1 Kings 13:3–21

³And the prophet went on to say, “This altar will fall apart, and the ashes on it will be scattered. Then you will know that the Lord has spoken through me.”

⁴When King Jeroboam heard this, he pointed at him and ordered, “Seize that man!” At once the king’s arm became paralysed so that he couldn’t pull it back. ⁵The altar suddenly fell apart and the ashes spilt to the ground, as the prophet had predicted in the name of the Lord. ⁶King Jeroboam said to the prophet, “Please pray for me to the Lord your God, and ask him to heal my arm!”

The prophet prayed to the Lord, and the king’s arm was healed. ⁷Then the king said to the prophet, “Come home with me and have something to eat. I will reward you for what you have done.”

⁸The prophet answered, “Even if you gave me half your wealth, I would not go with you or eat or drink anything with you. ⁹The Lord has commanded me not to eat or drink a thing, and not to return home the same way I came.” ¹⁰So he did not go back the same way he had come, but by another road.

The Old Prophet of Bethel

¹¹At that time there was an old prophet living in Bethel. His sons^q came and told him what the prophet from Judah had done in Bethel that day and what he had said to King Jeroboam. ¹²“Which way did he go when he left?” the old prophet asked them. They showed him^r the road ¹³and he told them to saddle his donkey for him. They did so, and he rode off ¹⁴down the road after the prophet from Judah and found him sitting under an oak. “Are you the prophet from Judah?” he asked.

“I am,” the man answered.

¹⁵“Come home and have a meal with me,” he said.

¹⁶But the prophet from Judah answered, “I can’t go home with you or accept your hospitality. And I won’t eat or drink anything with you here, ¹⁷because the Lord has commanded me not to eat or drink a thing, and not to return home the same way I came.”

¹⁸Then the old prophet from Bethel said to him, “I, too, am a prophet just like you, and at the Lord’s command an angel told me to take you home with me and offer you my hospitality.” But the old prophet was lying.

¹⁹So the prophet from Judah went home with the old prophet and had a meal with him. ²⁰As they were sitting at the table, the word of the Lord came to the old prophet, ²¹and he cried out to the prophet from Judah, “The Lord says that you disobeyed him and did not do what he commanded.