Skepticism about the supernatural is nothing new. Many people dismiss miracles and near-death experiences as wishful thinking or hallucinations. But Lee Strobel—a former atheist turned Christian apologist—has spent years investigating claims that challenge this materialist worldview. In a recent interview with Charisma Media about his book “Seeing the Supernatural,” Strobel shared compelling accounts that suggest there’s more to life—and death—than we often assume.
Strobel, whose background in journalism and law makes him a stickler for evidence, didn’t just take stories at face value. “I’m looking for cases where it’s not just a miracle, but it’s published in a peer-reviewed medical journal,” he explains. And what he found was astonishing.
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One case involved a blind woman who had been sightless since birth. After a severe car accident left her clinically dead, she described an out-of-body experience where she could suddenly see—something that should have been impossible. Doctors were baffled. “They gave her a crayon and paper and said, ‘Draw the emergency room you were in.’ And she did—perfectly. How do you explain that?” Strobel asks.
Another study he referenced examined 21 blind individuals who had near-death experiences. “They were able to see for the first time during their near-death experience,” he said. These individuals, who had no prior visual memory, described colors, shapes and scenes they could not have fabricated from experience.
Perhaps the most chilling stories come from those who saw things no one knew at the time. Strobel recounts the testimony of a woman in a London hospital who had a near-death experience and saw a pair of shoes on a ledge outside the hospital—a ledge completely hidden from view from inside the building. When hospital staff checked, they found the shoes exactly as she described. “That’s the kind of corroboration I’m looking for,” Strobel notes.
He also made a distinction between near-death and deathbed visions. While near-death experiences often involve people returning to life, deathbed visions happen when people are about to pass permanently. “Many report seeing loved ones who had already died—but here’s the twist: sometimes, they see someone they didn’t know had died. That’s what gets me.”
So what do we make of these stories? Skeptics may argue they are hallucinations, but Strobel pushes back. “You can’t dismiss this as mere imagination. There’s too much corroboration, too many cases that defy natural explanation. What do you do with that?”
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James Lasher is staff writer for Charisma Media.
