Hardening of the Heart

Exodus 9:27,29-30,34: [After God inflicted the land of Egypt with hailstones, resulting in utter destruction of the vegetation] "Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron. 'This time I have sinned,' he said to them. 'The LORD is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong. Pray to the LORD . . . .Pray to the LORD, for we have had enough thunder and hail. I will let you go; you don't have to stay any longer.' Moses replied, 'When I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands in prayer to the LORD. The thunder will stop and there will be no more hail, so you may know that the earth is the LORD's. But I know that you and your officials still do not fear the LORD God.' . . . . When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts . . . He would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses."

Here again is a good example of a supposedly penitent heart that (1) acknowledges that he has sinned, (2) confirms that the LORD is right, and (3) asks that Moses pray for him to bring deliverance. Still what is lacking in Pharaoh is a heart that is willing to submit to the LORD.

When God's judgment of hailstones ended, Pharaoh revealed his true heart. Even though God had stopped the plague of hail and rain at Moses' request, Pharaoh again desired to challenge the Lordship of the true God and keep God's covenant people in captivity. Pharaoh and his officials "hardened their hearts" in order that they might assert their own quest for lordship over the One Sovereign Lord (9:34).

Today, we must all evaluate ourselves to see who is on the throne of our lives. Are we passionately pursuing our own "rights" to divinity, or are we submitting to the One and Only True Lord?

Job 15 says that the wicked man, "shakes his fist at God and vaunts himself against the Almighty, defiantly charging against him with a thick, strong shield." In the end, the one who attempts to challenge God's Sovereignty will see God's righteous wrath. Still, those who surrender to the rightful Lordship of God through repentance, faith, and obedience will live in the blessing of the LORD's goodness (Lam. 3:25).