1 Kings 13 · a question people ask
How could the LORD's word come to the prophet who had just lied?
The chapter says it did: "As they sat at the table, the LORD’s word came to the prophet who brought him back" (13:20). It doesn't explain how, and it doesn't say anything more about the old prophet's heart. It calls him "an old prophet" (13:11) and "the prophet" (13:20, 13:26, 13:29), never a false prophet, and it says he lied (13:18). What he cried at the table, "your body will not come to the tomb of your fathers" (13:22), came to pass: the man of God was laid "in his own grave" (13:30), the old prophet's. He himself said the death was "according to the LORD’s word which he spoke to him" (13:26), and he said the man of God's word against Bethel "will surely happen" (13:32). Scripture tells of others through whom God spoke: "The LORD put a word in Balaam’s mouth" (Numbers 23:5), of whom 2 Peter says he "loved the wages of wrongdoing" (2 Peter 2:15); and Caiaphas the high priest, of whom John says, "he didn’t say this of himself, but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation" (John 11:51). These notes don't go beyond what the verses say.
The verses
“As they sat at the table, the LORD’s word came to the prophet who brought him back;”
“Now an old prophet lived in Bethel, and one of his sons came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel. They also told their father the words which he had spoken to the king.”
“He said to him, “I also am a prophet as you are; and an angel spoke to me by the LORD’s word, saying, ‘Bring him back with you into your house, that he may eat bread and drink water.’” He lied to him.”
“but came back, and have eaten bread and drank water in the place of which he said to you, “Eat no bread, and drink no water,” your body will not come to the tomb of your fathers.’””