"90 Minutes in Heaven"

Books in this vein are becoming a cliche. I'd like to briefly comment on this review:

http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2007/08/a-near-death-experience-a-theological-evaluation-of-don-pipers-90-minutes-in-heaven/

i) To begin with, unless a reported NDE has veridical features, then, minimally, I'm entitled to suspend judgment about the reported experience. In the nature of the case, NDEs are essentially private experiences. Absent veridical features, an outsider can't directly evaluate the claim. I didn't experience what you allegedly did. All I have is your word for it. 

ii) Mind you, that doesn't mean inverdical NDEs are inherently suspect. We shouldn't expect all or most NDEs to have veridical features. Certain advantageous circumstances must be in place for that to happen. A controlled setting. So many NDEs could be real, but inverdical. The main value of veridical NDEs is to establish the category as a factual experience, whether or not any particular candidate is factual.

iii) An objection to Don Piper's alleged experience is that it's trite. Pedestrian. And it seems to be easily explainable in terms of projecting his materialistic interpretation of Revelation onto the underlying experience, assuming his account has any basis in fact. 

Likewise, I agree with Patton that this account reflects "folk theology." 

iv) But with those caveats duly registered, I'd like to take issue with one of Patton's objections:

His description of people. He says that he was greeted by many people who were the same age as when they died. All of these people were those that influenced him in his spiritual walk throughout his life. Yet he talks about their physical appearance for quite some time. Most interestingly, he says that they all looked the same age as when they died. While the Bible does not tell us much about the state of existence between death and resurrection (the intermediate state), it is clear that our bodies are left behind until the resurrection. It is hard for me to conceive that the disembodied souls of believers have the physical appearance of their former selves. It is even harder for me to conceive that they look the same age as when they died. In the intermediate state their is no material bodily form which causes this type of recognition. As believers, it seems best to remain agnostic about how and if others will be recognized in the intermediate state.

I find that no more puzzling than when we dream about dead relatives. 

Since departed Christians haven't been glorified, they haven't been physically rejuvenated, as of yet. So if they were to appear us, I don't find it surprising that they'd appear as we remembered them. 

In principle, they could appear much younger, but that might make them less recognizable. That would be confusing or distracting. 

I'd add that this isn't confined to the issue of NDEs. The same principle applies to apparitions or premonitory dreams. 

At the moment I'm not vouching for any of this. Just saying that if it were to happen, it wouldn't be surprising if it took this form. If anything, that's to be expected.