Rescued by Heaven: The Near-death-like Experience of Russell Ricks
What Researchers Found
The Story
Russell Rex was an 8-year-old boy born with complete agenesis of the corpus callosum and hearing loss. He faced daily abuse at school after a traumatic first grade. Desperate to escape, he prayed intensely to God one night after his baptism, which triggered an out-of-body near-death-like experience. He floated above his body, got drawn into a light, and traveled through space to a clearing in an aspen grove on a mountaintop. He felt overwhelming love and peace. He witnessed the creation of the universe. A voice warned him not to leave the clearing. Jesus appeared, comforted him, and took him to a golden city of light resembling familiar temples. They talked about his life's blessings and challenges. Jesus assured him of atonement and promised to stay by his side. He returned to his body. After the experience, Russell felt lasting peace for months. It helped him endure abuse until high school. As an adult, he overcame social struggles through therapy, became a full-time artist, fathered 14 children, and wrote a book to share his story, finding purpose and hope despite disabilities.
“felt happiness and joy and I felt this warm feeling right here and uh so I”
This near-death-like experience lacks veridical perceptions of real-world events, featuring only a basic out-of-body view of the experiencer's sleeping body without specific, verifiable details or impossibly inaccessible information. Emotional distress induced altered consciousness but no clinical death, and no independent verifications or unpredictable elements were reported. The visionary spiritual content, while detailed, holds no evidential value for veridical claims.
Score reflects verifiable perceptions reported. A low score indicates the experience was primarily spiritual or subjective, not that it didn't occur.
Score reflects transformation as described. Domains scored 0 indicate the topic was not discussed, not that no change occurred.
Are you here because someone you love has died?
These accounts were gathered because death may not be the end. Thousands of people have experienced something beyond — and come back to tell us about it.
What Researchers Found
This near-death-like experience lacks veridical perceptions of real-world events, featuring only a basic out-of-body view of the experiencer's sleeping body without specific, verifiable details or impossibly inaccessible information. Emotional distress induced altered consciousness but no clinical death, and no independent verifications or unpredictable elements were reported. The visionary spiritual content, while detailed, holds no evidential value for veridical claims.
Score reflects verifiable perceptions reported. A low score indicates the experience was primarily spiritual or subjective, not that it didn't occur.
Score reflects transformation as described. Domains scored 0 indicate the topic was not discussed, not that no change occurred.