What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.
Is God unjust? That’s the question here. Paul has said that God chose Isaac, not Ishmael. Then he chose Jacob, not Esau.
So is God unjust because he chose out of the norm? He didn’t choose Ishmael, even though technically he was the firstborn. Nor did he choose Esau, who was the first born.
Bottom line is that God is God. He has all wisdom and understanding. In Him there is no evil nor injustice. He has reasons for his choices that man cannot comprehend.
It doesn’t depend on man’s will or human exertion, but God chooses as he sees fit.
The example is Pharaoh. Pharaoh had a hard heart towards God. He also heavily oppressed the Isarelites and worked them “ruthlessly,” Just how hard is visible by how deeply he resisted.
In this situation, God simply could have brought judgment against Pharaoh. God is God and could have easily removed him from power.
But instead, God chose to raise him up in power. The purpose was that through him and his hardness of heart, God would show his glory through all the earth.
He did this by allowed for the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart. Pharaoh already had a hard heart.
As the saying goes, “the same sun that melts the wax also hardens the clay.” The sun shone on Pharaoh and his heart hardened.
This hasn’t been unprecedented in the book of Romans. We saw in ch 1 that people neither glorified God nor gave thanks to him. They worshiped idols and indulged in unnatural sexual relations and lusts.
In the same way, they persisted in sin to the point that God gave them over to their desires.
“Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In teh same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
Furthermore, since they did not think worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved min, to do what ought not to be done… Although they know God’s righteousness decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them” (Romans 1:26-32).
Those are some seriously scary Scriptures. Sometimes God lets us go to fulfill the lusts and desires of our hearts, things which will reap a terrible judgment. And in the case of Pharaoh, he was given over the hardness of his heart.
Through it, God showed his glory.
It definitely is not an easy teaching. But it goes on.