Heaven's Lessons: Ten Things I Learned About God When I Died - Softcover

Sjogren, Steve

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1400204313 ISBN 13: 9781400204311

Verlag: Thomas Nelson, 2013

Inhaltsangabe

“If you’d asked me who God is on December 9, the year of my accident, I would have been able to give you a fairly cohesive but theoretical answer. A day later all of that changed.”

A simple surgery went horribly wrong. Steve Sjogren died on the operating table. He encountered a heavenly world where he felt infinite peace. And then he had to come back―back to a physical reality filled with pain and disability and an endless line of tests.

The drama of dying suddenly paled in comparison to the trauma of living. Sjogren could not face this new existence with his same old comfortable understanding of God.

“I had minimized God,” Sjogren says. “Somehow, over time, he had become fairly predictable―like he could be outlined, fully grasped, and contained in a neat set of mere ideas. Now I saw that he apparently wasn’t all that impressed with my cool little notebooks.”

One day in heaven followed by hundreds in agony forged a deeper and stronger faith than Sjogren could have crafted on his own. In Heaven’s Lessons, Sjogren shares his experiences and the life-changing ways they have affected his perspective on success, suffering, and the mysteries of God.

Watch the trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5l4jugXqiBU

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Steve Sjogren has lived and ministered in Los Angeles, Oslo, Norway, Baltimore, Cincinnati, and Tampa as he and his wife, Janie, helped launch new churches aimed at those who are spiritual but not religious. Their church in Cincinnati, Vineyard Community Church, grew from thirty to more than 6,000 weekly attendees mainly through free, creative acts of serving the community, such as giving away bottles of water at stop lights and offering car washes for one dollar--where a dollar was given to each driver for the privilege of washing their car--to show God's love in a practical way. Steve and his wife now live in the Los Angeles area where they head the Kindness Outreach movement and Kindness.com, a site for outreach leaders around the world.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Heaven's Lessons

Ten Things I Learned About God When I DiedBy Steve Sjogren

Thomas Nelson

Copyright © 2013 Steven R. Sjogren a/k/a Steve Sjogren
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4002-0431-1

Contents

1. We Live in a Spiritual World...............................12. God Is BIG.................................................173. Success Works Backwards....................................274. God Especially Enjoys Irregular People.....................435. Don't Fear Death...........................................596. Quit Quitting..............................................677. God Heals Gradually........................................838. Get Over It!...............................................939. Face Your Fear.............................................11510. Be Thankful...............................................131Conclusion: "I Dare You to Dare Me ...".......................143Notes.........................................................153Acknowledgments...............................................157About the Author..............................................159

Chapter One

We Live in a Spiritual World

When I opened my eyes, the people around my bed didn't look familiar. They didn't look like any people I had ever seen before. They were transparent. No words were spoken, but I knew in an instant what they were up to. They were present to support me, to urge me on—to not give up my desperate fight for life.

A few days before, I had gone into the hospital for a planned, forty-five-minute "simple surgery." I no longer use "simple" and "surgery" in the same sentence—anytime medical staff put you under with anesthesia, it isn't simple. I did not go home that night as scheduled. In fact, it feels as though I have been in the recovery room for more than twelve years since that procedure.

The plan was routine enough. Surgeons were to locate and remove my gallbladder—a procedure tens of thousands go through each year in the United States alone. In my case things went haywire during the first few minutes of the surgery.

Leading up to surgery, I had been having painful attacks centered in my midsection that caused me to double over in pain. I'm the sort of person who is quick to go to the doctor when I'm in pain, so after two of those attacks, I went in to see my family physician. His initial take was that my gallbladder was inflamed, so he referred me to a "great surgeon" at a nearby, medium-sized, suburban hospital. A week later I was in the office of a highly recommended but youngish local surgeon. I instantly liked this guy. He was into a lot of things that I, too, liked– target shooting and tropical fish. He was also a voracious nonfiction reader. I felt a connection with him.

After looking me over, he sent me in for a series of preliminary tests to guarantee that my gallbladder was indeed the problem. I had a CT scan, an MRI, and an ultrasound, but none of those showed the presence of gallstones—or a gallbladder. Later, when I spoke with the surgeon, he expressed his surprise that none of the tests revealed my gallbladder but commented that since "everybody has a gallbladder," mine must be diseased and had apparently shrunk significantly. That's why it wasn't showing up on the tests. It was even more in need of surgery.

I mentioned to him that I travel extensively, often out of the country. He said that might be a problem, since the surgical standards of other countries leave a lot to be desired. Was I willing to risk emergency surgery on the fly outside the country? he asked. The answer was obvious—clearly I needed surgery sooner rather than later. That was around Thanksgiving, heading into Christmas, a rather slow time for me workwise, thus a good time to face a surgery. I'm a little embarrassed to admit it now, but in a way, I almost looked forward to the surgery. It seemed like a bit of a vacation from the torrid schedule I had been keeping around that time. A week of downtime sounded as good as going to Florida for a week.

I later learned that about one person in every thirty thousand or so is born without a gallbladder. Doctors soon discovered I am one of those rare people.

In other words, on the day of the surgery, they were trying to remove a nonexistent gallbladder.

As with any laparoscopic surgery, the surgeons made three small, shallow, lateral incisions along my right side to insert equipment inside me. A final small incision was made just below my belly button, where the cutting instrument was to enter. The problem, for whatever reason—it was never determined how it happened—was that this final cut went far too deep, as in inches too deep. The razor-sharp blade hit the front of my descending aorta and then continued through to the back side of it. The aorta at that point is about the diameter of one's thumb. It is the largest artery and carries oxygenated blood from the heart "south," where it branches into smaller arteries that continue on to the legs. As I gushed blood internally, my blood pressure plummeted to 30 over 10. Normal is around 120 over 80. How low is that? Brain damage and all sorts of neurological problems predictably occur at that pressure if it remains there for any length of time. In the words of one doctor, "That's the blood pressure of a sponge, not a human." I was at that level for an hour and fifteen minutes.

Though I bled like a sieve, the doctors couldn't see the blood, since it was pooling behind my central organs, by my spine. When the team finally did notice the injury, they went to work instantly, but it was too late—I had almost completely bled out. There wasn't enough blood for my heart to continue to pump.

That's when it happened. I "coded" for seven minutes—that is, my heart stopped.

It would have stayed that way if it hadn't been for the valiant actions of my team of surgeons. They began to pump blood product into me as quickly as I could take it in.

Under duress, if there is not enough blood or circulation to go around, our bodies automatically shift into preservation mode to protect the brain and heart. All else is considered less important. Soon, due to my low blood pressure, other parts of my body began to be blood neglected, such as my liver, my colon, and my external extremities. My fingers, toes, and other, unmentionable parts began to turn blue. If something didn't change quickly, I was in danger of losing some or all of these to necrosis. In fact, my liver and colon had already begun to become necrotic (later, parts of each had to be removed, to halt the spread of gangrene), and both of my lungs filled with liquid.

Extremely low blood pressure does untold spinal damage, and that, in turn, causes all sorts of neurological problems. The damage is not obvious up front but is discovered gradually, later on. After surgery, I knew I had lost muscle control over my legs to a large degree but had no idea until time had passed that there were other, more subtle problems. More recently I've discovered that I have lost depth perception (my insurance company can vouch for that with my several wrecks). Doctors not too long ago discovered that long-term abdominal problems I have had are the result of nerve damage to my stomach from the surgical accident years ago. This often causes difficulty with sleeping. It never occurred to me that low blood pressure could be linked to digestive issues.

At times I've wondered if the repercussions of this accident at every level—physical, emotional, spiritual—will follow me through...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Thomas Nelson
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2013
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1400204313
• ISBN 13: 9781400204311
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 176
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Reckitt Benckiser Deutschland GmbH; consumerhealth_de@reckitt.com; ; Darwinstrasse 2-4; Heidelberg; 69115; Deutschland