“Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, ‘Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years.’” – Hebrews 3:7-9
In this section of Hebrews, the focus is on our hearts. We are told, “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, ‘Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts…’” The good news, we are told, is that the Holy Spirit speaks to us. He does this through such things as Scripture, our conscience, and godly wise counsel. The bad news is that we can, and sadly do, harden our own hearts.
The first reference to hardness of heart is written by Moses in the book of Exodus concerning the Pharaoh. Paul also speaks of this in Romans 9:14-18.
The Israelite people, numbering a few million, were enslaved to a cruel tyrant named Pharaoh, who ruled as the most powerful man on earth and was worshiped as a god. God called Moses to proclaim to Pharaoh God’s demand that His people be released to worship Him freely.
The concept of the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart is introduced by God in Exodus 4:21, “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the miracles that I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go.’” This theme of Pharaoh’s hardness of heart is a subject that appears 19 more times in the rest of Exodus (Exodus 7:3, 13, 14, 22; 8:15, 19, 32; 9:7, 12, 34–35; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 13:15; 14:4, 8, 17). Some of these verses say that it was God who hardened Pharaoh’s heart, while others indicate that Pharaoh hardened his own heart.
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s devotional where we look at how God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.
Has there ever been a time when you had a hard heart and what was that like?
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