Pharaoh too was a vessel used by God
For your thoughts:
Just as Moses was a vessel used by God, Pharaoh too was a vessel used by God, as made clear in Romans 9:17-18. These verses lead us to deeply reflect on why God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Although Moses hesitated when called by God, God showed him mercy and used him as a vessel to reveal His glory. In the same way, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart to make it evident to the Egyptians that “the Lord is God.”
In the Bible, the first king depicted as tyrannical is Pharaoh, the ruler of Egypt mentioned in the book of Exodus. He was a cruel king who enslaved and oppressed hundreds of thousands of Israelites. When the Lord commanded Moses to ask Pharaoh to let His people go to worship Him, Pharaoh hardened his heart. The Bible shows that Pharaoh hardened his own heart 11 times, and God hardened his heart 7 times.
Why did God harden Pharaoh’s heart?
For the first five plagues, Pharaoh himself hardened his heart. But from the sixth plague onward, God hardened his heart further. This illustrates God's sovereignty—it is His right, as the Creator, to use us as He wills.
Two key points must be noted here:
Pharaoh had to be brought to a state where he had lost all confidence in his gods and stood empty. The ten plagues sent by God were directly related to the gods of Egypt, proving that these deities could not save Pharaoh.
It had to be made clear to Pharaoh and to the world that the God worshipped by the Israelites is the one true almighty God.
Until these two purposes were fulfilled, Pharaoh’s heart had to remain hardened.
In the Old Testament, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart to give the land of Canaan to the Israelites. In a similar way, in the 20th century, Hitler’s heart was also hardened so that the Jews could receive a nation of their own. Though he was an instrument of Satan, God still used Hitler to fulfill His hidden purposes.
“Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.”
– Romans 9:18
Just as Moses was used as a vessel by God, Pharaoh too, in his own way, was undeniably a vessel used by God.