Let us continue to follow Gideon's path to see how God changed him from a prisoner to a freedom fighter.

"Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD. So the LORD delivered them into the hand of Midian for seven years, and the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of the Midianites, the children of Israel made for themselves the dens, the caves, and the strongholds which are in the mountains. So it was, whenever Israel had sown, Midianites would come up; also Amalekites and the people of the East would come up against them. Then they would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the earth as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep nor ox nor donkey. For they would come up with their livestock and their tents, coming in as numerous as locusts; both they and their camels were without number; and they would enter the land to destroy it. So Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites, and the children of Israel cried out to the LORD.

And it came to pass, when the children of Israel cried out to the LORD because of the Midianites, that the LORD sent a prophet to the children of Israel, who said to them, 'Thus says the LORD God of Israel: 'I brought you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of bondage; and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you and gave you their land.' Also I said to you, 'I am the LORD your God; do not fear the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell.' But you have not obeyed My voice.'

Now the Angel of the LORD came and sat under the terebinth tree which was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, while his son Gideon threshed wheat in the winepress, in order to hide it from the Midianites. And the Angel of the LORD appeared to him, and said to him, 'The LORD is with you, you mighty man of valor!' Gideon said to Him, 'O my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all His miracles which our fathers told us about, saying, Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt? But now the LORD has forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.'

Then the LORD turned to him and said, 'Go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. Have I not sent you?' So he said to Him, 'O my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house.' And the LORD said to him, 'Surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man.' Then he said to Him, 'If now I have found favor in Your sight, then show me a sign that it is You who talk with me. 'Do not depart from here, I pray, until I come to You and bring out my offering and set it before You." And He said, 'I will wait until you come back.' So Gideon went in and prepared a young goat, and unleavened bread from an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot; and he brought them out to Him under the terebinth tree and presented them. The Angel of God said to him, 'Take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on this rock, and pour out the broth.' And he did so. Then the Angel of the LORD put out the end of the staff that was in His hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened bread; and fire rose out of the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. And the Angel of the LORD departed out of his sight. Now Gideon perceived that He was the Angel of the LORD. So Gideon said, 'Alas, O Lord GOD! For I have seen the Angel of the LORD face to face.' Then the LORD said to him, 'Peace be with you; do not fear, you shall not die'" (Judges 6:1-23).

Gideon was working hard at making life work with his own power, but he ended up with failure, low self-esteem, and hopelessness. He was hiding in his wine vat underground in order to avoid the Midianites who would come in hordes and wipe out the crops and steal the livestock. No matter how hard he and his people tried, they could not overcome the enemy. The Midianites were those enemies that beat down God's pastures and robbed the seed. These were God's people like we are. They had a covenant like we do; however Satan had neutralized them in their effectiveness for God's mission for their lives.

Midianites. The Hebrew definition is strife, contention, and confusion.

In the same way, today's Midianites, demons rob the Word of God to keep us from being fruitful. Notice that they waited until Israel had sown their crops, then they swarmed down to destroy them. They came as grasshoppers. Israel was greatly impoverished.

God has a simple system for His covenant people to live by.

It is simple and childlike. It is living by the Word of God planted in your heart to bear fruit for all of your needs and all of God's needs and purposes on this earth. Please read the preceding sentence again. Get it down into your heart, deep down. Meditate upon it.

"But he answering said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word which goes out through God's mouth" (Matthew 4:4, Darby).

The angel of the Lord said to Gideon, "I am the LORD your God; do not fear the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell." But you have not obeyed My voice." This is why Gideon's people were in such terrible condition. They should have been exercising dominion over their enemies, not threshing their wheat hiding in caves. Wheat threshing is done in the open air with the wind acting as the threshing power.

The satanic world has never changed its strategy. Satan started with Adam and Eve in the Garden by convincing them that they did not need to live on God's Word. He even twisted the Word when he told Eve that God had said to not even touch the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. God never said that, He had told them not to eat of it. There is a big difference. God wanted them to sustain their lives on the Tree of Life, the Word of God, however they were convinced to sustain their lives with their own reasoning and intelligence.

Living by depending upon the Word is the only normal way for a righteous, new creation person to live. To live any other way is abnormal. It is like putting diesel fuel into a gasoline engine. It will just not work properly.

Thousands of years of cultures contrary to God's simple plan for man has distorted how we are supposed to live. Jesus was very clear when He taught His disciples and us that the entire Kingdom of God, its very mystery was embedded in the parable of the sower in Mark 4, Luke 8 and Matthew 13 "And He said to them, 'To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables'" (Mark 4:11).

The parable of the sower, Mark chapter 4, contains the secret.

"1 And again He began to teach by the sea. And a great multitude was gathered to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat in it on the sea; and the whole multitude was on the land facing the sea.

2 Then He taught them many things by parables, and said to them in His teaching:

3 "Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow.

4 "And it happened, as he sowed, that some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds of the air came and devoured it.

5 "Some fell on stony ground, where it did not have much earth; and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of earth.

6 "But when the sun was up it was scorched, and because it had no root it withered away.

7 "And some seed fell among thorns; and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no crop.

8 "But other seed fell on good ground and yielded a crop that sprang up, increased and produced: some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some a hundred."

9 And He said to them, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

10 But when He was alone, those around Him with the twelve asked Him about the parable.

11 And He said to them, "To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables,

12 "so that 'Seeing they may see and not perceive, And hearing they may hear and not understand; Lest they should turn, And their sins be forgiven them.'"

13 And He said to them, "Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?

14 "The sower sows the word.

15 "And these are the ones by the wayside where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan comes immediately and takes away the word that was sown in their hearts.

16 "These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with gladness;

17 "and they have no root in themselves, and so endure only for a time. Afterward, when tribulation or persecution arises for the word's sake, immediately they stumble.

18 "Now these are the ones sown among thorns; they are the ones who hear the word,

19 "and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

20 "But these are the ones sown on good ground, those who hear the word, accept it, and bear fruit: some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some a hundred."

21 Also He said to them, "Is a lamp brought to be put under a basket or under a bed? Is it not to be set on a lampstand?

22 "For there is nothing hidden which will not be revealed, nor has anything been kept secret but that it should come to light.

23 "If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear."

24 Then He said to them, "Take heed what you hear. With the same measure you use, it will be measured to you; and to you who hear, more will be given.

25 "For whoever has, to him more will be given; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him"" (Mark 4:1-25).

Now go back and study the ways that Satan steals the Word, and determine to overcome those temptations in God's power.

God's program is to have us feed on Him, Jesus, the Living Word of God. "Then Jesus said to them, 'Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you" (John 6:53). When we do He plants supernatural seeds into our hearts which grow into fruit. The fruit is for our character, our earthly provisions, and for God's work, ministry. This fruit glorifies God because only He can produce it, it is not something that we have produced and asked Him to bless.

The Word is actual substance when planted in our hearts by God speaking. Back in 1984 my income did not come close to my family obligations. I was talking to the Lord about it and He instructed me to give Him my budget. Then He told me that He was planting 2 Corinthians 9:8 into my heart as a seed; "And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work." He told me to meditate on it, confess it and stand on it. Within a few months my budget had been met. Since then I understood how the seed works. Of course there were other acts of obedience and I had to continually hear and obey God during the process.

Our substance is supernatural. You cannot see it with your eyes, or hear it with your ears. But you can thank Him when you know it is planted.

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1). When you look at the color yellow, your eyes see the evidence and relay it to your mind. When you hear the train that you cannot see, your ears hear the evidence that you cannot see and relay it to your mind. When you hear the Word of God you have another sense, faith, which tells you that the seed of the Word of God is now planted in your heart, and if you nurture it fruit will spring up from it.

Once the Word is planted in our hearts we are responsible for watering it with our verbal confession of it. The parable in Mark chapter 4 makes it clear that Satan will use all means to steal the Word, the seed from your heart. You will be tempted, but your weapon is the Word itself. Confess it out loud, several times daily! Repent your way through the trial and the fruit will appear.

Like a Rock! Fix your mind on this evidence. It is surer than anything!

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings [Words] of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the roc" (Matthew 7:24-25).

Take a lesson from the Israelites.

This passage of Scripture in Judges chapter 6 is very poignant with the idea of this struggle. First, the Hebrews were in desperate trouble because they had not obeyed the Word of God. Satan had succeeded in stealing the seed out of their hearts through their own rebellion and self-sufficiency. Also, there was a continuing destruction of the seed that were sown into the ground, in their farms, which is a picture of our hearts. The Midianites rode their hordes of camels down and destroyed the crops while they were still only seeds. That is Satan's program for you and for me!

God spoke to the Israelites. In God's mercy, He heard the cries of the Israelites and sent a prophet. His mercy endures forever. The prophet told the Israelites that God was their God, He had delivered them from bondage once and that the reason they were in bondage again (this time in their own Promise Land) was that they did not obey the voice of God (The Word of God). If we do not live on the Word of God daily, we will surely become slaves and prisoners to our enemies. There is no way around it.

Often the Lord must wait until we are hurting enough to really look at our true condition.

Could it be that only our failure and brokenness can bring us to trust only in the Word? Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3). Why are the poor so blessed? Because they will trust only in the Kingdom of Heaven, which, according to Mark 4:11 operates on the Word seed of God.

So often while we are in the process of allowing the seed turn into fruit we will go through tremendous suffering and even crushing unto despair of life. Look, if Satan is working you over to steal the seed, it is not going to be a party. However, he is only doing God's work of killing your flesh. Isaiah said that the Assyrians were God's rod when they attacked Israel.

When seeds germinate in the ground they absorb many of the elements in the soil. When God's Word germinates in our hearts, it absorbs the flesh, the sin, and the things that do not belong there. Oh, what a mighty God we serve!

Can we then thank Him for all of the things that come into our lives that crush us and make us "poor in spirit?" The Lord loves you very much. Don't let your circumstances taint God's character. He loved these Israelites and He wanted them to prosper, but He had to wait until they hurt enough to cry out to Him. Then His next step was to have the prophet show them why they were hurting. There is a hurting that is caused by not depending upon the Word, and there is a suffering that comes when we do depend upon the Word. So either way, get ready!

We desperately need to repent. Repentance is a gift of God. Too many people feel condemned when they are called to repent, and in their pride they miss God completely. While all the time the Lord is standing there in His mercy longing to deliver. But He needs our wills turned towards Him, He needs our sins of pride, rebellion, self-sufficiency, and not trusting in His Word confessed as sin. As soon as we do He forgives and moves us on to the next step. His grace kicks in, as we will see in the next chapter.

If you have not been depending upon on seed, the Word planted in your heart, for everything in your life, this is a great time to confess that as sin and repent. Don't live on the lower level of life, which Heathens must endure, rather turn, and you will find the Kingdom of God at hand.

"Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added [come upon you without human effort] to you" (Matthew 6:31-33).

Laid out flat!

"Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you [laid you out flat, horizontal], that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you" (John 15:16).

It's all about fruit! God's original plan for man was to have His Word spoken to man's heart, for man to react and obey His Word, resist the devil who would attempt to steal the precious seed, and then rest while the seed matured into fruit. Adam decided that he could abandon that plan and substitute it with a "better plan." That "better plan" is called sin.

Now God has us in a recovery mode. A major factor in the recovery is to be laid out flat, or in other words, to allow our "better plan" to fail. How can God plant seeds in a garden that is vertical and that is running around trying to use things that are not even seeds? Often we think God is unkind by allowing us to fail, but in fact it is His love and compassion to allow us to be "laid out flat" in order that we may return to normal and bear His fruit.

John 15 was a major part of Jesus' closing statements to His disciples. He emphasized fruit. He said that some of the conditions were to obey His Word and to be laid out horizontal so that the fruit could grow. In the parable of the sower, Jesus said in Mark 4:11 that this parable contained the very mystery of the Kingdom of God. Fruit is the mystery. So many people miss this simple Gospel of the Kingdom.

Thank God that as believers we are going to Heaven when our bodies die. But how are we supposed to live between now and then? He wants all of our needs supplied by fruit. We can watch His fruit supply the fruit of our character, the fruit of our material needs, and fruit in blessing others. Love, security, and significance are the big three.

Woe to the person who is so strong that he/she can make life work with "the better plan" and avoid being laid flat.