The prophet said that a man would come out of the House of David, named Josiah, and he would offer up the priests as sacrifices on that altar and human bones would be burnt on it. He also said to prove that it would happen the alter would break apart and its ashes would be spilled.
Jeroboam put his hand toward the altar and demanded they grab the prophet. When he did, his hand was dried up and withed, and the altar broke and the ashes were spilled. Jeroboam was mortified. He begged the prophet to ask God to restore his hand, so the prophet did, and his hand was restored.
Jeroboam offered him dinner if he would come home with him. The prophet said, “I don’t care if you offered me half your house, I will not go with you. God ordered me not to eat or drink anything, and not to go out the same way I came in, so I won’t.” And he didn’t.
Now, in Bethel, there was another old prophet who had sons that saw everything that had just happened, and they saw the way the man left out of Bethel, so they went and told the old prophet everything. So he had his sons to saddle a jackass, and he rode to find the prophet that had left Jeroboam. He found him under an oak tree and asked him, “Are you the man that came from Judah?”
The first prophet said, “I am.”
The old man said, “Come back home with me and eat some bread.”
“I cannot. God told me not to,” the prophet said.
So the old man lied to him and said, “I, too, am a prophet. God told me to bring you back and feed you.”
So the prophet went back with the old man and ate. As they were eating, God came to the old man and sent a message to the prophet he brought back with him.
God said, “Because you did not obey, you will not return home. You will die.”
When the prophet left the old man, a lion killed him. Some men came back and told the old man, who went and got the dead body and buried him in his own tomb. He then told his sons, “When I die, I want you to bury me in the same tomb, beside him, because what he prophesied will surely happen.”
And Jeroboam was guilty in the eyes of God for the death of the prophet, as well as the sins he committed, and sought to destroy him.
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If someone tells you that God said something or is going to do something, it is best to listen and not test him, because if he dies you will be held responsible, and there will be a punishment to bear.
If he is not telling the truth, it will not happen, but your job is to wait on God, regardless.
God sometimes lets people know what He has planned, not so you can stop it or do anything to help make it happen, but so your faith will grow, and you will have a chance to repent.
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