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(More customer reviews)With a heavy heart, I must give an honest review of this book. Before I begin, I want to start off by stating upfront that I am a born-again Christian, and I do believe that unbelievers who die without Christ will suffer eternal torment in Hell. However, with this said, I must say that I do not believe Bill Wiese' account.
I had heard about this book for quite some time before I had actually read it. At first I thought this was going to be a story about a man who wasn't a Christian, clinically died and went to Hell, came back to life and is now a Christian. Instead, I was surprised to find out that not only was Wiese already supposed to have been a Christian, but he didn't even die. Instead, he just went to bed at 3:00a.m. one night, fell into a pit and ended up in literal Hell. In this Hell he was tormented by demons, heat so intense that he should have been dead, and he witnessed a pit of fire where souls were being tormented. During his time in Hell, Wiese claims that he didn't know about God and had "forgotten" he was a Christian. He later supposedly gets rescued by Jesus and is told that he was purposely made to forget that he was a Christian. The entire reasoning behind this experience is so that Wiese can know that Hell exists and he can now tell others about it. He wakes back up in his living room where he fell asleep at 3:23a.m.
Right away, one would think that Wiese just had a nightmare, but Wiese is convinced that he had an out-of-body experience where his soul literally descended into Hell. Wiese insists that this wasn't just a dream.
This is all told in the first three chapters of the book, and the rest of the book is simply accounts of Wiese' evangelistic testimonies and answering a few questions about Hell. But the first three chapters are really the "highlight" of the book. In fact, I found myself getting bored after the third chapter, because the rest of it becomes testimonies of Wiese being invited to speak about his experience, and then the book going into answering standard philosophical questions about Hell that can be found in many other books.
The main problem I have with Bill Wiese' story is that it just simply isn't consistent with what the Bible teaches about how God operates. One of the claims Wiese says in his book is that God made him forget that he was a Christian while he was in Hell. On the contrary, the Bible teaches that God cannot lie, and therefore, I don't see how God would make Wiese "forget" that he is a Christian.
Also, in Luke 16:19-31 Jesus tells a story about a rich man who dies and ends up in Hell. The rich man becomes concerned that his family might end up in Hell too. So he asks if he can go and tell his family about Hell. And the response he received was, "If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead" (v. 31). So, knowing that Jesus told his story of the rich man, and the bible teaches that if someone isn't persuaded by the Scriptures, then they will not be persuaded by someone returning from the dead, why would Jesus send Wiese to Hell to basically do what Jesus himself says won't persuade unbelievers anymore than the Scriptures will? The simple answer is, Jesus wouldn't do that.
Another problem I have with Wiese's account is that Jesus said that anyone who believes in him will not see death (John 8:51).
After reading the book, I must admit that I am really disappointed. And while I am a born-again Christian who believes in the existence of Hell (and by that I mean eternal punishment, not annihilation), I must tell the truth of what I believe about this book. I had thought about not writing a review at all, but Christians need to stand on biblical truths, not lies. I'm still not even sure why Wiese is so convinced that he didn't just have a really bad dream... which is what I think he had if he's not just making this whole thing up.
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23 Minutes In Hell: One Man's Story About What He Saw, Heard, and Felt in that Place of Torment"My sincere hope is that this book is the closest you will ever come to experiencing hell for yourself"--Bill Wiese saw the searing flames of hell, felt total isolation, and experienced the putrid and rotting stench, deafening screams of agony, terrorizing demons, and finally, the strong hand of God lifting him out of the pit--"Tell them I am coming very, very soon!"Wiese's visit to the devil's lair lasted just twenty-three minutes, but he returned with vivid details etched in his memory. Since this life-changing ordeal, he has spent the last seven years studying the Scriptures to find answers and has listed more than 150 Bible verses referencing hell.Everyone is curious about the afterlife, and now Wiese shares his insights to commonly asked questions such as:
Is hell a literal burning place?
Where is hell?
Do you have a body in hell?
Are there Degrees of punishment in hell?
Are there children in hell?
Can Demons torment people in hell?
Can "good" people go to hell?
"Even if you don't believe my story, I hope you will believe the Scriptures and avoid hell just the same."
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