Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way

 

1 Kings 13:20-34

 

June 5, 2021

 

            

And as they sat at the table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back.  And he cried to the man of God who came from Judah, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have disobeyed the word of the Lord and have not kept the command that the Lord your God commanded you,   but have come back and have 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 tomb of your fathers.’”   And after he had eaten bread and drunk, he saddled the donkey for the prophet whom he had brought back.   And as he went away a lion met him on the road and killed him. And his body was thrown in the road, and the donkey stood beside it; the lion also stood beside the body.   And behold, men passed by and saw the body thrown in the road and the lion standing by the body. And they came and told it in the city where the old prophet lived.

And when the prophet who had brought him back from the way heard of it, he said, “It is the man of God who disobeyed the word of the Lord; therefore, the Lord has given him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word that the Lord spoke to him.”   And he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” And they saddled it.   And he went and found his body thrown in the road, and the donkey and the lion standing beside the body. The lion had not eaten the body or torn the donkey.   And the prophet took up the body of the man of God and laid it on the donkey and brought it back to the city to mourn and to bury him.  And he laid the body in his own grave. And they mourned over him, saying, “Alas, my brother!”   And after he had buried him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave in which the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones.   For the saying that he called out by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the houses of the high places that are in the cities of Samaria shall surely come to pass.”

After this thing, Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way but made priests for the high places again from among all the people. Any who would, he ordained to be priests of the high places.   And this thing became sin to the house of Jeroboam, so as to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth.

As the great Paul Harvey often said, and that is the rest of the story.  The rest of the story often happens to pastors and teachers, does the word of God speak to that issue?  In the Gospel of James 3:1, Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.  Every preacher and teacher needs to keep in their mind what God did to the man of God and hold to the teaching of 2 Timothy 2:15, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”

From the Back Porch,

`Bob Rice