From Splendor to Shadow

How a Prophet Was Tricked Into Disobeying

The prophet was about to return to Judea, when Jeroboam said to him, “Come home with me, and refresh thyself, and I will give thee a reward.” SS 54.2

“If thou wilt give me half thine house,” the prophet replied, “I will not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place: for so was it charged me by the word of the Lord, saying, Eat no bread, nor drink water, nor turn again by the same way that thou camest.” 1 Kings 13:7-9. SS 54.3

While traveling home by another route, the prophet was overtaken by an aged man who claimed to be a prophet and who falsely declared, “I am a prophet also as thou art; and an angel spake unto me by the word of the Lord, saying, Bring him back with thee into thine house, that he may eat bread and drink water.” Again and again the lie was repeated until the man of God was persuaded to return. SS 54.4

God permitted the prophet to suffer the penalty of transgression. While he and the one who had invited him were sitting together at the table, the false prophet “cried unto the man of God that came from Judah, saying, Thus saith the Lord, Forasmuch as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment which the Lord thy God commanded thee, ... thy carcass shall not come unto the sepulcher of thy fathers.” Verses 18, 21, 22. SS 54.5

This prophecy of doom was soon fulfilled. “After he had eaten bread, and after he had drunk, that he saddled for him the ass ... . And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way, and slew him: and his carcass was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it, the lion also stood by the carcass. And behold, men passed by, and saw the carcass cast in the way, ... and they came and told it in the city where the old prophet dwelt. And when the prophet that brought him back from the way heard thereof, he said, It is the man of God, who was disobedient unto the word of the Lord.” Verses 23-26. SS 55.1

If, after disobeying, the prophet had been permitted to go on in safety, the king would have used this to vindicate his own disobedience. The rent altar, the palsied arm, and the terrible fate of the one who dared disobey an express command of the Lord—these judgments should have warned Jeroboam not to persist in wrongdoing. But, far from repenting, Jeroboam not only sinned greatly himself, but “made Israel to sin”; and “this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off, and to destroy it.” 1 Kings 14:16; 13:34. SS 55.2