Why does God harden hearts?
Scripture says Pharaoh hardened his heart, and it says God hardened it, and it will not let us flatten either statement into the other. The pattern Scripture shows is judicial: God gives people over to the unbelief they have chosen, weaving even their defiance into His purpose to display His power and His mercy, while His own warnings plead with everyone to soften today. The doctrine is meant less to satisfy curiosity than to press one urgent question: am I hearing His voice today?
This question arose from studying Did God choose me to be saved before I chose Him? and What does it mean that God is sovereign?.
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Go into the Word
Not a summary of these passages: the passages themselves. Read them, then come back to the study below.
The study
What the Scripture says
The Bible speaks of hardening in both directions
Any honest answer has to hold two strands together. Again and again the narrative says Pharaoh hardened himself: 'when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart,' and 'Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also.' And just as plainly, before a later plague we read, 'Yahweh hardened the heart of Pharaoh.' Scripture refuses to let the story collapse into 'only Pharaoh did it' or 'only God did it'; both lines run through the whole account from beginning to end.
But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart, and didn’t listen to them, as Yahweh had spoken.
Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and he didn’t let the people go.
Yahweh hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he didn’t listen to them, as Yahweh had spoken to Moses.
Hardening is judgment: God giving people over to what they chose
Paul describes a solemn judicial pattern. Because people exchanged the truth of God for idols, 'God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness,' and again, 'God gave them up to a reprobate mind.' Isaiah was commissioned with words that would 'make the heart of this people fat,' ears heavy and eyes shut, so that a message offered for healing became the instrument of judgment on those who would not have it. Hardening, then, is not God dragging unwilling hearts away from Him; it is His giving-over of hearts that first shut Him out.
Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves,
Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting;
He said, “Go, and tell this people, ‘You hear indeed, but don’t understand; and you see indeed, but don’t perceive.’
Make the heart of this people fat. Make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and turn again, and be healed.”
Even hardening serves God's purpose of power and mercy
God tells Pharaoh, 'for this very purpose I caused you to be raised up, that I might show in you my power, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.' Paul draws out the mystery: God endures 'vessels of wrath made for destruction' 'with much patience,' 'that he might make known the riches of his glory on vessels of mercy.' None of Pharaoh's defiance frustrated God; it became the dark backdrop against which rescue was displayed and mercy became visible.
For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I caused you to be raised up, that I might show in you my power, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”
What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath made for destruction,
and that he might make known the riches of his glory on vessels of mercy, which he prepared beforehand for glory,
He hardens no one who wants to be soft
The warnings themselves prove the door stands open. Three times Hebrews rings the bell: 'Today if you will hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts.' A command not to harden makes no sense if hardening were irresistible. The psalm itself pleads, 'Today, oh that you would hear his voice!' And Peter explains the patience behind every delay: the Lord is 'not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.' If you want a soft heart, bring that desire to Him; the warnings prove the door stands open, today.
while it is said, “Today if you will hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts, as in the rebellion.”
for he is our God. We are the people of his pasture, and the sheep in his care. Today, oh that you would hear his voice!
Don’t harden your heart, as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
The Lord is not slow concerning his promise, as some count slowness; but is patient with us, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
Hold severity and goodness together, and hear Him today
Paul's conclusion is not a shrug but a summons: 'See then the goodness and severity of God. Toward those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness.' Hold both without trimming either one. And take Jesus' open arm as the last word toward anyone who worries about this doctrine: 'He who comes to me I will in no way throw out.' The question the doctrine finally leaves us is not 'why did He harden them?' but 'am I hearing His voice today?'
See then the goodness and severity of God. Toward those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness; otherwise you also will be cut off.
As you read, you may wonder…
Scripture raises the next question
Studying the Word naturally opens more of it. Follow what you just read: it leads somewhere.
Explore further
Does everyone deserve God's judgment?→Who We Are trail“for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God;”Did God choose me to be saved before I chose Him?→The Gospel trail“even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and without defect before him in love;”We haven't written this one yet. Take it to your church or small group: the Word answers it wherever it is asked. If we study it here later, all the better.
Hold onto these
Verses to meditate on
but indeed for this cause I have made you stand: to show you my power, and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth;
So then, he has mercy on whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires.
See then the goodness and severity of God. Toward those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness; otherwise you also will be cut off.
while it is said, “Today if you will hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts, as in the rebellion.”
All those whom the Father gives me will come to me. He who comes to me I will in no way throw out.
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