Preface
In the Old Testament, sometimes the Lord gives us a look at the successes of His prophets, but sometimes we get another view. Some prophets were murdered. like Uriah, who fled to Egypt, but was brought back to Judah and executed (see Jeremiah 26:20-23). Other prophets were more or less exiled, such as the 100 prophets whom Obadiah hid during the reign of Ahab and Jezebel (see 1 Kings 18). Amos was basically told to get out of town—ironically, at Bethel itself, some years after this incident according to Amos chapter 7.
The material here follows my previous message, “O Altar, Altar” and begins after the prophet has left King Jeroboam of the northern, ten-tribe kingdom. The prophet is now going back to his home territory in Judah according to God’s command.
But he never made it back to his home, as we will see.
The prophet who lied
1 Kings 13:11-18, NASB: 11 Now an old prophet was living in Bethel; and his sons came and told him all the deeds which the man of God had done that day in Bethel; the words which he had spoken to the king, these also they related to their father. 12 Their father said to them, "Which way did he go?" Now his sons had seen the way which the man of God who came from Judah had gone. 13 Then he said to his sons, "Saddle the donkey for me." So they saddled the donkey for him and he rode away on it. 14 So he went after the man of God and found him sitting under an oak; and he said to him, "Are you the man of God who came from Judah?" And he said, "I am." 15 Then he said to him, "Come home with me and eat bread." 16 He said, "I cannot return with you, nor go with you, nor will I eat bread or drink water with you in this place. 17 "For a command came to me by the word of the LORD, 'You shall eat no bread, nor drink water there; do not return by going the way which you came.'" 18 He said to him, "I also am a prophet like you, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the LORD, saying, 'Bring him back with you to your house, that he may eat bread and drink water.'" But he lied to him.
I used to think the “old prophet” was a good man, or a true prophet of the Lord, but that may not actually be the case. It is true that some godly people, genuine believers in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob remained in the northern kingdom, but at this time we don’t have any knowledge of how many were still there. We do read in 2 Chronicles 11 that many priests and Levites from the north came to Jerusalem, according to verse 16, to sacrifice to the Lord. We don’t read that they went back to the north, and who could blame them?
So, the fact that this prophet stayed in the very city where Jeroboam built the pagan altars, made the golden calves, and then declared these were the gods of Israel, makes me wonder how strong and sincere the old prophet’s faith really was. Why didn’t he cry out against the altar, if he were truly a prophet of the LORD? And, why didn’t he stand with the prophet (actually called a man of God) from Judah? These and other questions come to mind.
Even worse, the old prophet went looking for the man of God from Judah and deliberately lied to him. The old prophet offered the man of God from Judah a meal, but the text does not state if he had heard that the man of God had turned down a similar offer from the king himself.
Now the old prophet resorted to a blatant lie. The old prophet said that an angel told him that the man of God from Judah should to go to the old prophet’s house to eat and drink. We can understand this, namely, that the man of God had been resting under the shade of an oak tree. This probably meant that he was either hot, tired, possibly hungry as well (or all of these), even though Judah wasn’t very far from Bethel. This leads us to look at, sadly,
The prophet who died
The writer of 1 Kings records God’s message to the man of God from Judah:
1 Kings 13:19-25, NASB: 19 So he went back with him, and ate bread in his house and drank water. 20 Now it came about, as they were sitting down at the table, that the word of the LORD came to the prophet who had brought him back; 21 and he cried to the man of God who came from Judah, saying, "Thus says the LORD, 'Because you have disobeyed the command of the LORD, and have not observed the commandment which the LORD your God commanded you, 22 but have returned and eaten bread and drunk water in the place of which He said to you, "Eat no bread and drink no water"; your body shall not come to the grave of your fathers.'" 23 It came about after he had eaten bread and after he had drunk, that he saddled the donkey for him, for the prophet whom he had brought back. 24 Now when he had gone, a lion met him on the way and killed him, and his body was thrown on the road, with the donkey standing beside it; the lion also was standing beside the body. 25 And behold, men passed by and saw the body thrown on the road, and the lion standing beside the body; so they came and told it in the city where the old prophet lived.
The prophet from Judah, we need to remember, had been told to not eat or drink anything. Even though he heard a message from a prophet who turned out to be a liar, he had no excuse for his disobedience. Let’s not be too hard on him, though: he was a human, after all, and as a believer, he’ll be part of the multitude of saints, who, one day, will be part of the Eternal Kingdom! He lost his life on this earth because he didn’t obey, but one day he will be part of the many who will never die again. That promise, by the way, is available for anyone and everyone who will repent of their sins and accept God’s gift of salvation.
Another thing to notice is the reaction of the lying prophet. He spoke, apparently, very calmly, perhaps soothingly, but one wonders why he would tell an out-and-out lie to a true prophet. No one needs to speculate, however: God didn’t cause the lying prophet’s emotions, thoughts, etc., to be revealed. We would do well to stay away from the areas God didn’t want us to explore. Still, he somehow convinced the true prophet to disobey God!
Imagine the surprise, then, for both of them, when the Lord Himself spoke through the lying prophet! He cried out aloud (verse 21), when he relayed God’s message, in contrast to the tone he had used before. This problem, smooth talking and lies, has affected God’s people for many, many, years. The true prophet, sadly, wasn’t the first or the last to fall victim to lies.
One can only imagine the emotions and thoughts as the man of God from Judah must have pondered as he set out for home. We don’t know how far he was able to go on his journey because verse 24 says a lion met him and killed him. Now we can take a look at what happened after this event took place.
The prophet who cried
1 Kings 13:26-32, NASB: 26 Now when the prophet who brought him back from the way heard it, he said, "It is the man of God, who disobeyed the command of the LORD; therefore the LORD has given him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word of the LORD which He spoke to him." 27 Then he spoke to his sons, saying, "Saddle the donkey for me." And they saddled it. 28 He went and found his body thrown on the road with the donkey and the lion standing beside the body; the lion had not eaten the body nor torn the donkey. 29 So the prophet took up the body of the man of God and laid it on the donkey and brought it back, and he came to the city of the old prophet to mourn and to bury him. 30 He laid his body in his own grave, and they mourned over him, saying, "Alas, my brother!" 31 After he had buried him, he spoke to his sons, saying, "When I die, bury me in the grave in which the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. 32 "For the thing shall surely come to pass which he cried by the word of the LORD against the altar in Bethel and against all the houses of the high places which are in the cities of Samaria."
The writer gives us a detail in this passage that we may not catch at first glance. After telling the prophet of Judah that he was going to die because of his disobedience, the lying prophet stayed in at least his own home town. No way was he going to risk death on this day! So he stayed in his own city until he heard the news about the true prophet’s death.
We can also see God’s protection in another manner: the lion didn’t eat the prophet’s carcass, and the lion didn’t even touch the donkey, either! I don’t know much about lions (and, frankly, I don’t have much desire to learn about them!) but from what I remember in school, a lion usually carries off the “prey” so that the other members of the “pride” or group of lions can eat. Nothing like that happened to the prophet’s body: the lion stood by, and didn’t even menace the donkey. That is not coincidence, rather, it is providence.
Something else we can see involved a change of heart, we can hope, in the lying prophet. Again, we don’t know why he never took a stand for the living God and a living prophet when it counted, but he at least wanted to give the prophet’s body a decent burial. Contrast this with the body of Moses: God hid Moses’ body (Deuteronomy 34), but preserved the prophet’s body here at least for a while. The book of Revelation also tells that in the future, God will have two witnesses who will do great things (see Revelation chapter 11)—also in contrast to what happened here at Bethel or perhaps close by.
The greatest respect the lying prophet ever showed the true prophet was to bury the body in the lying prophet’s own tomb. We don’t know the true spiritual condition of the lying prophet or his sons, but we do have a parallel in Acts 8. After Stephen was stoned to death, devout men carried Stephen’s body to burial and mourned over him.
Eventually the lying prophet told the truth, as we see in the last few verses, namely that what God had predicted, God would fulfill. Many years later the northern kingdom fell into captivity, the altar was destroyed, and the bones of the true prophet were left alone (2 Kings 17 and 23)..
Conclusion
We can draw a few general principles from this section of God’s Word. First, if a city or any location abandons God, there is no guarantee of God’s blessing. Bethel was apparently a reasonably good-sized town or city but it lost much significance later on. God may have a location dedicated to Him but if the later generations do not honor Him, don’t be surprised if God takes away the blessing. I’ve known and seen a number of church buildings that are either empty, abandoned, or were converted to some other use.
Second, sin is still sin and disobedience is rebellion against God. The true prophet heard God’s call, and God’s message, but refused to obey. He paid with his life, and we have that record as a warning for us, even today.
Third, and most importantly, we need to really be careful when someone tries to misuse Scripture. Paul would later write to the Galatian believers that anyone who brought a message that was contrary to the Word of God, “ . . . let him be accursed (Galatians 1:9). We have a number of very clear passages which give us guidance and instruction and if we get off that path, we do so at our own risk, plus the risk of others. May we listen to the truth, and live it, so that we can be the kind of people our Lord delights in!
Scripture quotations taken from the NASB. http://www.lockman.org
