The author of the New York Times Bestseller “90 Minutes in Heaven” is headed to Bovina Baptist Church for a book-signing Tuesday night.

Since publishing the book in 2004, Don Piper has traveled the world, sharing his story of seeing Heaven after being pronounced dead following a car wreck on a Houston, Texas, highway in 1989.

“I heard he was in Mississippi and invited him to come,” said Jess Sumrall, pastor of Bovina Baptist. “I think there’s a lot of people curious about what happens after you die and what Heaven is like.”

Sumrall, who is from the Houston area, said he connects with Piper’s story because he, too, has traveled many times on that same highway.

That day in 1989, Piper, a pastor for more than 20 years, was leaving a church conference, says the book. He had taken a different route home than usual when his vehicle was struck head-on by an 18-wheeler. He was pronounced dead by four sets of emergency workers. A fellow pastor heading home from the same conference stopped and prayed, and Piper was revived.

“90 Minutes in Heaven,” which has sold 2.7 million copies in the United States, has been on the Publisher’s Weekly Paperback Religion Bestseller list, USA Today’s Top 150 Bestsellers list, Christian Retailing Top 100, Borders Religion and Spiritual Bestseller and CBA Christian Marketplace Top 50.

“There’s not too many people you can talk to who’s been dead,” said Sumrall. “When something important happens to you, you remember it.”

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Contact Manivanh Chanprasith at mchan@vicksburgpost.com