Why does God harden hearts?

In Exodus 7 begins the great struggle, and wonders upon wonders awfully fall on the devoted land of Egypt. Observe, as to the hardening of Pharaoh's heart, that this was in no-wise the case before the pronounced infidelity of Pharaoh. God never compelled a man to be an unbeliever. In short, unbelief in the first instance is never the consequence of judicial hardness on God's part. Is there no such thing then as hardening? Does not scripture mean that there is? Undoubtedly hardening there is. It is an equal error to suppose that God hardens a person when He first sends a testimony as to deny that He does harden after His testimony has been refused. The fact is, both are true, and this is just another instance of the importance of not taking up particular views of scripture, but of being guided and formed in our thoughts by all scripture.

God then sent a testimony to Pharaoh, as He does to everyone in some form or another. But man left to himself invariably refuses the testimony of God. He knows it is God; he has the consciousness that he is doing wrong in refusing it; yet he does refuse because he does not like and dare not trust God, whose word interferes with everything that he likes. Hence man gives himself up to unbelief, and then God may either at that or a later time, according to His own wisdom, seal up a person in a judicial hardness which is a distinct positive act on God's part. I hold therefore most strongly that hardening is not merely on man's side, and in the judicial sense not on man's at all, though no doubt the result of man's sin. God hardens because man refuses His word. Thus the hardening is a judicial act on God's part, which comes in after man has proved himself an unbeliever, and has persisted in it. It was so with Pharaoh, and his is a typical case, the permanent warning in the New Testament, as it is the first specified instance in the Old. It is the one which the apostle Paul quotes for this purpose. Consequently it is the standing witness of this solemn truth. And remember that this is not a mere exceptional fact. It is commoner than people imagine. It will be on a great scale in Christendom shortly (2 Thess. 2), as I have little doubt that it may be in many individual cases now, and has always been so. Thus it was when our Lord Jesus was here, and the presence of the Spirit, instead of preventing, confirmed it. Hence, whether on a great scale or in individual dealings of God, nothing can be more certain than that there is such an action on His part. At the same time it is never God who makes man an unbeliever. Hardening is a judgment which comes when man persists in unbelief in the face of distinct and repeated testimony from God.

Once more Moses received his commission, and again he hesitated on account of his poor speech. After all the gracious words Jehovah had spoken he pleads again his weakness. It shows what the unbelieving heart is. Twice Jehovah said that Moses should be a god. A god to Aaron (4:16) and a god to Pharaoh (7:1). He received divine authority and power over Pharaoh, while he was to his spokesman Aaron a god, because the word he uttered to him to communicate to Pharaoh was the word of the Lord. "And I will harden Pharaoh's heart." This was stated before in chapter 4:21. Eighteen times we read of the hardening of Pharaoh's heart. However, different words are used in the Hebrew to show an important distinction. One means to "make firm" or "strong." The other, "to make stubborn." These two words show Pharaoh's hardening of his own heart and God's hardening after he continued in his wicked way. After it is five times declared that Pharaoh hardened his heart, then God began His hardening and made Pharaoh's heart stubborn. Pharaoh hardened himself, then God hardened him. Pharaoh had his opportunities and as he refused and continued in unbelief, God made him stubborn. God hardens as a judicial act because man refuses His Word. God never hardens first nor compels a man to be an unbeliever. A solemn warning is contained in this. Thousands harden their hearts now, and ere long apostate Christendom will be hardened by God without remedy (2 Thessalonians 2).

Romans 9:18, p. 247. — The mercy had been illustrated by God's dealing with Israel after they had made the golden calf; and the hardening by the case of Pharoah. Both facts are reasoned on by the Apostle in vindicating the sovereignty of God — a sovereignty which, while it lets in the Gentiles during Israel's rejection, is nevertheless the sole foundation even for Israel's hopes. It was in vain to talk of being Abraham's seed. The Ishmaelites and the Edomites could boast the same descent, and yet they were not called. History and prophecy alike showed that the blessing of Israel hangs upon God's sovereignty. Is there then unrighteousness with God? God forbid! The truth is, that Israel were ruined at the foot of the mountain where they had pledged themselves to obey all that God should command. And what did God say to Moses? "I will have mercy," etc. The very sovereignty which they disliked when shown in mercy to the Gentiles is thus proved to be everything to the Jew.

As to the hardening, it is equally clear and certain. God never made any man bad; but He may, and in certain cases does, give people up to the consequences of their own folly and evil: that is, He hardens in judgment those who slight and reject His grace. It was so with the Gentiles after the flood; it is so with Israel, as even their own prophets testified; and it is to be so with professing Christendom. Pharoah was wicked, and this in proportion to the patience which God displayed; at last he was judicially blinded, and made an example of by Him whom he had despised. All are responsible. Sin destroys the capacity, not the responsibility of obeying God.

In setting up the golden calf, Israel did wickedly, and God in sovereignty shewed mercy. Pharaoh also did wickedly, and God judged him. Where does the sovereignty of God come in here? Is it not seen in the fact that, again and again, God acted in sovereign mercy in removing the plagues. But this mercy only became the occasion of Pharaoh hardening his heart (see Ex. 7:13, 22; 8:15, 19, 32.; 9:7 N.Tn) Finally, Pharaoh having hardened his heart, we read that, "The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh" (Ex. 9:12).

God did not make Pharaoh wicked. God leads no man to sin; but when Pharaoh had proved himself wicked and stubborn, God judicially hardened his heart. This hardening, however, never takes place until man has proved himself to be wicked. The natural fallen man, as described in Romans 1, first gives up God before he is given up by God. So with Israel, the nation heard "the report of the Lord" and had seen "the arm of the Lord", and rejected both His words and works before the word is applied to them, "He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts" (John 12:37-41).

He now takes up the case of those who failed to receive blessing. Pharaoh illustrates this. Mercy had been within his reach, but he refused it again and again. Six times over had he been solemnly warned as to the folly of resisting God, in the shape of terrible plagues, but each time he hardened his heart (Ex. 7:13, should read, "And Pharaoh's heart was hardened (or strong) that he hearkened not." The Lord did not judicially harden him till ch. 9. 12). Then came that terrible word, "In very deed, for this cause have I raised thee up, to show in thee My power." If privilege and mercy be despised, God hardens people's hearts, and uses them as beacon lights of His power and wrath. He can in this way turn even the wrath and unbelief of man to the display of His own holy glory (vv. 17-18).

But God will maintain His own glory, whatever man's attitude may be — in fact will display His own power by the very means of those who harden their hearts against Him. Scripture had testified to this before the law was given, and Jews were well acquainted with God's using the stubborn opposition of Egypt's monarch for the purpose of showing His absolute power over the strongest force man could muster. We ought to tremble at the greatness of His glory when we hear His word to Pharaoh — “Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew My power in thee, and that My name might be declared throughout all the earth.” God Himself had allowed Pharaoh to become great, though to Pharaoh it was a matter of personal pride and the occasion of displaying his will in independence of God. What then? In the face of this independence God would show His own power. Indeed, Pharaoh had been allowed to be raised to this very height, in order that the higher power of God might be shown. Not that God is to be blamed for the stubbornness of Pharaoh. For while verse 18 insists “Therefore hath He mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth” — yet we must take care to inquire, whom does He will to harden? Does Scripture say that God hardened Pharaoh's heart before Pharaoh had any sense of responsibility? Far from it. Pharaoh had first boldly disdained and insulted God when faced with the responsibility of letting Israel go — “Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go” (Ex. 5:2). So we see that Pharaoh's wilful hardening of his own heart preceded God's judicial hardening, which is first seen in Ex. 7:13. Dare we then quarrel with God's will to harden such a character?

So on the other side, in the case of Pharaoh, God was shewing His power and making His name known, and Pharaoh is set up as one in whom it is to be done. He was already a wicked man who defied Jehovah: "Who is Jehovah that I should obey him? I know not Jehovah." Well, says Jehovah, you shall know, and all the earth too; and hardens him, that he may be a monument of His judgments to those that defied His power. Both were wicked - Israel and Pharaoh. Righteousness would have condemned both. He has mercy on one, and hardens the other. He has mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardens, where simple righteousness would simply have condemned both. This is sovereignty. He proves Himself not merely righteous (the day of judgment will prove that), but proves Himself God; and this is of all importance for us all: without it none would be saved.

The case of Pharaoh is another which men speak of much. God says of Pharaoh: "For this same purpose I have raised thee up, that I might show in thee My power and that My Name might be declared in all the earth." But what does He mean by this? If God is going to declare His Name, for what purpose is it? In fact, when God did thus raise up Pharaoh, the world at large was sunk in idolatry. Pharaoh was the head of the most idolatrous nation, probably, upon the face of the earth. He was also in a place in which that which was done to him, the manifestation of God's sovereign power in his case, would go far and wide amongst the nations. Was there no goodness manifest in that very fact, that "against all the gods of Egypt" He was executing judgment? We find that it did indeed speak, and the song of Israel at the Red. Sea shows what was the effect amongst the nations. Not indeed, that they were brought to God by it; not necessarily that any were. Of this we have no knowledge. Yet in the case of Rahab, supplemented, no doubt, by other testimonies, we see how much it wrought. Thus, if God raised up Pharaoh and made him a monument of His judgment, it was mercy, nevertheless, that made him so, and that mercy had been displayed with regard to Pharaoh himself, as it is very easy to see. Nay, the hardening of Pharaoh's heart was largely wrought by the very mercy shown him. "Because judgment is not speedily executed against an evil work, therefore the heart of the sons of men is thoroughly set in them to do evil." But shall not God show mercy then? He does show it, again and again, removing the judgment threatened or brought about in the ease of Pharaoh, and when the king finds relief from that which had for the moment terrified him, his heart hardens itself against God. One may say that we are told that it was God who hardened it; certainly not by any putting forth of His power to do this. It was rather the very mercy that was displayed, by which the hardening was effected, and thus God's goodness remains all the way through, whatever might be the effect upon a human heart in opposition to Him. The sun which melts the ice may harden the clay. It is the same sun that does both. Thus, while it is true that "on whom He will He showeth mercy, and whom He will He hardened)," and although we may be little able to follow out in detail the mystery of God's ways in this, we are not in the least called to justify Him. The day will come when everything will be fully manifest; and then He will be "justified in judgment and clear when He is judged."

367 However, important as this may be, it is not all that the apostle has to bring forward as proof of his position. He asks, "Is there unrighteousness with God? Far be the thought." According to His divine title He can without doubt shew mercy to whom He will, as He says also to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." "So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy." And what was the occasion on which God spoke thus to Moses? When Israel had made the golden calf, at a time when God, if He had not retreated into His own sovereignty in which He was free to shew grace, must have destroyed the whole nation except Moses and Joshua; so that then, according to the carnal Jewish principle, the Ishmaelites and Edomites must have become heirs of the promises, while Israel would have been shut out. We find the same principle in Israel's deliverance out of bondage in Egypt. God had not made Pharaoh's heart bad, it was so already; but He hardened it, that He might glorify His name and power in all the earth. Thus He shews mercy to whom He will, and whom He will He hardens. His ways with Israel were a clear and indisputable proof of it; for otherwise their enemies would have become heirs of the promises, but they themselves would have been excluded, and the glorious beginning of their history would have been falsified.

This has been thus, and will be thus still, under this judicial dementation; worldly men violate the clearest and most sensible means of their own interests, and religious men depart from the simplest instructions of the truth. We are not to wonder at anything. The very idols which men have taken as spoils of war, they have afterwards bowed down to as their gods. (2 Chron. 25:14.) For what folly, what incredible blindness of understanding, will not the infatuated heart of man betray. But this dementation is never sent forth to visit man until he has righteously exposed himself to judgment. All the cases show this. Pharaoh, for instance, had, in deepest ingratitude, forgotten Joseph. The Amorites of Canaan had filled up the measure of their sins. The old Gentiles had brought this reprobate mind on themselves. (Rom. 1:28.) Israel "had not," Jerusalem "would not." (Matt. 13:12; Matt. 23:37.) And the strong delusion is to be sent, by-and-by, abroad upon Christendom, only because "they loved not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness."

This hardening precedes destruction; but it comes after man has ripened his iniquity. God endures with all longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, as He fashions by His Spirit His own elect vessels of mercy ere He glorifies them. "Whom He will He hardens," is surely true; but He wills to show His wrath in this way, of hardening, or of prejudicial dementation, only in the case of those whom He has in much longsuffering endured. (Rom. 9:11-22.)

Thus, then, we see there is such a process in the judgment of God as the hardening of the heart - that this is never executed till man has ripened himself in evil - and that the fruit of this may appear in such human folly and blindness as we should never have apprehended, or perhaps conceived.