Billy Hallowell for The Blaze, April 16, 2015, that 9-year-old Annabelle Beam claimed she visited Heaven and saw Jesus when she fell into the hollow of a tree on her family’s farm in Texas. After her rescue, Annabelle mysteriously recovered from a chronic illness.
The incident happened 3 years ago in 2011.
As recounted by the girl’s mother, Christy Beam, in her book Miracles From Heaven and in a The Church Boys podcast this week, “Annabelle and her sisters — they all three are rough and tumble country tom boys. They were out doing what they love to do which is climb trees. They climbed up and were just sitting on a branch talking, and then the branch began to give way.”
Attempting to scramble to safety, Annabelle ended up falling into a hole on the side of a hollowed-out cottonwood tree (see above), tumbling 30 feet head-first into the trunk.
The little girl was trapped inside the tree for hours as firefighters and rescue teams tried to figure out a way to get her out. They eventually rigged up a series of pulleys and ropes that made the rescue possible. Remarkably, Annabelle had no severe injuries, though she was kept over night at a local hospital to be observed.
Christy and 12-year-old Anabelle Beam
It was the next day that Annabelle told her mother what happened while she was trapped inside the cottonwood tree. As recounted by Christy Beam:
“The next day after they released her from the hospital … we were driving down the road … and she just turned to me out of the blue … and she just said, ‘You know mommy, I went to heaven when I was in that tree’…. My very, very first thought was, ‘Did you hit your head really hard? Was it just a dream … what is she talking about?’
She said that she sat on Jesus’ lap and that they talked and that he said that the firemen will get her out and when they do there will be nothing wrong with you. And [Jesus said], ‘I’m going to send my guardian angel to light the tree and to stay with you.’”
Annabelle asked Jesus if she could stay in heaven, as she felt no pain during the encounter, but “He said, ‘I know you want to stay Anna, but I have plans for you on Earth that you can’t fulfill in heaven.’”
Then Annabelle was suddenly aware of the fact that she was back inside the tree, but there was a light in the deep dark hollow which helped her find the ropes and pulleys that the firefighters had rigged up.
In her time in Heaven, Annabelle said she saw her great-grandmother, who looked much younger. But what convinced Christy that her daughter was telling the truth was when Annabelle said she also saw a little girl in heaven who God told her was her sister.
Christy explained, “I had had two miscarriages, and one of them had been the creation of life,” while the other pregnancy had resulted in a blighted ovum — a fertilized egg that did not develop. She once told her daughters that she had two miscarriages, but did not go into detail about the blighted ovum.
Christy said,
“When Anna[belle] was telling me about [heaven], she said, ‘I saw a little girl in heaven, mommy, and she looked just like you … and [she] said, ‘I know that face and I asked God who is that little girl and he said, ‘Anna, that’s your sister’ and that did it for me. I just remember thinking there’s no way for her to have known.”
If Annabelle were lying, she would have said that she saw two children in heaven, but, instead, she said she only saw one. Considering that only one of the pregnancies progressed, Christy was floored, “I thought at that moment, ‘This is real, this happened.”
Annabelle had suffered from chronic intestinal pseudo-obstruction, a painful disorder that involves how food is processed, among other complications. After the incident with the tree, however, Annabelle’s illnesses cleared up and she went from taking 10 medications a day to taking none.
Christy said, “Her life is different and everybody sees it.”
Christy Beam said that her daughter’s story will also be a feature film set to release in 2016. She hopes what happened to Annabelle Beam will change lives and people’s personal relationships with God.
For other miraculous encounters, please go to our “Christian/Inspirational” page for post links colored purple.
~Éowyn
