038. The Prophet’s Prayer For The Restoration Of Jeroboam’s Withered Hand.

The Prophet’s Prayer For The Restoration Of Jeroboam’s Withered Hand. The Prayer as recorded.—1 Kings 13:6-8.

Jeroboam had neglected to worship God at the temple, and wickedly built another altar at Bethel, and while a prophet—“a man of God out of Judah,” was prophesying against the altar, the king stretched forth his hand to lay it violently upon him, and by a sudden interposition of Providence it became withered. The suffering man thus thwarted in his resolve, entreats that the prophet would pray that his hand might be restored; he would have him pray to the Lord his God. We see by this request his confidence in his idols and his self-invented sacrifices was shaken. The sudden judgment and the rending of the altar had produced conviction in him, and he knows nothing but prayer to the Lord God of the prophet will avail. After the prayer and restoration we hear no thankful strain from Jeroboam’s lips to the God who had restored him; a sense of gratitude to the prophet is evinced by his offer of hospitality for the present, and a reward in the future; here let the reader pause for a moment, and consider how like the world is the conduct of Jeroboam, how often, like him, is one the recipient of God’s favor, but no word of thankfulness is heard. One is, perhaps the object of God’s mercy in some special deliverance from evil, but there is no upward glancing of the eye, no lifting of the voice of thanksgiving to heaven. “Pensioner of God be grateful; let thy full heart pour out its treasure of thanks to Him who has sent the blessing.”

“A wicked man scorneth prayer; in the shallow sophistry of reason, He derideth the silly hope that God can be moved by supplication; But I knew that his reasonings were false, for the promise of the Scripture is true.”