The strange story of Daniel Ekechukwu, the Nigerian pastor who reportedly died, saw heaven and hell and came back to life

• Daniel Ekechukwu was reportedly pronounced dead after a car accident in 2001.

• His wife took his coffin to a Reinhard Bonnke crusade in Onitsha.

• Witnesses later claimed he began breathing again inside the church basement.

What business does a coffin have inside a church, except, of course, for the religious rites performed before a burial?

On Sunday, December 2, 2001, thousands of Christians gathered in Onitsha, southeastern Nigeria, for a church dedication service where famous German evangelist Reinhard Bonnke was preaching.

Upstairs, Bonnke was preaching to the crowd, while downstairs, a dead man lay on two tables in a Sunday School room.

His name was Daniel Ekechukwu, a Nigerian pastor who had been dead for more than a day, embalmed and prepared to be buried by his family. His wife, Nneka Ekechukwu, however, refused to bury him.

What happened next would become one of Nigeria's strangest religious stories.

A few days earlier, Ekechukwu's life had seemed completely ordinary. On November 29, he and Nneka had an argument. 

The disagreement ended with Nneka slapping him. The two tried to reconcile the following morning, but Ekechukwu remained angry. “He angrily thought about how he would put his wife in her place when he returned home."

On November 30, he left home in his Mercedes-Benz 230E but never made it back.

As Ekechukwu drove down a steep hill that evening, the brakes of his car reportedly failed. The vehicle crashed into a concrete pillar designed to prevent cars from going over an embankment. 

He was not wearing a seat belt, so the impact threw his chest violently against the steering wheel. He began vomiting blood and struggling to breathe. Passers-by pulled him from the wreckage and rushed him to St Charles Borromeo Hospital in Onitsha.

Ekechukwu's wife was called to the hospital. He was in critical condition and asked to be transferred to a hospital in Owerri, where his personal doctor practised. Nneka arranged an ambulance despite the distance — about 80 kilometres.

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On the journey, Ekechukwu, sensing that he might soon die, called his wife to share his final words. 

"My husband called to me and told me that I should take care of the children and the ministry. He said he had built a house for me and that I should not worry. I should take care of everybody. He said that some people are called to go quickly (to die early) and that he was among them," Ekechukwu’s wife told CBN.

According to the account documented by Christian writer David Servant after interviews with people connected to the incident, Ekechukwu was later examined at Eunice Clinic by Dr Jossy Anuebunwa.

The doctor reportedly found no breathing, heartbeat or pulse, while Ekechukwu's pupils were dilated and fixed. A death certificate was issued at 11:30 p.m. on November 30.

His body was taken to a mortuary in Ikeduru, near Owerri, shortly after 1 a.m. And this is where the story became even stranger.

The mortuary reportedly had no cold-storage facilities, so the mortician, Darlington Manu, began preparing Ekechukwu's body with embalming chemicals.

Servant documented that Manu injected chemicals into Ekechukwu's fingers and feet and then attempted to make an incision in his inner thigh to continue the embalming process.

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He said he experienced a physical shock and was pushed away from the body. He tried again. The same thing allegedly happened. The mortician eventually stopped and placed Ekechukwu's body with the other corpses in the mortuary.

Later that night, Manu reportedly heard what sounded like worship songs coming from inside the building. When he approached, the singing stopped. He reportedly heard it again and, on investigating, said he noticed what appeared to be a light coming from Ekechukwu's face.

Manu became frightened and asked Ekechukwu's father to remove the body.

Nneka had a dream. According to her later account, she saw her husband's face and heard him telling her that he was not dead and that she should take him to Onitsha, where Bonnke was preaching.

Her family thought she had lost her senses, as Ekechukwu had already been dead for more than 28 hours, and his body had reportedly become stiff with rigor mortis.

But Nneka insisted. "I began to call on the name of the Lord. I wanted to remind God of His promises. One verse that inspired me was Hebrews 11:35: 'Women received their dead bodies to life.' The moment I read this verse, it strengthened me to hold God firm and act," she said.

As a result of her insistence, the family bought a coffin on Sunday morning, dressed Ekechukwu for burial and placed his body inside. An ambulance then carried the coffin to Grace of God Mission in Onitsha, where Bonnke was preaching at an afternoon service.

They arrived at about 1 p.m. Security officers initially refused to let the coffin onto the church grounds. Bonnke's presence had drawn heavy security, and according to Servant's account, officers suspected that the coffin could contain explosives.

Nneka opened it to show the security men that it was her husband's corpse. Eventually, church leaders allowed Ekechukwu's body to be taken downstairs, where it was placed on two tables in a basement room.

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Upstairs, Bonnke kept preaching while downstairs, people gathered around Ekechukwu's body and began praying, and then, according to eyewitness accounts, the corpse twitched, and irregular breathing followed. Those around him continued praying and began massaging his stiff neck, arms and legs.

Immediately it happened, word spread through the church, and people began rushing downstairs. The basement filled with believers, then Ekechukwu sneezed and suddenly rose from the table.

According to the account, it happened sometime between 3:50 p.m. and 5:15 p.m. on December 2 — roughly 42 hours after he had been pronounced dead.

Bonnke was not downstairs when all of this happened. In fact, according to his later account, he did not even know the dead man was inside the building.

Years later, Bonnke described the incident to the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN), saying Nneka had brought her husband's body because she believed he would return to life. He said he had been preaching and knew nothing about what was happening below.

But Ekechukwu's story did not end with his resurrection.

Pastor Ekechukwu claimed that during the period between his death and reported return to life, he had experienced what he believed was the afterlife.

According to his testimony, two angels appeared after he died and separated his spirit from his injured body. He said he was then taken to Paradise, where he saw multitudes of people dressed in white worshipping before a brilliant light.

He described seeing what he believed was a heavenly mansion prepared for believers. He also said the angel took him to Hell.

Ekechukwu described darkness, screams and people suffering consequences for sins they had committed during their lives. Among the people he claimed to have seen were a former Nigerian military dictator, a pastor who had embezzled church money and a Christian who had become involved in occult practices.

According to Bonnke’s account, he said one shouted to him, 'I was a pastor, and I stole money. 'Help me to return the money.' He said it was so frightening to him that the angel turned to him and said, 'The prayer of the rich man in Luke 16 will now be fulfilled, and you will be sent back to earth as a last warning to this generation.' "

But the most frightening part of his account was that he said he was warned that he could also end up there.

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Ekechukwu had been angry with his wife before his death. According to his testimony, the angel reminded him of Jesus' teachings about anger, forgiveness and reconciliation. He said he was shown that his refusal to forgive Nneka mattered even after he had prayed for forgiveness while dying.

Ekechukwu later travelled around Nigeria sharing his testimony, while Christ for All Nations, Bonnke's ministry, produced a documentary featuring him, his wife, the doctor who pronounced him dead, the mortician and others connected to the incident. 

Servant also published four reports based on his investigation, including interviews conducted in Nigeria in 2002 and 2003.

But the story has never escaped one enormous question: Did Ekechukwu Ekechukwu actually die?

In part two of four of Servant’s report, he wrote that he had received questions about Daniel Ekechukwu’s resurrection story with reactions ranging from “total unbelief to serious self-examination".

Ideally, one would question whether Ekechukwu was correctly pronounced dead and whether the medical circumstances were adequately documented. 

Note that even Bonnke, in his interview with CBN, acknowledged that Ekechukwu “was embalmed, but not the way it is done in America with the removal of organs.” 

However, according to accounts published by David Servant, the Christian Broadcasting Network and Christ for All Nations, Ekechukwu was pronounced dead after the accident, went to heaven and hell, and came back to life in the church basement. 

More than two decades later, Ekechukwu is reported to be alive and has continued sharing his account of the experience.