Heaven Is For Real‘s Colton Burpo, the subject of the book-turned-movie Heaven is for Real, stands by his story of visiting Heaven as a boy.
His revelation comes in light of a confession by Alex Malarkey, the subject of another book, The Boy Who Went to Heaven, who recently revealed that his story is not real and did not happen.
Alex Malarkey said he made up the story when he was only six years old and didn’t yet have a personal knowledge of the Bible.
“When I made the claims that I did, I had never read the Bible. People have profited from lies, and continue to. They should read the Bible, which is enough. The Bible is the only source of truth.”
Alex Malarkey said he came to understand that what he did was wrong after reading the Bible and felt compelled to come clean about his mistake.
However, Alex Malarkey’s confession has tarnished to some degree Colton Burpo’s claims that Heaven is for real.
According to Christian Today, Colton Burpo has released a statement on his website insisting that Heaven if for real and that he did visit Heaven when he was four years old after complications during emergency surgery to remove his appendix. He also insists that he met Jesus and saw Mary and the angels. He even claims he met his sister — who never made it to Earth after his mother had a miscarriage — something Colton Burton didn’t know about. It was the claim of meeting his sister that convinced his parents that he did indeed visit Heaven.
“Dear friends, I know there has been a lot of talk about the truth of other Heaven stories in the past few days. I just wanted to take a second and let everyone know that I stand by my story found in my book Heaven is for Real.”
“I still remember my experience in Heaven. I want to keep telling people about my experience because it has given hope to so many people. People have their doubts about my story. But the thing is, I wasn’t coaxed into doing this. I wanted to tell people about my experience. In fact, I started sharing my story with my friends and people in our town way before there was a book called Heaven is for Real.”
The book was later made into a very successful movie starring Greg Kinnear.