This is a daily devotional by Pastor David Guzik. Enduring Words for Troubled Times. Here is a link to David Guzik's commentary on 1 Kings 13: enduringword.c...
david is such a good teacher man.. he doesn't ramble like so many pastors. he really is spirit-filled every time he opens his mouth. i hope to meet him someday, because i'd like to pick his mind on the things of God
Please pray for me and my children. I know sometimes , it may be hard to trust God’s plan but we must take comfort and have faith in him. We can’t place our faith in mortal things our trust should be for God alone. So I’m keeping faith. Since losing my job as a social worker at Forsyth Hospital I have been struggling financially. I lost my job because I declined the vaccine I declined due to my pre existing health condition lupus and heart disease. I was denied my medical/religious exemption. I’m waitressing and I’m so thankful to be working but I’m not making nearly enough to make ends meet. I have two beautiful boys both are autistic. My husband passed away years ago. I’m all alone. Each month is a struggle to not end up on the streets with my two boys. I’m constantly in fear of losing my home. But even as I face homelessness nearly every month. I have faith, God will provide. He has this far. He always shows up in the nick of time to perform miracles! With GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE when we put him first. I will continue to have faith that Our father will provide.
Amen! That's the only way to be happy in Jesus. Trust and obey is the only path that leads to heaven. May the Lord continue to bless you and your ministry.
Interesting story, the way I’ve looked at this story is that it’s an allegorie, that paints a picture of some one turning back from the true focus of out faith which should be the cross. For example Jeroboam was offering up incense on the alter at Bethel, he should have been offering up a sacrifice at Solomons temple in Judea, which in the old testament was a picture of the cross to come. The man of God was instructed to correct him, then leave by a different way, this shows in God we can only go forward in our faith, not turn back in any way, or turn to a different way. When the false prophet found the man of God, he was sitting under the oak tree, this is the position we should always be in, as the oak tree represents the cross, so we should live our life in the shadow of the cross, however the old prophet comes to the man of God and tells him to go back to his place. I see two problems here, one is he is going back to an old doctrine that does not anchor their faith in the cross, it could be a doctrine of works, and second one is he is eating and drinking from the old way of teaching before he learnt the “message of the cross” which is the terminology the apostle Paul called it in 1 Corinthians 1:10. To summarize, its simply going back to old teachings that do not teach the “message of the cross”. Reply
It is an interesting and ironic passage indeed ~ For he who knows to do right and does it not, to him it is sin. The highest authority, the highest allegiance, the highest loyalty must 1st and always must be to the Lord, our King, the one and only true God.
Okay, Pastor David, I know the story I’m looking up today! Thank you for clarifying this story and really breaking it down into components. It’s one of our family’s favorite things about your teaching method - clarity.
“Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.” Acts 5:29 These men of God got it right No lion will confront them🫡
Wooooooow I have always wondered…. Why a prophet lied to another leading them to their death Now I know The first prophet shd have known God never contradicts himself He cant give you instructions and then give u contrary instructions through another man Lord may I always remember to ask for confirmation from you before jumping on another wagon
The prophet from Judah was all but home, he had accomplished his mission. Isn't it odd, that even in a season where we seek rest and refreshment after seeing a good move of God in being obedient, it is then the enemy even can use one "within" who seems to be "among us as if our own" to trip us up? Sad is the story of this old prophet of Bethel. No doubt he was once a prophet used of God, but we know there was no good king ever in the Northern kingdom of Israel all 19 were bad and did evil in the sight of God, so what does it say that the prophets (even secret ones) who didn't take a stand against such a tyrant dictator? Later this prophet of Bethel lamented that it wasn't he who stood before the king and rebuked him as the young man who came by his way, later in death, not while alive he honored him in his remembrance and burial. What good is that? May have been a relative of my wife's uncle, who in the 88 yrs his mother lived was harsh, demanding, never spent a dime on his mom to do something nice, miserly, and miserable. When she died spent an enormous sum of money to have a nice casket, funeral, and burial at Forest Lawn Glendale, Burbank. Made no sense to anyone. We must remember these were corrupted prophets, like a city bus that doesn't work, No longer in service or any good. I surmise this prophet of Bethel remembered the old days, longed for the company of a good man, and the young naive man by yielding to him wound up losing his effect, his mission, and his life. Serving God is a serious call, one should take it to be so. We must be on guard from those within with their wild ideas who have no platform to give them time or place - distracting us away from the call, focus, and mission of God, no matter at one time, what they were. The prophets of the north were all yes men, telling the kings there what they wanted to hear. The kings rebelled against God and would not hear His will, nor His ways.
This story makes me sad. I almost wish that old prophet never appeared. The younger prophet could've gone on his way and received His blessing from God. We are human and I assume that the younger prophet was more naive and had less experience than the old prophet. The younger prophet did well in questioning the other prophet and could've even mentioned to the other prophet "God told me to do X, Y, Z. Sadly at the last attempt to get this new prophet off course, the new prophet gave in doing the very thing God told him not to do. I guess those in higher positions get higher punishments. The new prophet died a harsh death by a lion. I wonder did it cross his mind to repent to God in between the time the old prophet told him he would die and the time he saddled away on his donkey. That's a scary judgment to face from God and I'm happy that God sent Jesus and we have our sins covered by grace, and times are DIFFERENT. I just pray everyone in a leadership position in Christ can have a chance to repent and that their heart doesn't get hardened and that God teaches about their wrong and are given a chance to learn, because although they know better, they are still human.
