Floyd Cummings, Jr. (Graduated with Class of 1976)
Kenneth Glover
Franklin Owens, Jr.
Michael Jerome Pierce
Ronald Stephen Sampson
Hector Lloyd Armando Scott
Arthur George Shay
1975
Thomas Harrison Hooper III
Mark Anthony McArthur
Edward Sommerville McCatty
Joseph Michael Miller
Gerald Wayne Stover
Robert Willingham Yancey
1976
{Michael K. Butler}
Floyd Cummings, Jr.
David Lawrence Holmes
Jack Wade Jenkins
Ronald Lee Nabrit
Ronald Heribert Ware
Kenneth Gray Willoughby
1977
Quentin Frederick Atherley
Lucia Irene Butts
David Menilek Goodwin
Shelton Joyner, Jr.
{Michael S. McHenry}
Lloyd James Miller
Gerald Gilbert Anthony Penny
Michael Paul Whittingham
1978
Otho Wells Artis, II
Lawrence Edward Baugh
Charles Edward Blair
Steven Messiah Coleman
{Tommy G. Eubanks}
Jonathan Clark Gatlin
Woodrow Alque Pinder, Jr.
John David Williams, Jr.
1979
Darryl Nathaniel Harrison
Gregory Nelson
1980
Robert John Ellis, Jr.
Gregory Ivan Johnson
1981
James Corey De Pina
Julie Laurynn (Keith) Jarrett
David Gerald McLeod
Eric Nathaniel Miller
Charles Homer Riley, Jr.
Michael Anthony Joseph Thomas
1983
Beverly Elaine Allen
1984
Leopold W. Giscombe
Yvette Cecilia Mendez
Margaret Rose Vendryes
1985
Royal Lester Allen III
1987
Anthony Michael George
Steve Lawrence Joseph
Christopher David Manuel
Etta Patricia (Johnson) Milton
1989
Kevin Lawrence Frazier
1990
Paul Kwesi Bilson
1991
Derrick Andrew Lawrence
1996
Daina M. Howell
1997
Tara Christine (Goins) Brennan
Elizabeth Delilah Fairfax
Monet Elise Hilson
Nicole D. Scott
David Christopher Simms
1998
Jason Bradley Anderson
2000
Dana Alexis Perry-Hunter
Alissa Suzanne Wilson
2003
Kwesi A. Christopher
2005
Renee Marika Chung
Christopher W. Hunter
2006
Marc A. Fuller
2009
Chike Bartholomew Nnaji
2011
Jordan A. Moore-Fields
2013
Omar Wallace Brown, Jr.
Stefan Brian Henry Edwards
2014
Robert Frank Gooden III
Reyane Nafi Jeni Mbaye
2015
Lydia B. Nampeera
Morgan Ashly Venezia
2016
{Kenneth Aboagye-Adinkra}
2024
Kiiren Aamer Jackson
2026
{Abdullahi Mire}
Faculty
Marion Brown
Mavis Christine Campbell
Asa Davis
James Quincy Denton
Jeffrey B. Ferguson
Lucius Weathersby
Staff
Elizabeth "Liz" Agosto
Chaka Ajene
Gertrude Batie
Robert Bosworth
Adolphus Butler
Luther Chaney
Joseph Cooper
Bobby Dodd
William Fisher
Barbara Forrest
Sabe Hairston
David Key
Genalvin Morse
Alexander Morton
F. Dwight Newport
Richard McDougald O'Daniel
Robert Gilbert Roberts
Fran Taylor-Anderson
Charles "Professor Charley" Thompson
Mable Whitehead
James Whitner
Reginald Young
The Civil War Soldiers
Joseph Evins
Charles Finnemore
Sanford Jackson
William Jennings
Genalvin Morse
Charles Thompson (Professor Charley)
Christopher Thompson
James Thompson
John Thompson
The Honorary Amherst College Friends
Those Amherst College Alumni, Students, Faculty and Staff Who Fought to Abolish Slavery During the Civil War
Robert C. Follette, Jr., Amherst College Employee - Friend of Amherst College Black Alumni (Long Time Director of Valentine Dining Hall)
Frank Alvan Hosmer (Born November 14, 1853; Amherst College Class of 1875); Ninth President of Punahou School [the Alma Mater of Barack Obama]; Great Barrington High School Educator Who Inspired W. E. B. DuBois to Pursue a College Education: Died May 28, 1918)
Kenneth Joseph Howard (Amherst College Class of 1966), "The White Shadow" of Manhasset High School (Manhasset, New York), Television's "The White Shadow" and Pudd'nhead Wilson and the President of Screen Actors Guild
{William McFeely (Amherst College Class of 1952), Yale University Ph.D. in American Studies, Founder of the Yale University African American Studies Program, Pulitzer Prize Recipient in 1982 for Biography of Ulysses S. Grant}
{Robert H. Romer (Amherst College Class of 1952 and Amherst College Physics Professor from 1955 to 2001) Author of "Slavery in the Connecticut Valley of Massachusetts" and articles pertaining to the Civil War Soldiers of Amherst and the Turbulent History of Phi Psi Fraternity During the Late 1940s}
Charles Milson Stillman (Amherst College Class of 1967), Descendant of Founder of Stillman College, a HBCU; Long-Time Trustee of Stillman College; Two Million Dollar Benefactor of Stillman College
Henry Martin Tupper (Born April 11, 1831; Amherst College Class of 1859; European American Founder of Shaw University, the Second Oldest Historically Black College and University [HBCU]; Died November 12, 1893)
David W. Wills (Amherst College Professor of Religion) The General Editor of African American Religion: A Documentary History Project
The Honorary Amherst Alumni
Robert Purvis (African American Abolitionist Who Most Likely Attended Amherst Academy)
In the Summer of 1972, after my freshman year at Amherst College, I was at home in Victorville, California. After a day of working at the local Safeway store, I came home and ventured into the backyard to look at the stars. While engaged in this stargazing, I received what I say was a Call -- a Divine intervention that would change my life forever and which has been the reason for my rather inspired writing career. Probably the most important experience of my life occurred after I received The Call. I was hospitalized and, for some unknown reason, I almost died. I went into a deep coma and when I awoke I weighed only 83 pounds. During the time that I was hovering near death, I took a trip with God. God took me beyond the Universe and from this distant perspective the Universe seemed small like an egg. However, unlike the Universe that we see, this Universe was not one with great empty spaces. The Universe that God showed me was a Universe filled with Light, filled with Life, and filled with Love. And the message that was conveyed is that We are all a part of this vibrant Divine Universe. It was later in Life that I came to understand how this Near-Death Experience came to influence my spirituality and my beliefs. If you are so inclined, please see the article referred to in the link below and contemplate why my interest in all faiths may be Divinely Ordained.
What Near-Death Experiences Tell Us About the Nature of God | by Mike Rosebush, PhD | Backyard Church | Medium.
What Near-Death Experiences Tell Us About the Nature of God
Firsthand stories of the afterlife — and the love that changes everything.
12 min read
·
Oct 26, 2025
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Introduction
When a person is declared clinically dead — no heartbeat, no breath, no measurable brain activity — most of us assume their story has ended. Yet thousands of people around the world have returned from that border between life and death with memories so vivid, loving, and consistent that they challenge every assumption we hold about consciousness, eternity, and God. These are the people who have experienced what medicine and science now calls a Near-Death Experience (NDE).
For more than two decades, the Near-Death Experience Research Foundation (NDERF) has collected over 4,000 accounts from every continent, culture, and faith tradition. Among them, 303 individuals describe what they believe was a direct encounter with God or Jesus — a moment of radiant presence that defies human language yet changes their lives forever. Their testimonies, though deeply personal, converge on strikingly similar themes: overwhelming light, boundless love, unity with all creation, and a divine presence that knows and accepts them completely.
What do these experiences tell us about the nature of God?
God is not a collection of doctrines or commands written into any religion’s script. Rather, God is the living essence behind every tradition’s name for the divine and every attempt to teach goodness. It is difficult even to use the word “God” in this article, for that name often carries the weight of painful memories — times when someone misused it to justify judgment or harm. For some, the very word awakens wounds of spiritual abuse.
Personally, I find peace in calling the Supreme Being the “Love Source,” for that name feels free of division and full of truth. Yet, for familiarity and clarity, I will predominately use the word God throughout this article.
Across this study of the afterlife, one truth rises again and again: those who have faced death often return with a certainty that God is Light, Love, and Oneness — not distant or judging, but deeply personal and compassionate. Many say words fail, yet the feeling remains: an embrace beyond comprehension.
Love itself is the core reality of the universe.
This article explores both the science and spirit of these encounters — drawing on the verified NDERF database, medical insights into death and consciousness, and the timeless human longing to know the Love Source who awaits us beyond the veil. If their stories are even partly true, they suggest that the God who meets us at death is not a stranger, but the very Love we have been seeking all along.
Part 1. God as Love: The Core Reality
If one word dominates every near-death account that touches the divine, it is love. Across languages, cultures, and beliefs, those who have come to the edge of death and returned say that God does not simply provide loving. Instead, God is Love itself.
Dr. Jeffrey Long’s analysis of 303 direct God-encounter cases in the NDERF database found that nearly one-third used the very word love to describe the Being that they met. Yet even that number understates its force, for many Experiencers confessed that “love” was the only word their limited language could grasp.
“It wasn’t human love,” wrote one woman resuscitated after cardiac arrest. “It was a total knowing of me — every failure, every kindness — and loving me for all of it. I was home inside that Love.”
Another man, clinically dead after drowning, recalled:
“I entered a light that was alive with Love. It wasn’t judging; it was embracing. I felt as though I had never really been alive until that moment.”
Over and over, Experiencers describe this Love as unconditional, absolute, and unearned. It is not transactional — there is no sense of needing to be worthy. Rather, they say, Love itself is the atmosphere of eternity.
“Love wasn’t something God did. Love was the environment itself — the very air of heaven.”
Theologically, such accounts echo the mystics of many religious paths. Yet these Experiencers’ voices are not quoting concepts from their own beloved scriptures. Instead, they have experienced a universal phenomena as they encountered Love in their own NDE.
When asked later what they learned, many say the same simple truth: “Love is the reason for everything.” Acts of kindness, compassion, and forgiveness on earth, they add, are not peripheral but centrally. These virtues are the very language of the divine.
“Every loving thought you ever had still exists,” one man said. “It was shown to me like ripples on water. Love never disappears; it keeps expanding.”
To encounter this boundless affection, Experiencers report, is to have all fear dissolve. Death is no longer an ending but a return to the Love Source from which all life began.
Part 2. God as Light: Conscious Presence and Knowing
If Love is the atmosphere of heaven, then Light is its face.
Among the 303 direct encounters, light was the single most reported quality of God — appearing in over one-third of the accounts. Yet these reports are unanimous that the Light is not merely visual; it is alive.
“It wasn’t just bright — it was conscious,” one woman wrote. “The Light knew me. It welcomed me like a long-lost child, and in that moment, I understood that it had always known me.”
Another Experiencer described it more poetically:
“The Light was brighter than a thousand suns, but it didn’t hurt my eyes. It felt like intelligence itself smiling.”
In these testimonies, Light is often interchangeable with Presence. It sees, communicates, teaches, and loves. One man said:
“The Light spoke without words. It told me, ‘Everything you have ever done has been seen through the eyes of understanding.’ I realized this Light had been with me my entire life.”
Experiencers insist that the Light was not a hallucination but a Being. They describe returning with a knowledge, moral clarity, and an enduring sense that they had met a Supreme Being who had ultimate consciousness itself.
“It [the Light] was the Source [of all Love],” said another woman. “I realized this Light wasn’t separate from me — it was what I had always been made of. When I looked into it, I saw myself, and everything that ever existed, shining inside it.”
The Light is never cold or impersonal. It radiates compassion that erases shame. In some cases, Experiencers identify the Light as “God”; others call it “the Christ Light,” “the Love Source,” or simply “Love.” Regardless of vocabulary, they agree on its essence: the Light is total awareness joined with total acceptance.
“I didn’t have to say anything,” one woman said. “The Light already knew my heart. It didn’t ask who I was, it reminded me who I had always been.”
For these witnesses, the Light is not distant — it is the intimate consciousness underlying all that exists. To encounter the Light is to awaken to a deeper truth: that divine awareness and divine love are one and the same reality.
Part 3. God as Unity: The Great Oneness
When Experiencers try to describe what came after the Light, many speak of a moment where even the distinction between “God” and “self” fell away. About 16% of those who encountered God described a state of oneness — not metaphorically, but as literal reality.
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An Experiencer explained:
“I saw that every being was part of the same living Light. There were no outsiders. Nothing was left out, not even the smallest creature. We are all cells in the body of God.”
For many, this Oneness felt like an ecstatic homecoming. Individual identity dissolved, yet awareness expanded into something infinitely larger.
“It was like a drop returning to the ocean,” said a man who had been revived after heart failure. “But the drop could still remember what it was.”
What is striking is the peace that accompanies this revelation. In Oneness with the Light and with every created thing, fear and judgment cease to existbecause there is no “other” left to fear or judge.
“I saw that hurting another person is the same as hurting God, and hurting God is the same as hurting yourself. There is only One of us here.”
Many return unable to see anyone — friend or enemy — as separate from the divine.
“After that, I could never hate again,” said one man simply. “It would be like hating my own hand.”
This revelation of Unity reshapes how they live once they return — more compassionate, more inclusive, more in harmony with creation.
Part 4. God as Energy: The Source and Sustainer of All Life
A smaller subset — about 2% — explicitly described God as energy, power, or vibration, suggesting that God is not merely the Love Source among all living beings, but is the living current that animates all existence.
“I saw energy flowing through all creation like a golden pulse,” wrote one woman. “It was God breathing. Every atom shimmered with that rhythm, and I realized it was the same rhythm in me.”
“The universe was alive, humming,” one man reported. “Every particle was connected by a single vibration, and that vibration was love.”
This divine current is conscious, relational, and loving.
“It was like plugging back into the Source,” another said. “An ocean of energy that thought, cared, and rejoiced. Every soul was a spark of it.”
After returning, many report heightened sensitivity to the sacredness of nature.
“I could feel God in the trees, in the space between words,” one woman said. “Everything was made of the same energy I met in the Light.”
One man summarized it this way:
“The best word is electricity, but not of wires — of life. We are living conduits of God’s energy. That’s why love feels powerful: it’s the current of God moving through us.”
Part 5. The Life Review: God’s Nonjudgmental Compassion
Perhaps the most humbling and transformative element reported in NDEs is the Life Review — a panoramic replay of one’s earthly existence. Those who undergo it say they relive their actions not from their own perspective but through the eyes and emotions of everyone they ever affected.
“It wasn’t like a movie of my life,” wrote one woman. “It was as if I became each person I had ever touched. I felt their joy when I was kind, and their pain when I was cruel.”
Contrary to fearful expectations, the Presence presiding over this review is never condemning. Over and over, Experiencers insist that God does not judge them — God helps them to understand.
“I expected to be scolded,” confessed one man. “Instead, I was wrapped in love. The Light showed me every selfish thing I’d done, but there was no anger — only the question, ‘What did you learn from this?’”
Many liken it to being loved into truth.
“Nothing was hidden,” one woman said. “Every moment mattered. But God’s Love held even my worst mistakes like a parent holding a child who doesn’t yet know better.”
They feel the pain of having hurt others — not because God punishes them, but because, in that state of unity, they feel what the other felt.
“It was self-judgment in the light of absolute love. God didn’t shame me; I simply saw and understood.”
“Every act of kindness rippled outward,” another recalled. “Even small things — a smile, a gentle word — shone brighter than I could bear.”
The Life Review becomes an experience of being seen completely and still loved completely.
“When it ended,” one man wrote, “I realized that judgment had always been human. God only teaches.”
Part 6. Transformation After the Encounter
Having met the Presence of unconditional love, Experiencers return profoundly changed. Over 80% report life-altering transformation. Fear of death vanishes, compassion grows, and priorities shift from material success to spiritual purpose.
“I lost all fear of death,” wrote one woman. “Not because I’m brave now, but because I know I’m loved. That Love doesn’t end.”
“I used to chase money,” said another. “After the NDE, I started chasing kindness. People are the only treasures that last.”
Many return with heightened empathy.
“I can’t walk past someone who’s suffering without feeling it in my chest,” one woman explained. “I see God’s spark in them.”
“God didn’t send me back to be religious,” a man said. “He sent me back to love people. Same job, different heart.”
Forgiveness often blossoms spontaneously.
“I saw the pain of the people who hurt me,” said one Experiencer. “When I came back, forgiveness wasn’t a decision; it was the only thing that made sense.”
Even atheists return reverent.
“I don’t know the name of what I met,” one atheist said, “but it’s love. I see it in the eyes of my kids, in sunlight on water. It’s everywhere.”
“Every time I love someone,” another atheist wrote, “I feel like I’m sending a beam back to that Light. It’s the same energy, just flowing through human hands now.”
Part 7. Beyond Doctrine: The Infinite Embrace of God
The God of the Near-Death Experience transcends religion.
People of every background describe meeting the same boundless Love Source, though they use different names for It.
“I was raised without faith,” said one woman. “But when I met that Light, I knew it was what every religion had been reaching for.”
“I asked, ‘Which religion is right?’” recalled one man. “And the Being of Light laughed — kindly — and said, ‘All paths that teach love lead home.’”
The NDERF database confirms: atheists, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, Christians, Hindus — all describe the same divine qualities: light, love, unity, peace.
“Our doctrines are like children’s drawings of the sun,” one Experiencer said. “Beautiful, but the real Sun burns brighter than our crayons can show.”
This realization expands in reverence rather than diminishing it.
“God is too big for our boxes,” one woman wrote. “The Light loved everyone — Christians, Muslims, atheists, even people who had never heard the word ‘God.’ Love didn’t care about names.”
“I saw no hell made by God,” said another. “The only hell was the pain of not believing I was loved. When I finally accepted it, the darkness vanished.”
Again and again, these voices converge on the same truth:
God’s love is bigger than our beliefs.Doctrine may divide; Love unites.
The divine reality they describe is inclusive, personal, and endlessly creative — a Love Source that fills galaxies yet cares for every soul as if it were the only one.
“There are no strangers to God,” said one. “Only children who have forgotten where home is.”
Conclusion. The God Who Knows and Loves Us Completely
From the thousands of near-death accounts — and especially the 303 direct-encounter cases — emerges a portrait of God. This amazing Love Source is not a distant ruler but the living heartbeat of existence and consciousness. The words repeat like a hymn across the testimonies: Love. Light. Oneness. Home.
God is the radiant Love Source that greets every soul, the Light that knows every secret and still embraces us, the Unity that erases every division, the Energy that animates every atom. The Life Review reveals that this God’s judgment is mercy, that our choices matter because we are the instruments of that same Love Source.
Experiencers return changed, convinced that nothing — not death, not sin, not disbelief — can separate us from the Love Source that made us. They speak with quiet certainty that every being is known and fully accepted, exactly as they are.
“When I was in that Light,” wrote one woman, “I realized I had never been alone for a single second of my life. God had been inside every breath.”
This is the God the Experiencers bring back — not a distant Judge to be appeased, but the Beloved Presence in which all things live and move and have their being. To encounter such an awesome Love Source is to awaken to our truest identity: children of Light, infiniteflows of love.
And so, the final message, repeated across cultures and centuries, is simple yet revolutionary:
Love is what we came from. Love is what we return to. Love is who we are.
Author’s Note
This essay is offered from my heart. I have not written it to promote any doctrine or system of belief, but to listen — to the voices of those who crossed the boundary of death and returned bearing messages of love. Their words move me because they reveal something I have always hoped was true: that the deepest reality of the universe is not power or judgment, but love.
In studying these accounts, I have come to believe that the God encountered in Near-Death Experiences is not confined to any single faith or name. God is the very Love Source itself — living, luminous, and endlessly inclusive. This Love is the ground of our being and the destiny toward which every soul is drawn.
I do not claim to understand all the mysteries of these experiences, but I do know that they have changed how I see others, and how I see God. If every life is held in unconditional compassion, then every moment — every act of kindness, forgiveness, and mercy — becomes sacred.
My hope is that these stories remind you, as they remind me, that you are already known, already loved, already home in the heart of God.
Dr. Mike Rosebush (Ph.D., Counseling Psychology; he, him, his;) is the editor of “Reconstructed Love” where you may access intriguing and life-giving articles here. A short synopsis of Dr. Rosebush’s beliefs can be found here. He may be contacted at mikerosebush75@gmail.com.
