By Teena Myers
God had an unexpected solution for Israel’s problem. He appeared to Moses, who did not need help, to send him to Pharaoh, who was not asking for help.
Arise from sleep
Paul explained why Jehovah dealt with Pharaoh before he delivered the Israelites. In his letter to the Romans, he quoted Jehovah’s message to Pharaoh, “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”[1] Paul used a Greek word for raised that means to arouse from sleep.[2]
Jehovah had more than the ancient Egyptians and Israelites on his mind. He endured Pharaoh’s arrogance to benefit “all the earth,” by making his love and mercy known to everyone. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Jehovah went to Egypt to love Pharaoh by waking him from spiritual sleep and educating him to the truth about the gods of Egypt, so everyone in all the earth can know the truth about Jehovah. Then Paul concluded, “God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.”[3]
Hardening
Some believe Jehovah hardened Pharaoh’s heart so he could destroy him and all of Egypt. That belief contradicts Jehovah’s character. God is defined as love in the Bible. Would a God who takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked deny them a way to escape the consequences of their sin?[4]
In the account of the Israelites deliverance from Egypt’s power three Hebrew words, chazaq, kabad, and qashah, are translated hard or harden. Each word carries a different meaning.
Chazaq means to make strong, courageous, strengthen, cure, help, repair.[5] It describes the physical and moral strength Jehovah gives us to believe. We can use that strength to obey him or turn that strength into stubbornness against him.
Kabad means heavy, in a good sense meaning numerous or in a bad sense meaning difficult or stupid.[6] Our hearts can become heavy with numerous reasons to believe in Jehovah’s love. If we close our eyes to the truth, and become stubborn it makes us difficult to deal and we make stupid decisions.
Qashah means to be dense, tough or severe. It is similar in meaning to kabad and only used once in God’s dealings with Pharaoh. Kabad is what fools do with chazaq. The mercy God gives can harden us into a stubborn Abraham, who believed the best of God when circumstances said otherwise. But mercy can also turn us into a foolish Pharaoh. Pharaoh experienced God’s goodness when God gave him credible, verifiable evidence to believe and obey him. Pharaoh turned the strength received from credible evidence into a stubborn refusal to obey God.
When Jehovah works in our lives to repair our hearts, we have a choice. Resisting the strength Jehovah gives us to believe is kabad, stupid. If we repeatedly kabad our heart against the truth our hearts become qashah, dense.
All Jehovah’s dealings with Pharaoh were designed to turn Pharaoh and his followers from their wicked ways, so they could live. Each miracle Pharaoh witnessed is followed by a commentary on his heart. Either Jehovah strengthened Pharaoh’s heart by giving him reasons to believe, or Pharaoh’s heart became kabad, heavy with the truth he refused to accept.
God’s Justice
To those who question Jehovah’s justice in his dealings with Pharaoh, Paul pointed to Jehovah’s rights as a potter by using an example from Jeremiah chapter 18.[7] Jehovah sent Jeremiah to the potter’s house to watch the potter form a vessel. The vessel the potter fashioned on the wheel was marred, so he refashioned it into a different vessel.
Jehovah told Jeremiah as the clay is in the potter’s hand so are the nations on earth in Jehovah’s hands. If he decides to destroy a nation for its evil, but that nation repents, he will reshape it into a vessel filled with his blessings. If Jehovah blesses a nation, but that nation does evil in his sight and refuses to obey his voice, he will destroy that nation. When Jehovah came to Egypt to deliver the Israelites, he put Egypt’s leaders on the potter’s wheel. If they had repented and obeyed him, he would have remade them into a vessel filled with his blessings.
Mercy
Jehovah’s power is his mercy. He said to Pharaoh, “For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth.”[8] Jehovah did not need to ask Pharaoh’s permission to let Israel worship him. He could have easily whipped the people of Egypt off the face of the earth. Jehovah wanted to save him and his people. But saving a leader who leads his followers astray is hard and sometimes impossible.
Why should we worship anyone who solves a problem the easy way at the expense of the people he rules, when he could save us by doing what is hard? Allowing the sacrifice of Jesus, his one and only son who never sinned against him, was hard. God allowed it to include everyone in his blessings by proving the depth of his love for us and his power over life and death.
[1] Romans 9:17, Exodus 9:16
[2] Thayers Greek Lexicon : 1) to arouse, raise up (from sleep) 2) to rouse up, stir up, incite. Exegeiro is used twice in the New Testament Romans 9:17 and 1 Corinthians 6:14. (bibletools.org, biblehub.com)
[3] Romans 9:18
[4] Ezekiel 33:11, 1 John 4:8, 1 Corinthians 13:1-8
[5] “H2388 – ḥāzaq – Strong’s Hebrew Lexicon (kjv).” Blue Letter Bible. Web. 26 May, 2024. <https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h2388/kjv/wlc/0-1/>.
[6] “H3513 – kāḇaḏ – Strong’s Hebrew Lexicon (kjv).” Blue Letter Bible. Web. 27 Jun, 2024. <https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h3513/kjv/wlc/2-1/#lexResults>.
[7] Romans 9:19-21
[8] Exodus 9:15
Leave a Reply