God is the One who is in control and if He so chooses to withhold the fullness of His mercy from certain individuals, He can certainly do so—just as He did with Pharaoh. We are told in the Scriptures that Pharoah hardened his heart, and also that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Now, we could rightly ask the question, “Which came first, Pharoah’s hardening of his heart or God’s hardening of Pharaoh’s heart?” Well, we are not really told. But I do know what we learned in the beginning of our series on Romans that God gives the wicked over to the sinful desires of their hearts (Rom. 1:24, 26, 28). It seems that God gave Pharaoh over to the desires of his heart, but at the same time, God hardened Pharoah’s heart, and God purposed it to be so. Why didn’t God move in Pharaoh’s heart to believe God and humble himself to God? God didn’t. Why? Well, all we know is because God had a purpose in it, so that the Name of the Almighty God “might be proclaimed in all the earth” (v. 17). God does all things that His name be magnified and glorified. God will show mercy to whom He wants to show mercy and He will harden whomever He wants to harden. If a person doesn’t like this—they can take it up with God. And God does not need anyone to come to His defense. God can stand for Himself. But I do know—God is just, God is love, God is always right and God is fair only in accordance with what is True and Perfectly Just. And if His way does not make sense to us, God does not have to answer our every question. God does not have to give account of Himself according to our standards and judgments. If any person ever feels that they have found fault with God or with God’s Word as revealed in the Scriptures, then you can rest assured that the real fault is not with God, but with them. God is never at fault. His way may not always make sense to us, but God is bigger and greater and wiser than we are. We may not always understand what He does, but He does not always ask us to. He simply tells us to humbly believe Him and trust Him and surrender all to Him and to His way—for He is God—and we are not. Click on the link to listen to this sermon: