APRIL, 2007

 

Dear Lamplight Family,

 

We receive a continual flow of correspondence from needy people in Third World countries and from inmates in prisons and jails who have been helped by the publications that we send to them free of charge.  All of these people have been helped because of your contributions to Lamplight Ministries.  Thank you and God bless you.

 

COMMENTS FROM PEOPLE WHO HAVE

BEEN HELPED BY OUR PUBLICATIONS

 

We are pleased to share these comments with you each month.  If you would like to see the effect of your contributions, please visit our website at www.lamplight.net to see 525 comments from people in 39 different countries who have been helped by our books and Scripture cards. 

 

A MAN FROM MASSACHUSETTS ATTRIBUTES HIS REMARKABLE CALM-NESS BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER PROSTATE CANCER SURGERY TO QUIET CONFIDENCE IN THE LORD.  This man said, "As soon as I was diagnosed with prostate cancer I began to meditate on the Scripture and your explanation of the Scripture in Quiet Confidence in the Lord.  I carried this book with me everywhere for several weeks.  The specialist at the Lahey Clinic in Boston told me I was the calmest person with this diagnosis that he had ever seen.  During the pre-op and the surgery a number of people commented on how calm I was.  I experienced a lot of discomfort during the difficult first week at home after the surgery.  I focused constantly on the Scripture in this wonderful book.  I was remarkably calm.  Thank you for writing this book that has helped me so much."

 

A MAN FROM NIGERIA SAID THAT NEVER, NEVER GIVE UP HAS HELPED HIM TO FIND A CLOSER RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD. Stephen Ayiya from Kaduna State in Nigeria said, "Thank you for the books you sent me.  These books are so inspiring.  Never, Never Give Up has encouraged me to stand firm when everything is going wrong and I am going through some adversity.  This book has helped me find a closer relationship with God.  No matter how difficult my life is, I am learning to abide in a continuous consciousness of my Father's love for me.  I wish your ministry great success and prosperity."

 

A WOMAN FROM THE PHILIPPINES SAID THAT EXCHANGE YOUR WORRIES FOR GOD'S PERFECT PEACE HAS HELPED HER NOT TO WORRY EVEN THOUGH THE ECONOMY IN THE PHILIPPINES IS GETTING OUT OF CONTROL.  Loida Waggas of Danuo in the Philippines said, “Exchange Your Worries for God's Perfect Peace is a wonderful and encouraging book.  I have exchanged my worries for God's perfect peace.  Our economy has been getting out of control.  The price of rice, our main food, has risen 20%.  Fish, our second main food, is in greater need than ever.  I am a slow reader but I really enjoyed your book about God's peace.  For the first time in my life I understand what faith is all about.  Now I exercise my faith daily and it is growing.  Faith is not begging God, but believing God.  Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Hartman for the release of faith in the Philippines."

 

A MAN FROM IOWA WHO READ THE MANUSCRIPT OF THE SUPERNATURAL POWER OF THE LIVING WORD OF GOD SAID THAT THIS BOOK HAS GIVEN HIM TOTAL PEACE.  This man said, "The manuscript for your new book, The Supernatural Power of the Living Word of God, is great.  The Scripture in this book has given me total peace.  I absolutely refuse to focus on the circumstances I face, no matter how severe they seem to be.  I focus continually on God and His promises.  There is no place in my life for fear or worry.  I have shared this manuscript with approximately 20 Christians who meet each Thursday night for praise and worship, Bible study and prayer.  The response has been unanimous.  All of these people were encouraged by this book and are motivated to spend much more time studying and meditating on the Bible."

 

COMMENTS FROM JACK HARTMAN

 

The status of our next book:  Judy and I continue to work diligently on our next book which will be titled The Supernatural Power of the Living Word of God.  We are just finishing Draft #5 of this book.  We believe that the contents of this draft are approximately 90% of what the finished product will be.  Our major task now is to do the exhaustive study guide that we include at the end of each book.  Our study guides normally contain more than 200 questions complete with Scripture references so that you can take this test to see what you have learned from each book.  We will work diligently on completing the study guide.  Then we will do Draft #6.  We believe that the book will be ready to go to the printer this summer.  We are trusting God for the finances to print this book.

 

You can see from the preceding comment from the man in Iowa that he and the people in his weekly home fellowship group have been helped greatly by the contents of this book.  We would be pleased to send any interested reader an e-mail copy of all of Draft #5 when it is completed.  If you would like to get a preliminary look at this book, please send me an e-mail.  We would very much like to receive your comments regarding this manuscript, but receipt of your comments is not a necessity.  If you are helped by Draft #5, we hope you will share your comments with us so that we can encourage others so that they can be helped by this book.  Please contact me at lamplightmin@yahoo.com if you would like a copy of Draft #5.

 

One of my most precious possessions:  In our March newsletter I told you how God spoke to me to have 2,000 Scripture references categorized by topic by my 76th birthday on July 7th.  I started this project on January 27th.  I recently went past 1,000 Scriptures categorized by topic.  I believe that the total will be almost 1,200 by the end of April.  I am on track to have 2,000 Scriptures on July 7th.

 

This project is extremely hard work, but it is very rewarding.  I do not miss a day.  I am spending approximately 1 1/2 to 2 hours each day on top of everything else I do to complete this project. Doing this project is much more difficult now than it was at the start.  When I check I now find that more than 50% of the Scripture I want to include is already in there.  Therefore, I now must put in almost twice as much time to include a passage of Scripture as I did at the beginning.

 

 

I believe that we will have 4,000 or more passages of Scripture when this project is finished.  Right now my goal is to get to 2,000 by my 76th birthday and then to develop a specific plan to move forward from there.  I am very enthused as I work on this project.  I believe that you too will be enthused as we share more of this Scripture with you during the upcoming months.  We are adding many more Scripture references to our books as a result of this project.  I praise God and thank Him for this difficult, challenging and encouraging project.

 

A report regarding our website:  We are very optimistic about where we are headed with our website.  At the present time we have had a temporary breakdown because the man who hosts our website also works with Bill Keller on LivePrayer.  This man has been out straight dealing with several challenges that have come up with LivePrayer.  We believe that we will get back on track with our website in the near future.  We have several improvements and changes that we want to share with visitors to the website.

 

Even though the current changes and corrections have not been completed, we believe that you will find a great deal of valuable information on our website as it now is.  We hope you will visit this website.  We request your input and/or suggestions.  We are determined to get this website in perfect working order so that we can help many people from all over the world who are logging on to www.lamplight.net.

 

COMMENTS FROM JUDY HARTMAN

 

We have a sense of great expectation.  Living in the Spirit of God is the greatest of joys.  We see God weaving a tapestry of people whose talents join with us for the glory of God.  This tapestry becomes more beautiful every day!

 

We have self-published all but two of our seventeen books and ten sets of Scripture cards. We spend the majority of our time writing, publishing, printing, and distributing our publications free of charge to Third World pastors and leaders plus inmates in prisons and jails.

 

Jack has mentioned the goal of 2,000 Scriptures categorized by topic in Judy and then greatly expanding this Scripture.  We have just begun to pray about the possibility of this categorization being published in book form.  We do not believe we can self-publish this book.  We can only use The Amplified Bible in our books when we remain below a specific number of Scripture references.  If we do write The Topical Amplified Bible, we probably would have to have this book published by Zondervan, the publisher of The Amplified Bible.  We do not know how to achieve this goal, but the Lord does.  If He wants all of this Scripture published by topic, this goal will be achieved.  We are taking this project one day at a time.  Would you please pray for this?  We will let you know as this project develops. 

 

This book is by far the one that has captured Jack’s whole heart and emotions the most.  Every book has been a labor of love and devotion.  The bond that Jack has with this book exceeds the bond he has had with every other book.  The Topical Amplified Bible will contain the cream of all of the references Jack uses from The Amplified Bible.  The book will be a literal banquet of God’s Word presented by subject.  The atmosphere is electric in our home these days!  Jack has mentioned that we are completing The Supernatural Power of the Living Word of God.  Every one of our books could have this title.  This title summarizes exactly what Jack and I do.  We present the supernatural power of the living Word of God by subject.  This book is the essence of who we are and what God has commissioned us to write for the spread of the gospel and for His children to understand His Word.

 

Can you imagine a husband and wife writing a book together, correcting each other back and forth until they agree?  Can you imagine a husband and wife each having an office in their home and working together every day?  Jack and I are experiencing something that seems supernatural.  We are working together in closer harmony than we could have imagined possible.  We almost don’t have to speak because we know what the other is thinking.  We are laughing a whole lot and enjoying the commission that God has given to us of serving His Word in bite-sized pieces.

 

We have had a steady flow of income since we began Lamplight Ministries, Inc.  We have had times when our bank account has been low, but we already knew of God’s faithfulness, so we have always known God would provide.  We are now in a new time of walking on the water.  These times are the most fun times in the Lord.  We take a step of faith knowing that God will do something, but not knowing exactly what.  That is what we are doing right now.  With extremely limited funds we are preparing to mail an enormous number of free books to pastors in Third World countries who will be distributing the books to other pastors in their nations.  This massive project is necessary because on May 14th the United States Post Office is eliminating the sea mail that we have used for many years.  All of our future publications will have to be mailed to Third World countries by air mail. 

 

Because of this massive change we are planning to send out in the next two weeks more books than we used to send out in an entire year.  Elizabeth, our faithful and talented shipping lady, asked us how we can send so many books in such a short time with so little money.  We just smiled and asked her to please mail them steadily each day.  We are trusting the Lord completely.

 

Instead of seeing this rate hike as a deterrent, we are finding that we are bonding more deeply with the pastors and having even closer contact with them.  They will report to us during the months and years ahead on the lives that are being changed by these Scripture-filled publications.

 

If you have never experienced going beyond your comfort zone, you are missing one of the highest joys of life.  You make a decision to do something that can only take place if God intervenes.  Let me know what happens if you decide to walk on water.  Come on in, the water’s fine!

 

We love you with deep love.  We pray that you remain in the center of God’s will for your life, where there is the deepest joy.  We are blessed to be a blessing (Romans 12:1-3).

                       

Love in Jesus Christ,

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AN INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY IN GOD’S KINGDOM

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