LDS Author Kim Rives Talks About Her Near-Death Experience Documented In Her Book "My Walk Through Heaven"

Fifty-one-year old Kim Rives, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has written a book entitled "My Walk Through Heaven", in which she documents a near-death experience leading to a short trip back to the spirit world. She has captivated audiences throughout Utah and the West who have invited Rives for seminars. And her basic message to such groups: The only three things that truly matter are that people love, forgive and serve one another. You can read the full story in the Salt Lake Tribune; a short summary and a key excerpt are provided below.

You can visit Kim Rives' website and find out more about her book HERE.

The countdown to Rives' experience began in 1997, when doctors found examined a lump on her breast that was the size of an egg. It was determined to be cancerous. At first, she refused traditional medicine, and tried to cure it with diet and nutrition. But when the cancer continued to progress, Rives agreed to chemotherapy. Weakened from the disease and treatment, she slept much of the time and no longer could work. At one point before a bone-marrow transplant, she was near death from viruses due to a weakened immune system. Lying on a rented hospital bed in her mother's second bedroom, she prayed for release from her pain. God's answer to that prayer was a glimpse of heaven she never will forget, described below:

Rives, according to her own account, was led by a messenger through a beautiful, rose-studded meadow to a city -- bypassing two others -- that boasted streets of gold and diamond-studded buildings.

Inside a classroom, she says, she met her deceased grandmother, who was teaching other ancestors about genealogy. She also met Joseph Smith, founder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He, too, was teaching a lesson. Her twin sisters, who had died in infancy, were there, and she saw a vision of her premortal self learning to love music.

Rives says she was taught about forgiveness from her Mother in Heaven and shown orphans in the Third World whose personal lights beamed brighter as they received handcrafted clothing that Rives' own mother had made.

Jesus Christ, she says, showed her his crucifixion, which was more violent and painful than she ever had imagined. From the cross, she says, "he asked me to give him my pain." Jesus also showed her a vision of the basement pigsty and her young self, surrounded by demons that she later realized symbolized the anger, depression, fear and guilt in her life. "He said, 'Kim, look to the light and live,' " she recalls. "As soon as I was willing to look at his light, they had to flee. I felt his power, strength and deliverance...He didn't point out my faults, my failings, my weaknesses. He just loved me. He's God, but here he is willing to serve me. I'm still humbled by that."

It became apparent during her trip through heaven that she was expected to return to her body. She balked. Finally, she was led to her sister's room in Logan, where Krambule was working on her master's thesis, aided by a "cute" male angel who could communicate by thought with Rives and whom her sister clearly could not see.

Rives watched as her sister answered a phone call from their mother, saying she had found Rives cold and lifeless. "It was terrifying," [Sandy] Krambule [her sister] says. "Mom was saying, 'She's gone. We've lost her.' " She demanded their mother put the phone by Rives' ear. "I told her to come back," Krambule remembers.

Suddenly, Rives began talking to Krambule, in what she now believes was her "spirit voice," through the phone receiver. Her mother, with Rives' body, saw and heard none of the conversation, but Rives assured Krambule she was in the room with her. She affirmed it by telling her what she and her little girls were doing, what they were wearing. She even told her about the cute angel helping write her master's thesis. "It was a little bit of a head trip," Krambule remembers.

Krambule again told her sister to go back to her body. The second Rives decided she should return, she was whisked through a tunnel, a portal back to earthly life.

Other Latter-day Saints have reported near-death experiences as well, most notably Betty Eadie, who wrote a series of books about her experience and the message she was told to deliver. Jedediah Grant's near-death experience is described HERE. And more experiences are documented on GreaterThings.com.

The LDS Church does not take an official position on near-death experiences, but teaches that individual members can receive personal revelation in a variety of ways. The one ground rule is that a Church member can only receive revelation applicable to self, family, and Church calling; only the President of the Church, in his capacity as Prophet, Seer, and Revelator, is entitled to receive revelation applicable to the Church as a whole. So if someone comes to you and claims he's had a revelation saying the the Church leadership has all gone astray and needs to repent, that person most likely has been influenced by Satan.

An authentic revelation may frequently present facts and truth not contained in existing scripture, but an authentic revelation will NEVER contain information explicitly contrary to existing scripture.