Disobedience to God's direct command, even when prompted by another prophet, leads to severe consequences, as illustrated by the story of the young prophet in 1 Kings 13. This prophet, after boldly confronting Jeroboam and his false worship, was deceived by an older prophet into returning and eating with him, violating God's explicit instruction. The sermon highlights how this compromise, driven by loneliness or a desire to avoid confrontation, resulted in the young prophet's death by a lion, serving as a stark warning against hardening one's heart and compromising God's word. The ultimate lesson is the critical importance of unwavering obedience to God's commands and the grave danger of spiritual compromise, even when presented with seemingly plausible justifications.
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when you open the word of God to the thirteenth chapter first Kings chapter thirteen we shall read from verse eleven on now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel of Bethel and his sons came and told him all the words that the man of God had done that day in Bethel. The words which he had spoken unto the king, then they told also to their father.
And their father said unto them, What way went he? For his sons have seen what way the man of God went, which came from Judah. And he said unto his son, Saddle me the ass. So they saddled him the ass. And he rode thereon, and went after the man of God and found him sitting under an oak. And he said unto him, O thou the man of God that cameest from Judah? And he said, I am. Then he said unto him, Come home with me and eat bread. And he said, I may not return with thee, nor go in with thee, neither will I eat bread, nor drink water with thee in this place.
For it was said to me by the word of the Lord, Thou shalt eat no bread, nor drink water there, nor turn again to go by the way that thou camest. He said unto him, 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. But he lied unto him. So he went back with him and did eat bread in his house and drank water. And he came to pass as they sat at the table.
that the word of the Lord came unto the prophet that brought him back, and he cried unto the man of God that came from Judas, saying, Thus saith the Lord, for as much as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandments which the Lord thy God commanded thee, but cameeth back and hath eaten bread and drunk water in this place, of which the Lord did say to thee, eat no bread and drink no water, thy carcass shall not come unto the sepulchre of thy fathers.
And it came to pass after he had eaten bread and after he had drunk, that he saddled for him the ass to which for the prophet whom he had brought back. 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. Will you notice verse twenty-eight? And he went, that is the old prophet, and found his carcass cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by the carcass.
The lion had not eaten the ass, or rather the carcass no torn the ass. And the prophet took up the carcass of the man of God and laid it upon the ass and brought it back and the old prophet came to the city to mourn and to bury him. For months this portion of God's word burned within me, for I believe that there are people who have come to this conference, and when it's all over with, perhaps have profited very little, except that mentally they have been enlightened.
There was no prophet. What was this all about? There was a split in the kingdom. When Solomon passed off the scene, his son Manasseh came to the throne. And as he came to the throne, he made the burdens more heavy than his father Solomon because of taxation and no relief in sight. Jeroboam, who was against Solomon, his life was threatened, he went into Egypt, and when he heard of all the tumult, finally came out from Egypt, led the ten tribes up north.
And as they went up north, the two remaining tribes were Judah and Benjamin. God's promises, regardless of Judah's unfaithfulness, his promises were through Judah that Messiah would come. When they went up north, a counter-worship was set up. And in this counter-worship, Jeroboam was a clever politician. He had to give the tent fraud an aura of their history. So he chose Shechem to be the capital.
And when Shechem was chosen as the capital, He was telling the people in so many words that he had not forgotten that Abraham erected his first altar in Shechem and that Jacob made his first home in Shechem. He also reminded them that Joseph was buried in Shechem. It had a religious historical aura. and thereby made it his capital, but God's will was that the capital be in Jerusalem.
He set up a counter-worship. He knew as a politician that unless he held the people politically and religiously, his rule would fall apart. So he set up a counter-worship. And as that took place, Jeroboam was quite comfortable. But what he did was this, acting as a king and taking the priesthood to himself, thereby strengthening his position, the Lord God sent a young prophet from Judah.
And as he sent him up north, This young prophet said unto Jeroboam, when he was there at the altar, he said that upon this altar certain things of God's judgment would take place, and as a sign, the altar would go topsy-turvy and all the ashes would come down from it, which happened. Jeroboam said, take hold of him, and as he stretched out his hand, it withered. And he pled with the young prophet, and the young prophet was pled with that his arm or hand be restored.
The young prophet prayed, his arm was restored, to compromise the young prophet and say faith before the people. Jeroboam said, Come home and eat bread with me. And what happened? The young prophet heard the word of the Lord, that he was not to eat bread, nor drink water in that place, but go back some other way. He was obedient to the word of God. When this took place, there were sons of an old prophet.
and with flushed face, no doubt, with excitement and their eyes showing all the excitement of what they felt had taken place. They told their father what this upstart, this stranger, this young prophet, had the audacity to do. He had the audacity to stand up to the king. hurl forth the word of God and all that accompanied it afterwards. When the sons of the old prophet told that to their father, I am trying to use sanctified imagination.
I personally believe that the old prophet was full of consternation. He was perturbed and he became bitterly angry and the sons must have noticed it and adorned upon them why their father, who was a prophet, did not do what the young man, the young prophet of Judah, did accomplish. Why did he not, as a prophet, speak out as a counter-worship, speak out against the king for having the audacity to take the priesthood unto himself?
And the prophet was beside himself? What made that old prophet so comfortable while being out of the will of God? When the change came where the ten tribes went up north, and he going with them, he must have felt, like all of us do, that self-preservation is the first law of life. And he felt, no doubt, with the high taxation in Judah and the bitterness that they experienced from the hand of the then king, that his family he himself would be better off in every way if he went up north.
But at last all the lethargy that entered into him, all the unperturbedness, all the conscience that was hardened and all that took place was finally upset when his sons came to him and told him what had taken place. And at last he was exposed, and being exposed he just had to hit back at that young prophet. In many conferences where I was privileged to minister, I had seen afterwards that when the conference was over, that although the people listened politely and laughed here and there, and everything seemed to be going well, that although they did not actually literally kill the instrument of the Lord, they killed him mentally.
They killed whatever was said that could have pierced their conscience. And they did everything within their power to so vacillate and oscillate the thing that was said till finally distorted away and wiped out the individual instrument who said it. And might I say potentially, all the evil that has ever taken place upon the face of the earth, all the sins that have ever been committed are potentially in your sin nature and in my sin nature.
Given the right circumstances, given the right pressure, it would manifest itself. What the Lord is waiting for in this conference is this. He is waiting to be truly wanted. He is waiting for me and for you not to merely receive enlightenment in the word, but he is waiting for us to embrace him unequivocally. That's what he's waiting for. And what did the older prophet do?
He said, I've got to get rid of him. I've got to wipe him out. And he was so adamant that he asked his sons which way did he go. And they saw by which way he went. He had to say faith even as Jeroboam, the council king, had to say faith. He was going to compromise that young prophet. And might I say unto you, I am just as susceptible to certain flatteries that others are. And I learned in a bitter way that I am an instrument of the Spirit of God, and the Lord helped me if I do not allow him to use me as a mere means to an end and no more.
he had to get hold of that young prophet. And as we read, he rode on his ammo. And where did he find the young prophet? He found him sitting under a tree. Even though he went some other way, what was he doing under that tree? Why did he not keep going? Could it have been that when Elijah heard that Jezebel was going to get hold of him and kill him. And all the energy, emotional energy and confrontation that he had with the Prophet's bail, and he was at low end physically, could it have been that he ran, sat under a juniper tree, and wanted to die?
Couldn't he? He was at low air, and personally, this is just my own feeling. That young prophet, feeling a rejection spirit, when so many things could have been offered to him, the honor of defying tempter. And then being rejected, he must have done the will of God, but when it was overworked, he was at low ebb and discouraged. And he just took time out to sit under a juniper tree. And pardon me, no, under a tree.
Poor Elijah, I blame him for too many things. He was sitting under that tree and along came the prophet. And he said, O thou that prophet, etc., etc. Yes, I am. Come with me. Let us eat bread and drink water. And he repeated the Lord's message that he must not. But he was lonely. He was lonely. And the prophet finally said, the old prophet said, Look, I'm a prophet like you are. If he couldn't get him at one end, he would try some other tactic.
I'm a prophet like you are. And an angel spoke to me. That young prophet must have been so dejected, so tired, so discouraged, so unwanted, that he didn't realize the inconsistency of Jehovah saying, don't do it. And then an angel lower than Jehovah said, do it. The old prophet was able to lie to him. The old prophet knew because of his disobedience his life would be taken from him, and so it was. As they sat, the law spirit of prophecy that the old prophet once had returned and thereby condemned both of them.
When the Spirit of God said to the old prophet, you are disobedient, your life you have forfeited because of disobedience, he thereby brought condemnation on himself. Are there any old prophets here? Are there individuals who once were faithful to the Lord Jesus Christ? And because they were faithful to him, the Spirit of God moved within their beings. Could it be because of some circumstance in your life or whatever it might have been, you took the line of least resistance as the old prophet did, and you went away in an atmosphere that has a religious aura, you still mingle, but within yourself you know that you have compromised.
Do you know even as I am speaking, I'm a stranger here. Even as the word of God is given, you could put me down mentally. You could wipe me out of your mind. You can reject the application. But one thing you will never be able to do, which the old prophet tried and could not get away with, you'll have to pay the bitter consequences of the hardening of your heart. And besides that, because your life as an older one is not what it should be.
Some younger one, unbeknownst to him, would say something or bring something from the Word of God. The Spirit of God takes it right at home to your heart. You're shaken. And oh, how you want to compromise that fledgling. that younger one so you could put them down in order to save faith. It's been done over and over and over again. I used to do it. Others have done it. And what happened? Here's what happened. My time is going fast.
I wish they would put a shroud on it because time is timeless where God is concerned. But I want you to notice what happened. Verse twenty-one. And he cried unto the man of God that came from Judas, saying, Thus saith the Lord, for as much as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandments which the Lord thy God commanded thee, but cameeth back, and you were disobedient. your knuckles to go back to Judas, you're going to die right here. And a lion came, took hold of him, killed it, flew him.
The carcass was lying there as a testimony for a disobedient prophet. And what happened? Look at verse twenty-four. And the ass stood by it. The lion also stood by the carcass. Verse twenty-eight. And he went, the old prophet went and found his carcass cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by the carcass. And listen, the lion had not eaten the carcass nor torn the ass.
the strongest of the three was the lion. And yet the lion did not assimilate the carcass nor had he torn the earth. Why does the Spirit of God bring it to our attention? I remember when I say in the first chapter, Hear, O earth, hear all heavens, and give ear, O earth, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth its owner, and the ass his master's crib, but my people doth not know, my people doth not consider.
Watch that the animal has a greater instinct to know where to go for its preservation than my people Israel. And so here the animals were under the control of God himself. Whereas the old prophet was not and the young prophet was not. The animals were. The ant didn't run off. The lion didn't touch it. and the caucus, there it was, it was not devoured. Could it be that we have lost the instinct, the sensitivity to respond to the spirit of God?
Could it be, could it be, and listen carefully, I may never come again, but could it be that your heart has become so hardened that the Spirit of God has no way in you anymore? Might I say, if that is so, look to yourself if you are really in the Lord. You know, this comes out of bitter years, of twenty years of backsliding. where no one believed that I was ever born again.
It came from bitterness, from tears from hardness of heart, and finally the Spirit of God because of the grace of God broke me, and I said I will never compromise the Word of God in my life or before others, but say it as it is. could it be that you're hardened, that you're not conscious that this might have some relationship relevancy to yourself, where the animals and nature are under the control of God, and His highest creation has rebelled against Him.
Old prophets, I have sentenced and I thank the Lord for it that there is something here where the Lord is lived for and there's the desire to follow him. I am appealing to the old prophets to deal very gently with the younger ones. And because something has entered into your life, may the Lord forgive you if you ever try to compromise them.
And tonight, I pray that as this word was given, that you might ask the Spirit of God to deal with you, you older ones. I am old and I cannot live the years that have swiftly gone by but I can cry I can cry so it would go from one crying heart into another that the Lord Jesus Christ for whom I have suffered things will be glorified as the word is being given shall we pray Our Heavenly Father, O how we thank thee for every instrument of the Spirit of God.
And we pray that the Spirit of God indeed might give us such a restlessness until we rest in the will of God. In Jesus' name. Three hundred seventy three years ago Jesus, just to take him at his word, just to rest upon his promise, just to know that there's a war.
Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him, how I could be born and born. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus, old boy, praise you, trust him, Lord. Let's sing the second verse. Oh! Oh!
Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! If there are some visitors around that do not have a place tonight, Jerry Stonehouse is taking care of it. It doesn't look like he's here, his wife Peg is, back here just in front of Lowell. If you do not have a place to stay, look him up for his life. Rangements have been made. And I believe supper should be ready directly.
We'll wait till we get a notice from them, but you can probably start.