Pronounced Dead at 20, He Came Back With a Mission | George Ritchie NDE

What happens after death? George Ritchie found out at 3:15 in the morning on December 20, 1943, when his heart stopped in an army hospital in Texas and doctors covered his body for the morgue.

Ritchie was a 20-year-old private dying of pneumonia when he was pronounced dead. His body lay in the morgue for nine minutes before a determined doctor ordered a stimulant injected directly into his heart. When Ritchie opened his eyes, he carried with him a vision of the afterlife so powerful that he would spend the rest of his life telling the story.

In this episode of What Happens After Death?, we follow Ritchie's journey as he described it in his classic book Return from Tomorrow. He watched his own dead body from above. He traveled through the realms beyond, seeing a city of blinding light and the destinies of human souls, some still chained to earth by their own choices. He understood with terrifying clarity that what we do with our lives determines where we go. And then he met Jesus, a presence of pure, radiant love, who showed him his entire life in a review of every word, every action, and every effect he had on others. He was sent back, told there was work for him to do.

Ritchie kept that promise. He became a psychiatrist who counseled thousands, and he lectured for decades about his nine minutes on the other side. His account, published as Return from Tomorrow, has become one of the most influential near-death experiences in history. If you have ever asked what happens after death, listen to the young soldier who died in a Texas morgue and came back to tell the world.