Trudy gets so many questions and stories of end-of-life experiences from Guideposts readers, we decided to make her responses a regular feature on her blog.
Dear Trudy,
My husband and I were very close. He often called me on my cell phone when he was out working. One Thursday David phoned me to tell me that he had become ill while out hauling asphalt. He had driven himself to the hospital, but once there he was unable to get out of the truck.
After calling the ER to ask someone to go out and look for him in the parking lot, I phoned him back to tell him that help was on the way. It was then that David told me that he had witnessed 14 angels and a bright light!
I signed off and our son Jeremy and I raced to the hospital. When we arrived, David appeared to be much better. It was April Fool’s Day and he was attempting to pull off a joke on one of the nurses.
The hospital insisted, however, on sending him to the coronary hospital in the city for more testing.
By the time I found his room in the new facility, David was very sick again. I stayed with him most of the night. We were able to talk some and I asked him about the 14 angels and the bright light. He explained that he had counted them and was very taken with the bright light. I asked him what the angels looked like and he replied that it was hard to explain as the images were fuzzy, but that he knew they were angels.
Early in the morning, David told me that I should get a little sleep and that he would try to do the same. As I walked out of the room, he said, “I love you, Susan.” If you knew David, you would know that this is not something that he said out loud very often, and I have never forgotten it. My eyes filled with tears.
Later that morning, I was back with David when a physician explained that David was about to undergo a simple procedure of no more than an hour or so. He went on to tell me that only 1 in 2,000 patients ever experience complications. David looked up at me with his big blue eyes and I knew that he was afraid. I assured him that I would be there waiting when he returned. Little did I know that that would be the last time that I would see him.
I think of him daily and I am so thankful that the Lord graciously allowed me to be with him during his last few hours. David died April 2, on Good Friday.
How great it is to know that he was leaving with 14 angels, into a bright light!
Susan
Dear Susan,
What a perfectly beautiful gift of time God gave to you and David. How wonderful that he was able to tell you about the 14 angels and the beautiful bright light before he died. It sounds as if you were very close to each other in your everyday life and so God allowed you to share completely in those last few, very meaningful hours.
David was already experiencing heaven, seeing the angels and the presence of God. We know by what people share with us that they frequently visit heaven and are given a lovely view of where they are going, sometimes days before they leave this Earth.
A patient said to me one day, “Trudy, how can I still see you when I’ve already seen them?” When I asked who he had seen, he said his mom and dad, who had died many years before. I explained that his soul was very ready to enter heaven but that his body was not yet ready to shut down. He understood the explanation completely.
You and your family will find great peace now, because God was so gracious to David. Before he took him home to eternity, he allowed him to share heaven with you.
It was a lovely gift, too, that God chose to take him into heaven on Good Friday, the very day Jesus died.
Blessings to you and yours,
Trudy Harris
