In First Kings, chapter thirteen, verse twenty-four, speculation that the prophet received eternal punishment after he died should not be considered. His disobedience is in the same category as that of Moses. Why doth God punish a good man so severely for so meager an offense?
His sin was not small, for it was gross disobedience to a positive command. But he supposed and was told by another prophet that God had repealed his instruction, and so was deceived.
First, the Old Prophet had no sufficient discharge from the former command; for he neither received assurance that the other man was a prophet nor that the message he delivered was from God. However had reason to suspect the contrary, or at least to inquire about the mind of God in this doubtful point, which he grossly neglected to do and willingly believed the message because it suited his inclination and necessity. Add to this that he is a prophet obliged to the greater exactness in obedience to all God’s precepts. Therefore this sin was much more in him than in another because he dishonored God, and the authority and success of his message blasted Jeroboam, the idolatrous Israelites hardened in their wicked courses. God needed to exercise severity towards him.
Secondly, as the world and all men in it are for God’s glory, and all their lives and deaths ought to be laid out in his service; it cannot seem strange nor harsh if God should bring his deserved death upon him in this manner, for the accomplishment of his glorious designs, as to vindicate his honor and justice from the imputation of partiality. To assure the truth of his predictions and thereby provoke Jeroboam and his idolatrous followers to repentance. To justify himself in all his dreadful judgments which he intended to inflict upon Jeroboam’s house, and the whole kingdom of Israel, for their cursed apostasy, and to warn all succeeding sinners not rashly to venture upon these sins, and especially to take heed of greater sins for which they might expect far sorer punishments.