A Vision of Heaven by a Wesleyan Lady

Recorded by Robert Young, Missionary

While residing in a British colony, as a Wesleyan minister, I was called one evening to visit a Miss D., who was said to be dying. Mrs. Young, whom Miss D. met with weekly for religious instruction, feeling a deep interest in her spiritual welfare, accompanied me to her residence. We found her in the chamber of a neat little cottage, exceedingly ill, but trusting in the merits of Jesus. After spending some time with her in conversation and prayer, we commended her to God and took our departure without the least hope of seeing her again in this life.

Soon after we left, she seemed to die. But as the usual signs of death, which so rapidly develop in that country, did not appear, her friends concluded that she was in a trance, and they anxiously waited to see the end. She remained in this state for several days, during which period we repeatedly visited her. The only indications we could perceive that life was not extinct were a slight foaming at the mouth and a little warmth around the region of the heart. She was watched with great interest both night and day; and after having been in this state for nearly a week, she opened her eyes and said, “Mr. C. is dead.”

Her attendants, thinking that she was under the influence of delirium, replied that she was mistaken, as he was not only alive, but well. “Oh no,” said she, “he is dead; for a short time ago, as I passed the gates of hell, I saw him descend into the pit, and the blue flames cover him. Mr. B. is also dead, for he arrived at heaven just as I was leaving that happy place, and I saw its beautiful gates thrown wide open to receive him and heard the host of heaven shout, “Welcome, weary pilgrim!” Mr. C. was a neighbor, and a very wicked person, but Mr. B, who lived at no great distance, was a good old man, and for many years he had been a consistent and useful member of the church of God. The parties who heard Miss D.’s startling and confident statement immediately made inquiries about the two individuals alluded to, and found, to their utter astonishment, that Mr. C. had dropped dead about half an hour before while in the act of tying his shoe; and that about the same time Mr. B. had suddenly passed into the eternal world. For the truth of these facts I do solemnly vouch. Miss D. went on to tell where she had been, and what she had seen and heard.

"After being sufficiently recovering to leave the house, she paid us a visit, and Mrs. Young, as well as myself, heard from her own lips the following account of what she had passed through. She informed us that at the time she was supposed to die, a celestial being conducted her into the invisible world, and mysteriously unveiled to her the realities of eternity. He took her first to heaven, but she was told that, as she yet belonged to time, she could not be permitted to enter into that glorious place, but only to behold it; which she represented as infinitely exceeding in beauty and splendor the most elevated conceptions of mortals, and whose glories no language could describe.

"She told us that she beheld the Savior upon a throne of light and glory, surrounded by the four-and-twenty elders, and a great multitude which no man could number; among whom she recognized patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, and all the missionaries who had died in that colony, besides many others whom she mentioned; and although those parties were not named by the angel that attended her, yet she said that seeing them was to know them.

"She described these celestial spirits as being variously employed; and, although she felt herself inadequate to convey any definite idea of the nature of that employment, yet it appeared to be adapted to their respective mental tastes and spiritual attainments. She also informed us that she heard sweet and most enrapturing music, such as she had never heard before, and made several attempts to give us some idea of its melodious character, but found her notes too earthly for that purpose.

While thus favored, the missionaries already referred to, and other happy spirits, as they glided past her, sweetly smiled, and said they knew whence she came, and, if faithful to the grace of God, she would, in a-short time, be admitted into their delightful society. All the orders of heaven were in perfect and blessed harmony, and appeared to be directed in all their movements by mysterious influence, proceeding from the throne of God.