"While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light." When Jesus had said this, he departed and hid himself from them. Though he had done so many signs before them, yet they did not believe in him; it was that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
"Lord, who has believed our report,
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?"
Therefore they could not believe. For Isaiah again said,
"He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart,
lest they should see with their eyes and perceive with their heart,
and turn for me to heal them."
Isaiah said this because he saw his glory and spoke of him. Nevertheless many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. John 12:36–43 (RSV)
God spoke to Moses before he went before Pharaoh to demand that Israel be set free. God also told Moses that He would harden Pharaoh's heart after the signs that Moses did so that Pharaoh would not let Israel go. It seems curious that God would prevent the very thing He had sent Moses to accomplish.
Pharaoh considered himself to be the god Ra in human form. The authority of Pharaoh's rule depended on all in Egypt believing that it was so. God intended to heap humiliation and defeat on Pharaoh, so none would be able to deny by whose power Israel was set free. The Pharaoh, who let the Children of Israel go, was no more a god than the slaves who were departing his realm.
So God hardened the hearts of the Pharisees, so they would learn that they were not in control of either Jesus or His Father. The Pharisees had convinced themselves that if only ten of them kept the Law perfectly for one day, then God would have to send the Messiah.
The Pharisees chafed at the idea that a carpenter's son from Nazareth could be the Chosen One of God. It offended their sensibilities that God would behave in such an unGodlike fashion. The Pharisees had read Scripture, learning it backward and forward, so they believed. True, they had read Scripture, but they did not know it as revealing God's purpose and will.
Anyone who thinks that God needs our defense to protect His divine nature has no idea of who God is. It is God who has chosen the hour of the Messiah's coming. It is the will of the Father that His Son will be the redeemer of the world. Jesus is God in the flesh, and it matters nothing if any believes it or not.
Jesus has come to redeem, and those who hear the promise given through Him receive what He has won through His death and resurrection. The Father set the Children of Israel free. He has sent His Son to free us from sin and death.
Pharaohs and Pharisees come and go in every age. They will be as hard-hearted as they always have been. They will go on believing that God needs them to be God. They will deny themselves the very One they imagine they are serving. Let us pray that the mercy of the Father will transform even the most hard-hearted.