatively few distressing NDEs — consistent with the general finding that they represent a minority of all NDE reports — the cases he did document are illuminating.⁵²

One case involved a man named Jake, a wheelchair-bound veteran who had attempted suicide by overdosing on Quaaludes. During his NDE, Jake found himself in a place he described as hell — a valley of scorched earth, with demons like those in a Bosch painting, vapor rising from the ground, an overcast sky. The demons made fun of him, kicked him, tormented him. He felt awful — depressed and miserable beyond anything he had experienced in life. Then, in the background, there was chain lightning, and God spoke to him: "You could have had anything you wanted — you threw it away." Jake fell to his knees and prayed, begging for forgiveness, begging to live. Suddenly he came to, vomiting the pills he had taken.⁵³

Another case involved a man named Beau, a retired grocery store owner who collapsed from a cardiac event. Beau initially went to what he called "hell" — a hot, uncomfortable place. But then guardian angels arrived and told him there had been a "mistake" — he was going to "move up." They guided him upward, and he eventually encountered his deceased father and experienced a much more positive realm.⁵⁴

These cases from Sabom illustrate several features of our framework. In Jake's case, the distressing NDE functioned as a divine warning — God spoke to him directly, and Jake responded with repentance. In Beau's case, the movement from a distressing realm to a positive one suggests the complexity of the intermediate state and the possibility of transition within it. Both cases resulted in positive spiritual outcomes.

The Frequency Question: How Common Are Distressing NDEs?

The question of how common distressing NDEs are is important but difficult to answer precisely. As we noted earlier, estimates vary widely. Long reports that about 1 percent of NDEs shared with the NDERF database are hellish, though he acknowledges significant underreporting.⁵⁵ The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences reports that twelve studies involving 1,369 subjects found about 23 percent ranging from disturbing to terrifying.⁵⁶ Rawlings claimed a much higher rate when patients were interviewed immediately after resuscitation.⁵⁷

Long offers an important methodological observation. Many frightening NDEs are not actually hellish — they are frightening for reasons other than hellish content. Some people are frightened by the OBE itself, or by the tunnel, or by the unfamiliarity of the experience. The truly hellish NDE — featuring demonic beings, landscapes of torment, and overwhelming dread — is rarer than the broader category of "frightening" NDEs. Long also notes that experiences involving unexpected alterations of consciousness that are not NDEs — such as ICU psychosis or drug reactions — are much more likely to be frightening. Some people who report frightening experiences may not have had NDEs at all.⁵⁸

What is clear from the research is that distressing NDEs are real, they are a genuine minority of the overall NDE phenomenon, and they are likely underreported because of shame and fear. Van Lommel notes that many who experience hellish NDEs never come forward because shame and guilt prevent them from sharing.⁵⁹

Burke's Pastoral Perspective

John Burke, in Imagine Heaven, approaches distressing NDEs with the heart of a pastor. He notes that researchers have found negative NDEs are just as real as pleasant ones and can occur in the absence of anesthetics or other medical triggers. He also observes that the suppression hypothesis — the idea that many distressing NDEs are forgotten or repressed — may explain why early NDE research found so few distressing cases. People who have positive NDEs are excited to share. People who have distressing ones may feel too ashamed or frightened to speak up. And some, as Rawlings suggested, may genuinely not remember what happened.⁶⁰

Burke tells the story of a fourteen-year-old girl who attempted suicide and was resuscitated from cardiac arrest. During the resuscitation, she kept crying out, "Mama, help me! Make them let me go! They're trying to hurt me!" When the doctors apologized for hurting her, she said it was not the doctors but "them, those demons in hell." After sleeping for another day, she remembered taking the aspirin but absolutely nothing else about the experience. The hellish NDE had been completely suppressed. Significantly, she later became a missionary — another powerful example of a distressing NDE producing long-term positive spiritual fruit.⁶¹

What Distressing NDEs Tell Us About the Nature of the Intermediate State

When we step back and look at the full body of evidence on distressing NDEs, several theological observations emerge that strengthen our understanding of the intermediate state as described in Scripture.

First, distressing NDEs confirm that the intermediate state is conscious. People in distressing NDEs are not asleep. They are not unconscious. They are acutely, agonizingly aware. This is consistent with the biblical portrait of the rich man in Hades in Luke 16 — awake, aware, remembering his earthly life, communicating, experiencing suffering. Soul sleep — the view that the dead are unconscious between death and resurrection — cannot account for what distressing NDErs report any more than it can account for positive NDEs. As we discussed in Chapter 20, the NDE evidence powerfully confirms the conscious intermediate state.

Second, distressing NDEs confirm that the intermediate state involves moral differentiation. Not everyone ends up in the same place. Some NDErs experience beauty, love, and the presence of God. Others experience darkness, isolation, and separation from God. This is consistent with the biblical picture of Paradise and Hades as distinct regions of the intermediate realm — a two-part intermediate state with different experiences for the righteous and the unrighteous.

Third, distressing NDEs suggest that the intermediate state is not static. Several cases — including Beau's case from Sabom and Howard Storm's case — involve movement from a distressing realm to a positive one. This is consistent with the possibility that the intermediate state allows for spiritual change — a possibility we explore in depth in Chapter 23's treatment of postmortem opportunity.

Fourth, distressing NDEs confirm that the spiritual realm includes genuine evil. Malevolent beings, deceptive entities, and forces of spiritual darkness are reported across cultures and across the NDE literature. This is consistent with the Bible's teaching that we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against spiritual forces of evil (Ephesians 6:12). The spiritual realm is not uniformly benign. It is a battleground.

Conclusion: Darkness, Light, and the God Who Redeems

Distressing NDEs are among the most challenging phenomena that NDE researchers — and Christians — must grapple with. They are real. They are painful. They cannot be dismissed or minimized. But when we examine them through the lens of Scripture, they fit into a coherent theological picture.

These experiences correspond to the biblical concept of Hades — the temporary intermediate state of separation from God — not to Gehenna, the final Lake of Fire. The final judgment has not yet occurred (Revelation 20:11–15). No one currently experiences the second death. Distressing NDErs are catching a glimpse of the intermediate state — real, but not final.

Some distressing elements may involve demonic interference — Satan's attempt to corrupt what God intends for good. Others may be genuine glimpses of Hades. Still others may be divine warnings, or even misinterpreted positive experiences. Not every distressing NDE has the same cause, and each must be evaluated on its own terms.

The most remarkable finding, and the one that speaks most powerfully to me as a Christian, is the paradox of positive outcomes. Distressing NDEs consistently produce repentance, conversion, spiritual seeking, and transformed lives. Howard Storm went from atheist professor to Christian pastor. Countless others have turned to Christ after seeing the darkness and crying out to the One who is the Light of the world. If these experiences were purely demonic, they would not consistently produce genuine faith. The outcomes testify to a God who is sovereign even in the darkness — a God who can take the worst experience of a person's life and turn it into the beginning of their salvation.

I believe distressing NDEs serve, ultimately, as evidence for the Christian faith — not against it. They confirm the reality of the intermediate state. They confirm the reality of spiritual evil. They confirm the urgency of the biblical call to repentance. And they confirm the power and love of Jesus Christ, who rescues even from the darkest places when we cry out to Him.

As we move forward in the next chapter to consider why Jesus is consistently loving and compassionate in NDE encounters — even toward the unsaved — we will see the other side of this coin. The God who allows distressing NDEs to function as warnings is the same God who meets every willing heart with overwhelming love. He is not eager to condemn. He is eager to save. And the testimony of near-death experiences — both the beautiful ones and the terrifying ones — points us to this truth again and again.