by Sandra Hansen

The man of God from Judah defied the Word of the Lord and didn’t keep the command the Lord gave to him. It didn’t seem that tough—God said don’t eat or drink, so don’t eat or drink! But when tricked by an older prophet—that’s right, a fellow prophet, he was killed by the Lord for disobeying.

When I first read today’s text, I thought- No fair! That guy tricked him! He lied and deceived him! But who should the man of God been listening to? He knew what God had told him. When confronted with someone whose message completely contradicted what he knew to be right, the man of God from Judah quickly abandoned what he was told to do. Maybe he should have checked back with God to see if the message had truly changed. Maybe he should have questioned the old prophet more closely. I wonder why he was so quick to abandon what he knew to be right.

Who are you listening to? Many times we receive messages that look like they come from a trustworthy source but they contradict the word of God. Even as Christians, these wrong messages are sometimes hard to spot. With the right justification, almost any message can sound like the truth. With this in mind, we must read the Bible carefully, with our eyes wide open. Many of these messages floating around out there these days claim to be ‘the truth.’ Be skeptical! As Christians our first instinct should be to run back to the Word and check that what we are hearing matches up with what God tells us in the Bible! Lots of the stuff I hear contradicts what I read in my Bible. But I pray and read God’s word and look for the Spirit of truth (1 John 4:6). I know that God doesn’t contradict Himself and will always help me to find the way.

Life can sometimes be confusing, but God never is.

Your fellow traveler,
Sandy