Walk Worthy Press: Heavenly Places by Kimberly Cash Tate

Author Testimony

I came to know Jesus at the age of twenty-seven. I had known about Him growing up, mostly through religion class at my Catholic school, and even believed that He was the Son of God and Savior of the world. But I never knew what that had to do with me personally. I never knew I was a sinner in need of a Savior, and that He had died for me, that I might live.

For a long time, I thought I was on the right track, even successful. I graduated from college, then law school, clerked for a federal judge, and landed a position at a top law firm in Wisconsin. But it wasn't until I visited a church one Sunday and sat crying in the pew at the end of the sermon, that I realized my life was empty. God drew me that day by His love and grace, and I've never been the same.

Soon after, I joined a women's Bible study that met on Wednesday evenings at the church and I began to grow through study of the Word. What an incredible time! My mind was being renewed constantly as twenty-seven years of thinking, doing, and being were shaken up and replaced by biblical ways of thinking, doing, and being.

A couple of years later, as I sat in church one Sunday, this idea came to write about the changes God was working in my life. After a lot of prayer, I put together a proposal with the first couple of chapters and an outline of the rest of the book, as well as a query letter to send to agents. I had heard of Denise Stinson but she wasn't in the huge Guide to Literary Agents that I had bought and I didn't have an address for her. So, for my first mailing, I decided to send query letters to six agents who looked like they might have an interest in African American or spiritual subject matter. I remember praying over the letters as I put them in the mailbox. That same week, I got a call at work.

I answered the phone and heard, “Kim, this is Denise Stinson.” My jaw dropped. I hadn't sent her a letter. She went on to say that I had sent a query to an agent in New York who happened to be an atheist, and that this agent forwarded the letter to Denise, thinking she might be interested. She asked if I had sent her a proposal.

“Um, I'll send it overnight.”

Denise called that weekend to tell me she loved it and would represent me. More Christian Than African American was published in 1999 by Rodale Press.

I thought more books would follow on the heels of that one. My children were toddlers and I left my position as a partner at the law firm to be at home with them and, I thought, to write. God had other plans. He wanted to teach me that my first ministry was my family and my home, which, I soon learned, would consume all of my time. He also gave me the desire to devote a regular part of my day to studying the Bible, a discipline I love and continue to this day.

Meanwhile, Denise told me about this publishing company she was starting that would feature African American Christian fiction, and encouraged me to try my hand at fiction. It seemed pie-in-the-sky at the time, but God was working, planting seeds. Years later, ideas for a novel kept tickling the corners of my mind. I still didn't have much time to write because by then, God had put it in my heart to homeschool…which also consumes one's time. But one day I sat down at the computer and typed out a sentence, then another, and another, erased them, and started again.

I don't have one of those stories about completing a novel in a month's time. Heavenly Places took about three years, a chunk of it spent doing nothing with the book but praying that it was truly God's will. It may seem strange but by that time, writing another book was no longer a priority. Home was, and I didn't want to invest loads of time writing—and away from my main ministry—unless I was sure God was calling me to it. When I got that assurance in my heart, the writing took off, and I was amazed at the way the book unfolded, with story lines I hadn't even envisioned. When I finally finished it and sent it to Denise, with a hint of anxiety I might add, I was overjoyed when she gave it the thumbs-up.

I love this book, with its powerful themes of skin color, marriage, family, and friendship, because I know with all my heart that God was the inspiration for it. I pray it blesses everyone who reads it.

My mother recently found a piece of paper on which I'd written at ten years old that I wanted to be a writer. I have no idea what kind of writing I thought I'd be doing, but I know I didn't imagine this. I would have never thought, first of all, that I would know intimately the God of the universe, or that He would use me to minister through writing. This is definitely a ministry to me, and I give God all the glory for establishing it.

Kimberly Cash Tate

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