This is where God’s Truth Podcast began. For our very first episode, Timothy Smith shared his near-death experience: 18 minutes clinically dead, an interrogation by a dark council, the torment of hell, and a rescue by a love so powerful he calls it an atomic bomb.
A believer who didn’t believe
Timothy grew up around his grandmother, a holy woman who was always praying, fasting, singing hymns or serving someone. He always believed in Jesus, privately. He believed Jesus died for his sins and rose on the third day. But he didn’t believe Jesus was God, and he didn’t trust the Bible, because the behaviour of many churchgoers convinced him it couldn’t be from God.
April 12, 2020
Timothy, who runs electrical service calls, had started a new medication for a skin condition. About a week in, he began feeling strange while driving, and made his way to the hospital. There, he had a severe allergic reaction. His blood pressure dropped, and he passed out.
The next thing he knew, he was sitting on his couch at home. Figures in dark suits surrounded the house, came inside, and began questioning him about his entire life. When they asked about Jesus, Timothy told them he didn’t believe in Him. That’s when the torture began.
No escape, no end
Timothy describes hell as torment beyond words: physical, mental, and degrading in ways he could only hint at. There was no free will. He couldn’t even close his eyes. Whenever he felt himself fading and hoped it was finally over, everything reset and began again. The problem, he explains, isn’t just that you’re tortured. It’s that you can no longer die.
His tormentors offered him everything he’d ever wanted, if he would join them. He refused. The only thing that matters, he told them, is love.
“Do you believe He died for your sins?”
Timothy found himself on a stone table, surrounded by twelve or thirteen cloaked figures chanting in a language he couldn’t understand. Their leader raised a golden dagger and declared him condemned for not believing in Jesus Christ.
“I believe in Jesus,” Timothy said, and the room erupted. When he added that he didn’t believe Jesus was God, they screamed blasphemy. They questioned him again: did he believe in the resurrection, the virgin birth, that Jesus is the Son of God? Finally, the leader leaned in close and asked: “Do you believe that He died for your sins?”
Timothy said yes, and shot out of that darkness like lightning.
“Tim, we love you”
He found himself before an enormous cloud, which parted like two hands opening. A plain floor and a wooden door formed in front of him, guarded by four figures in radiant white dresses with purple sashes. They shone brighter than a welding arc, and cast no shadow.
Then a man walked toward him: thick white curly hair, tanned skin, brown eyes, an old T-shirt tucked into worn jeans, and boots so old you could see the shape of his toes. He looked like a farmer who had just stepped out of his workshop.
“Tim, we love you.”
Timothy knew the voice instantly, better than his own mother’s. The love that hit him, he says, was like an atomic bomb, a high with no peak. “This is what I’ve been looking for my whole life.”
The life review
Jesus began to speak, and Timothy watched his entire life unfold: the moment he was born, and every motive and secret behind everything he’d ever done. He experienced life as every person he had ever affected, for good or ill. He saw that the good he’d done was only what he should have done anyway. And he saw that every prayer he’d ever prayed mattered, even the silent ones for strangers.
Then Jesus stepped back, waved His hand, and Timothy was back in his body.
Coming back
Doctors worked for 18 minutes to stabilise him. When he woke in ICU, all he could ask was what year it was. He was convinced his own son was one of his tormentors. For months afterwards he lived with his mother, too afraid to leave his room, crying every day.
Then one night, the Lord told him to go out to his storage unit. Behind three boxes, at the very back, was a King James Bible. Five years of reading the Word, prayer and fasting have, as he puts it, put him back on the rock.
His message to you
Read the Bible for yourself, from beginning to end, Timothy urges. Other believers can guide you, but they can’t stand before Jesus for you. Fellowship is the cherry on top. The Word of God is the cake.
Scriptures in this episode
- Matthew 5:25, being handed over to the judge
- Luke 19:22, judged out of your own mouth
- James 1:17, no shadow of turning
- Isaiah 64:6, our righteousness as filthy rags
- Luke 17:9–10, unprofitable servants
- Deuteronomy 30:19, choose life
- Acts 7:48–49, God doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands
Watch the full testimony
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