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God's free will trumps everybody else's free will, and this fact is very evident in the confrontation that Jehovah forced between Himself and the Egyptian monarch holding Moses' people captive.
• Rom 9:17-18 . . For the scripture says to Pharaoh: For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
That's a reference to Exodus 9:13-17 where it says:
• Ex 9:13-17 . .Then Jehovah said to Moses: Rise up early in the morning and stand before Pharaoh and say to him, "Thus says the Jehovah, the God of the Hebrews; let My people go, that they may serve Me. For this time I will send all My plagues on you and your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is no one like Me in all the earth.
. . . For if by now I had put forth My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, you would then have been cut off from the earth. But, indeed, for this cause I have allowed you to remain, in order to show you My power, and in order to proclaim My name through all the earth. Still you exalt yourself against My people by not letting them go.
There's some interesting information tucked away in Jehovah's proclamation. The most notable is that He could've simply wiped the Egyptians off the map with just one miracle and been done with it. But instead, Jehovah chose to whittle them down piece by piece, a little at a time, and just to make sure His intentions succeeded; Jehovah deliberately, and willfully, strengthened Pharaoh's resolve to resist and not give in.
Someone, somewhere, is sure to demand: How can God condemn Pharaoh's stubborn will to resist when it was God himself who strengthened the man to do so?
The thing is; Pharaoh was already condemned for refusing Moses' initial request. From that point on he was dead meat-- Jehovah could say "I own you" and it became His sovereign prerogative to do with the man as He pleased because God's free will trumps everybody else's free will.
Now the situation is this: there are people out and about who have been presented an intelligent gospel message, and turned from it. Those people have put themselves at risk of God himself deliberately, and willfully, stiffening their resolve to the point where they will never be able to accept the gospel-- ever! Thus their destiny in Hell becomes a sealed fate.
• Heb 10:31 . . It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
NOTE: See also 2Thess 2:7-12
_
God's free will trumps everybody else's free will, and this fact is very evident in the confrontation that Jehovah forced between Himself and the Egyptian monarch holding Moses' people captive.
• Rom 9:17-18 . . For the scripture says to Pharaoh: For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
That's a reference to Exodus 9:13-17 where it says:
• Ex 9:13-17 . .Then Jehovah said to Moses: Rise up early in the morning and stand before Pharaoh and say to him, "Thus says the Jehovah, the God of the Hebrews; let My people go, that they may serve Me. For this time I will send all My plagues on you and your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is no one like Me in all the earth.
. . . For if by now I had put forth My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, you would then have been cut off from the earth. But, indeed, for this cause I have allowed you to remain, in order to show you My power, and in order to proclaim My name through all the earth. Still you exalt yourself against My people by not letting them go.
There's some interesting information tucked away in Jehovah's proclamation. The most notable is that He could've simply wiped the Egyptians off the map with just one miracle and been done with it. But instead, Jehovah chose to whittle them down piece by piece, a little at a time, and just to make sure His intentions succeeded; Jehovah deliberately, and willfully, strengthened Pharaoh's resolve to resist and not give in.
Someone, somewhere, is sure to demand: How can God condemn Pharaoh's stubborn will to resist when it was God himself who strengthened the man to do so?
The thing is; Pharaoh was already condemned for refusing Moses' initial request. From that point on he was dead meat-- Jehovah could say "I own you" and it became His sovereign prerogative to do with the man as He pleased because God's free will trumps everybody else's free will.
Now the situation is this: there are people out and about who have been presented an intelligent gospel message, and turned from it. Those people have put themselves at risk of God himself deliberately, and willfully, stiffening their resolve to the point where they will never be able to accept the gospel-- ever! Thus their destiny in Hell becomes a sealed fate.
• Heb 10:31 . . It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
NOTE: See also 2Thess 2:7-12
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