General Bio That Everyone Gets
As an author, Lisa is a storyteller with a heart for truth. Her greatest desire in her fiction and nonfiction work is to challenge the reader to discover the truth of who Jesus is and who they are to Him. Now, here as we wait for the any-minute arrival of Jesus for His church in the rapture, Lisa’s latest mission is to warn the lost and wake the found and to help others discover their unique voice to share the truth of our times. More at DaybreakWithLisa.com or lisaheatonbooks.com.
The Personal Stuff Just for You
I’m a Nashville native, which makes me something of a unicorn in a city of transplants. I now live in a town nearby with my hubs, Kelly. Other than our pup Sophie, we’re empty nesters, something way underrated if you ask us. We would rather be together than anywhere else, a surprising feat after twenty-eight years of marriage and after a really rocky start to that marriage. I’m blessed and thankful and never take him for granted.
My oldest son Adam lives in South Carolina and is a devoted family man. I’m so proud of the amazing strides this young man has taken over the years. He has a beautiful story of redemption and a hard-fought-for testimony of the power of God after addiction. Citlalli is my daughter-in-love and a wonderful mom to the world’s cutest kids, Ellie and Ayden.
The youngest is Zack, last to fly the nest. He works from home, a bit of a homebody like his mum, for a great Nashville based company. Zack has tremendous, God-given talent as a singer. From fourteen to twenty he was on the adult praise team and led us each week in worship. I’ll never stop hoping and praying that he steps back into his call to lead God’s people in worship. There’s an empty place in the kingdom as long as that boy forfeits his call. You can pray with me for his return.
Daybreak with Lisa
My journey with Daybreak first began when I saw this world was merely “minutes” away from its end. It was easy to see that we had only so many daybreaks remaining until Jesus came. With all the well-informed prophecy pastors, teachers, and sites keeping us informed, I knew that wasn’t my lane to travel. Instead, I have given readers a way to share that truth with friends and family who don’t see by offering Daybreak, Last Days of Light for free here. The fiction story tells what’s going on in our world and helps the reader find comfort and hope in the rapture.
Daybreak with Lisa has grown from there. I’m a discipler at heart. I long to help others know their soon-coming Groom, something I hope to do through the Prepare Your Heart Series that is being offered on Rapture Ready. And I hope to help others like me, those who do see what’s going on, to find their unique voice in telling others through the How Do I Share What I Know? Series.
Me Before Jesus
Before walking with Jesus, I was a messy and damaged young woman. Sin dominated my life for many years, but isn’t that what we expect of a life apart from Truth? Because I experienced sexual abuse as a very young child, my early adulthood was lived out with a terribly skewed view of love and sex. My way of navigating the world and getting my misshaped-heart’s needs met led me to make many mistakes and painful choices. I can’t count the things I would go back and do if given the chance. But I also can’t count the ways that God has used those very mistakes to minister to others through me.
When considering what I would write here, I had a long list of admissions in mind. I wanted to purge all the worst of me so that I would never be called a hypocrite since most things I call out now as sin are the same sins I was once guilty of myself. There are things in particular I felt I should tell. I asked in prayer if those things should land here on the page, absolutely willing to spill the beans. That very morning the Lord led me to Isaiah 54 for something that I thought was unrelated to the question I had laid before Him. Then there it was, a verse that He has used many times in relation to this very topic of my past. “Fear not, for you will not be put to shame; and do not feel humiliated, for you will not be disgraced; but you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more” (Is. 54:4). I do understand that, in context, this verse is spoken to a returned Israel, but I also know He has used it to speak to me personally at least a dozen or more times over the years when I remind Him that I have no business in ministry.
He’s often assured me, deep down in my spirit, that my past and the sins representing the broken woman I once was have no bearing on this new creation in Christ that He’s formed me into. What my past sins do allow is for the delicate hands of the Potter to sculpt the characters I write, ones still in process like me, like us all. I write about broken people because I was broken “people.” I paint portraits of redemption because I’ve known great redemption.
I would never expect you to reveal your before-Jesus past to the world for you to be qualified to minister to the broken and to the lost. If your service and ministry are true and genuine, and the fruit of that reveals the new creation you are now, why do I need to know? That would be between you and your Redeemer.
All this to say: A day may come when someone says, “Did you hear that Lisa Heaton did this or that?” Whatever they tell you, it just might be true. I did a whole lot of this and even more of that. So your response can be, “She prolly did. Isn’t Jesus good?” I can only praise Jesus, the One who fixes broken things and uses them in spite of their cracks. Am I still cracked? In this human body, yeah, a little. I’ve come to find, though, that vessels whom Jesus uses to pour very often have visible, Spirit-glued cracks since the perfect vases tend to sit on the shelf pointing porcelain fingers. The one who is forgiven much loves much. That’s a thing, says Luke 7:47.
After many years of healing, I’m more thankful for my cracks than regretful. Without them I might just be a pointing finger rather than one willing to tell the broken that the Potter loves and mends broken things.
Need the Potter? If you or someone you know has suffered childhood sexual abuse, I would love to offer you the ebook of Deceiver at no charge. The overall story does not dwell on Casey’s abuse and is not a devastating read for victims. Only a couple of later chapters address her healing. But the story does depict how a misshapen heart will make many wrong decisions based on childhood experience. Send me an email at Lisa@LisaHeatonBooks.com and tell me your first and last name and that you would like to read Deceiver for free.