The Message Bible MSG
King James Version KJV
1 And then this happened: Just as Jeroboam was at the Altar, about to make an offering, a holy man came from Judah by God's command
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And, behold, there came a man of God out of Judah by the word of the LORD unto Bethel: and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense.
2 and preached (these were God's orders) to the Altar: "Altar, Altar! God's message! 'A son will be born into David's family named Josiah. The priests from the shrines who are making offerings on you, he will sacrifice - on you! Human bones burned on you!'"
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And he cried against the altar in the word of the LORD, and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the LORD; Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee.
3 At the same time he announced a sign: "This is the proof God gives - the Altar will split into pieces and the holy offerings spill into the dirt."
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And he gave a sign the same day, saying, This is the sign which the LORD hath spoken; Behold, the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out.
4 When the king heard the message the holy man preached against the Altar at Bethel, he reached out to grab him, yelling, "Arrest him!" But his arm was paralyzed and hung useless.
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And it came to pass, when king Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of God, which had cried against the altar in Bethel, that he put forth his hand from the altar, saying, Lay hold on him. And his hand, which he put forth against him, dried up, so that he could not pull it in again to him.
5 At the same time the Altar broke apart and the holy offerings all spilled into the dirt - the very sign the holy man had announced by God's command.
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The altar also was rent, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of God had given by the word of the LORD.
6 The king pleaded with the holy man, "Help me! Pray to your God for the healing of my arm." The holy man prayed for him and the king's arm was healed - as good as new!
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And the king answered and said unto the man of God, Intreat now the face of the LORD thy God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored me again. And the man of God besought the LORD, and the king's hand was restored him again, and became as it was before.
7 Then the king invited the holy man, "Join me for a meal; I have a gift for you."
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And the king said unto the man of God, Come home with me, and refresh thyself, and I will give thee a reward.
8 The holy man told the king, "Not on your life! You couldn't pay me enough to get me to sit down with you at a meal in this place.
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And the man of God said unto the king, If thou wilt give me half thine house, I will not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place:
9 I'm here under God's orders, and he commanded, 'Don't eat a crumb, don't drink a drop, and don't go back the way you came.'"
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For so was it charged me by the word of the LORD, saying, Eat no bread, nor drink water, nor turn again by the same way that thou camest.
10 Then he left by a different road than the one on which he had walked to Bethel.
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So he went another way, and returned not by the way that he came to Bethel.
11 There was an old prophet who lived in Bethel. His sons came and told him the story of what the holy man had done that day in Bethel, told him everything that had happened and what the holy man had said to the king.
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Now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel; and his sons came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel: the words which he had spoken unto the king, them they told also to their father.
12 Their father said, "Which way did he go?" His sons pointed out the road that the holy man from Judah had taken.
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And their father said unto them, What way went he? For his sons had seen what way the man of God went, which came from Judah.
13 He told his sons, "Saddle my donkey." When they had saddled it, he got on
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And he said unto his sons, Saddle me the ass. So they saddled him the ass: and he rode thereon,
14 and rode after the holy man. He found him sitting under an oak tree. He asked him, "Are you the holy man who came from Judah?" "Yes, I am," he said.
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And went after the man of God, and found him sitting under an oak: and he said unto him, Art thou the man of God that camest from Judah? And he said, I am.
15 "Well, come home with me and have a meal."
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Then he said unto him, Come home with me, and eat bread.
16 "Sorry, I can't do that," the holy man said. "I can neither go back with you nor eat with you in this country.
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And he said, I may not return with thee, nor go in with thee: neither will I eat bread nor drink water with thee in this place:
17 I'm under strict orders from God: 'Don't eat a crumb; don't drink a drop; and don't come back the way you came.'"
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For it was said to me by the word of the LORD, Thou shalt eat no bread nor drink water there, nor turn again to go by the way that thou camest.
18 But he said, "I am also a prophet, just like you. And an angel came to me with a message from God: 'Bring him home with you, and give him a good meal!'" But the man was lying.
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He said unto him, I am a prophet also as thou art; and an angel spake unto me by the word of the LORD, saying, Bring him back with thee into thine house, that he may eat bread and drink water. But he lied unto him.
19 So the holy man went home with him and they had a meal together.
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So he went back with him, and did eat bread in his house, and drank water.
20 There they were, sitting at the table together, when the word of God came to the prophet who had brought him back.
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And it came to pass, as they sat at the table, that the word of the LORD came unto the prophet that brought him back:
21 He confronted the holy man who had come from Judah: "God's word to you: You disobeyed God's command; you didn't keep the strict orders your God gave you;
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And he cried unto the man of God that came from Judah, saying, Thus saith the LORD, Forasmuch as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the LORD, and hast not kept the commandment which the LORD thy God commanded thee,
22 you came back and sat down to a good meal in the very place God told you, 'Don't eat a crumb; don't drink a drop.' For that you're going to die far from home and not be buried in your ancestral tomb."
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But camest back, and hast eaten bread and drunk water in the place, of the which the LORD did say to thee, Eat no bread, and drink no water; thy carcase shall not come unto the sepulchre of thy fathers.
23 When the meal was over, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his donkey for him.
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And it came to pass, after he had eaten bread, and after he had drunk, that he saddled for him the ass, to wit, for the prophet whom he had brought back.
24 Down the road a way, a lion met him and killed him. His corpse lay crumpled on the road, the lion on one side and the donkey on the other.
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And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way, and slew him: and his carcase was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it, the lion also stood by the carcase.
25 Some passersby saw the corpse in a heap on the road, with the lion standing guard beside it. They went to the village where the old prophet lived and told what they had seen.
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And, behold, men passed by, and saw the carcase cast in the way, and the lion standing by the carcase: and they came and told it in the city where the old prophet dwelt.
26 When the prophet who had gotten him off track heard it, he said, "It's the holy man who disobeyed God's strict orders. God turned him over to the lion who knocked him around and killed him, just as God had told him."
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And when the prophet that brought him back from the way heard thereof, he said, It is the man of God, who was disobedient unto the word of the LORD: therefore the LORD hath delivered him unto the lion, which hath torn him, and slain him, according to the word of the LORD, which he spake unto him.
27 The prophet told his sons, "Saddle my donkey." They did it.
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And he spake to his sons, saying, Saddle me the ass. And they saddled him.
28 He rode out and found the corpse in a heap in the road, with the lion and the donkey standing there. The lion hadn't bothered either the corpse or the donkey.
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And he went and found his carcase cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by the carcase: the lion had not eaten the carcase, nor torn the ass.
29 The old prophet loaded the corpse of the holy man on his donkey and returned it to his own town to give it a decent burial.
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And the prophet took up the carcase of the man of God, and laid it upon the ass, and brought it back: and the old prophet came to the city, to mourn and to bury him.
30 He placed the body in his own tomb. The people mourned, saying, "A sad day, brother!"
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And he laid his carcase in his own grave; and they mourned over him, saying, Alas, my brother!
31 After the funeral, the prophet said to his sons, "When I die, bury me in the same tomb where the holy man is buried, my bones alongside his bones.
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And it came to pass, after he had buried him, that he spake to his sons, saying, When I am dead, then bury me in the sepulchre wherein the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones:
32 The message that he preached by God's command against the Altar at Bethel and against all the sex-and-religion shrines in the towns of Samaria will come true."
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For the saying which he cried by the word of the LORD against the altar in Bethel, and against all the houses of the high places which are in the cities of Samaria, shall surely come to pass.
33 After this happened, Jeroboam kept right on doing evil, recruiting priests for the forbidden shrines indiscriminately - anyone who wanted to could be a priest at one of the local shrines.
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After this thing Jeroboam returned not from his evil way, but made again of the lowest of the people priests of the high places: whosoever would, he consecrated him, and he became one of the priests of the high places.
34 This was the root sin of Jeroboam's government. And it was this that ruined him.
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And this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off, and to destroy it from off the face of the earth.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.
The King James Version is in the public domain.