Why Love Cannot Force Us
What Pharaoh’s story reveals about freedom, resistance, and the patience of God
Welcome back.
Today’s reflection explores one of the most challenging tensions in Scripture: freedom, resistance, and the kind of love that refuses to coerce. Pharaoh’s story has often raised difficult questions for me over the years, not just about judgment, but about the character of God itself.
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Paul
I used to find the story of Pharaoh deeply uncomfortable.
Not because of the plagues, the judgment, or even the scale of suffering.
But because of one repeated line that seemed impossible to explain.
“God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.”
For years, that verse sat awkwardly in my faith. If God made Pharaoh refuse, then in what sense was Pharaoh truly responsible? If resistance was engineered, then what becomes of freedom? Or love? Or justice?
And whilst we are asking questions, what about the people who suffered?
The story could begin to feel less like liberation and more like theatre. Pharaoh is cast as the villain before the drama even begins.
Yet the older I get, the more I find myself slowing down around difficult passages rather than rushing past them. And often, when I do, another detail emerges from the background.
Because Exodus does not only say that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.
It also says Pharaoh hardened his own heart.
That changes things.
