Why did God harden the Pharaoh’s? I’m in a Bible as Lit class and someone brought up “wouldn’t that be against free will,” and why did God let the Israelites stay it in slavery for so long. Why is God different in the Old Testament to the New Testament? I hope this doesn’t bother you, with all these questions

Okay, so there are several different questions here and I'm going to try to address them all. I'm sure I'll miss something somewhere, so other more knowledgeable friends feel free to add on. Follow-ups are also very much welcome.

First off, Bible as literature class! Yikes. I took a Bible as lit class for my English minor years ago and my experience was pretty much wall-to-wall frustration. It was mostly an exercise in coming up with the most transgressive reads on Scripture possible and that really upset me.

I hope that your experience is better than mine. However, assuming that the class is at a secular university, I'd still encourage you to be intentional about talking the things you cover in class over with knowledgeable Christians in your life. I certainly benefitted a lot from doing so, both in the sense that I got to vent a whole bunch and in that I got help contextualizing the secular perspectives within Christian scholarship.

That out of the way: The God of the Bible is the same in both the Old and New Testaments.

I do understand where you’re coming from. It’s not uncommon for people to find God kind of inscrutable in the OT when they're more used to reading the NT. I actually think that's a failure on the part of the contemporary church in the West; large swaths of the OT tend to be understudied among lay-Christians.

Systematic theology can help a lot here. I'm just going to hit a few really broad highlights, but I really can't recommend Wayne Grudem highly enough if you're interested in more in-depth reading. Lots of people start with Bible Doctrine, but my family happened to have a copy of his enormous Systematic Theology tome in the basement when I was in high school and I got a lot out of just poking through that a little at a time too. A few quick bullets though:

Across all the Biblical texts, God is love. He glories in kindness to his people, whether it's in the covenant with Abraham, the Exodus, the faithful ministry of the prophets, Christ's ministry/death/resurrection, or the promised coming of his kingdom.

God is holy; he gives the Law to the Israelites so that they can approach his holiness without fearing for their lives and he sent Jesus so that we can do the same. Both Isaiah and Peter react with fear and awe in the face of God's holiness.

God is just. By virtue of his holiness, he cannot allow sin to go unpunished. As modern westerners, we often chafe against this but has any of us experienced justice that was actually pure? Justice is a form of faithfulness, and the same God who sent his people into exile poured out his wrath on his own son in our place. He has promised that one day, every evil will face his perfect justice.

God is faithful. He keeps his Covenant with Abraham even unto the cross. In the OT he is faithful husband to an adulterous people. In the NT he tells us that when we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself.

Lots of other characteristics but this answer is going to be long enough as it is. The only way to get a real sense for the continuity within the Bible is to read the whole Bible with an eye towards the continuity.

The reason that God is more approachable in the NT than the Old is that he became human. In the Incarnation, all of that holiness and justice and faithfulness and love that was God came to earth in our perfect likeness so that he could live beside us and die for us. God is certainly easier to approach in light of Christ's work, but he is utterly the same as he ever was. Read the Transfiguration and tell me that isn’t the God of Mount Sinai. Read John 1 and tell me it doesn’t remind you of the end of Job. Read the Gospels, Hebrews, and Revelation and play spot-the-OT-parallel. It's beautiful.

Why did God leave his people in slavery for so long? You could ask the same question about the Babylonian captivity and even about why Jesus waits to return and finally defeat Death. Why does he wait? Why let his people suffer?

Well. God is sovereign and he only permits evil to the extent that it ultimately accomplishes the very opposite of what it intends. Because the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, the Exodus was able to occur. The Exodus glorified God in extraordinary fashion, both among his own people and to the peoples of the ancient world. It was also a necessary type and precursor to Jesus's work on the cross. I don't think it's an overstatement to say that redemptive history rests on God's work in the Exodus, which is itself contingent on a period of slavery in Egypt.

“How long, O Lord” and “Come Lord Jesus” are the same sentiment in different words. We are still in exile, even now. We are chronologically exiled from the place where we belong, the New Jerusalem, and we mourn because we live in a fallen world in which sin and death can still hurt us. We can ask, just as the Prophets once asked, why God waits to vanquish the Enemy, extract suffering from the world, and restore our years that the locusts have eaten. And in each case (the slaves in Egypt, the Babylonian captivity, and the period of waiting for Jesus to return), the answer is that God does not fix it yet because He is doing something bigger!

Regarding Pharaoh's heart: this is basically a question of human nature. The easiest way that I can articulate it off the top of my head is using Augustine's fourfold state of man:

Prior to the fall, man was able either to sin or not to sin (posse peccare, posse non peccare)

The natural state of man after the fall is one in which he is unable not to sin (non posse non peccare). This was Pharaoh's state.

Following the work of Christ, regenerate man is able not to sin (posse non peccare)

In eternity, glorified man will be unable to sin (non posse peccare)

When we talk about man's will, we must acknowledge that our wills are subject to our nature. In other words, Pharaoh was a natural, fallen man. His nature was inherently sinful and his heart inherently hard.

What we've got here is sort of a "Jacob I have loved but Esau I have hated" situation. Pharaoh, in his natural state, had a hard heart and a natural enmity with God. God did not intervene to give him a heart of flesh. My people I have loved, but Pharaoh I have hated.

Not a perfect parallel, but I think it serves its purpose. The point is that God's sovereignty isn't in conflict with man's will, since our wills are a function of our natures. Man behaves however his nature inclines him to behave at any given time. We call this free will; however, God is entirely sovereign over all of it.

This is definitely a long, messy answer, but like I said, feel free to continue the conversation. I've got some biochem to work on, but I'm always happy to talk theology :)

Jim Lake Jr. and the Amulet of Daylight (Part 2)

Book 1 Part 1 Link (covers Jim becoming the Boy Who Lived, growing up, arrival to Hogwarts, and Sorting).

There’s going to be a Part 3, cause this got long before I reached the end of HP1.

After thinking about it some more, I’ve returned Miss Janeth to being the Matron of the Hospital Wing (she was briefly going to be the Charms Prof in a post I made about TH Hogwarts Teaching Staff).

Content Note: References to major character death (Barbara is Lily Potter so she died saving Jim in the past).

And here we go!

Jim, Toby, and Claire left the Vault as they found it, but afterwards Jim had a strange, prickly presence in the back of his mind, like something was calling to him.  Unsettled by it, he’d refuse to listen.  But Jim had a weird feeling he wasn’t done with the Amulet of Daylight.

Life returned to normal, with the noted change of Claire becoming Jim and Toby’s friend.  Though, the friendship between Jim and Claire happened a bit quicker than it did for Toby and Claire.

This may have been due to the fact Toby went home for the winter holidays, but neither Claire nor Jim did.  Claire, because her mother was the Minister of Magic and it was easier for her if Claire just remained at Hogwarts.  Jim, because his father had been caught by the muggle police for some minor crime or another-Jim had stopped keeping track of all of them ages ago-and would be in prison through the spring.

Thus, Jim and Claire found they had Hogwarts almost to themselves for a few weeks and used that time to explore and have adventures.

They got lost an entire day because the staircases kept changing.  After hours of roaming and chatting, they managed to find the perfect, most comfortable sitting room to rest in for a bit.  However, when they tried to find it again later, they got lost a second time as the room had apparently vanished.

After a heated discussion on the matter, Jim and Claire formulated a plan to sneak each other into their respective common rooms to compare which had the better view.  Claire argued Ravenclaw Tower, as it had a breathtaking view of the sky and the grounds.  Jim, Slytherin Dungeon, because everyone could see the sky, but not everyone got visited by a giant, bioluminescent squid regularly.  In the end, they agreed both common rooms were nice in their own ways.  It was much more fun trying not to get caught than to argue anyway.

They briefly considered daring each other to so see how close they’d get to the Whomping Willow, but neither could go through with it.  They had an epic snowball fight instead.

Kanjigar, the head of Gryffindor House who taught Defense Against the Dark Arts, was Jim’s least favorite professor (due to the fact that Kanjigar always seemed to pick on Jim in class, asking him tough questions he clearly couldn’t know the answers to and such).  He also happened to be one of the professors who stayed on the grounds during the break.  During Jim and Claire’s snowball fight, he may have been walking by and Jim may or may not have “accidentally” thrown snowballs in his direction.  Five times.

Jim got in trouble for this, but decided it was still worth it.

A bit of work came in the form of Claire insisting they research the Amulet of Daylight in the library after Jim told her about the persistent, weird presence in the back of his mind.  Though they spend hours reading books, they came up with no explanations as to why it was happening.

For the first time in his life, Jim received holiday gifts that weren’t whatever odd item his father had easy access to and could shove in his general direction.  A big package full of cookies, fudge, candies, odd and unique stones Toby thought he’d like, and a warm sweater knitted by Toby’s Nana arrived for him from the Domzalski house.  Claire gave him a book of new recipes he’d never heard of before.

Jim’s gifts to his friends subsequently were to make (and send, in the case of Toby) them which dessert treat he thought they’d like best.

One quiet morning, Jim took a plate of fresh muffins he’d baked the night before down to the Hospital Wing and asked Miss Janeth for stories about his mother.  They’d spend the next few hours talking.

Jim learned his mother had been the first hat-stall in over a decade.  The Sorting Hat had debated back and forth between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff for her.  Gryffindor, because it sensed great fierceness and stubbornness in Barbara.  Hufflepuff, because it saw in her a deep kindness and desire to improve the lives of others.  Barbara had gotten tired of its contemplations and told it to decide already.  There were others waiting.  The Sorting Hat took this into consideration and declared her Gryffindor.

Jim didn’t know how to feel about this, being a Slytherin himself, but he wouldn’t admit that to Miss Janeth.

One of Miss Janeth’s favorite memories about Barbara, as she told Jim, was Barbara’s aspirations of combining muggle and wizard medicine.  Upon finding out that wizards used none of the muggle world’s advancements, Barbara had set about trying to change that.  If, she’d reasoned, both worlds could help so many people, think of what they could do if they worked together.

After telling Jim that, Miss Janeth went silent.  She walked back to her office, remained there for a few minutes, and then came back with a few of Barbara’s old notebooks and journals she’d managed to keep.

Jim didn’t understand pretty much anything scribbled in those books.  Both because the concepts were far too advanced for him and because his mother’s handwriting was as horrible as his own.  But he loved being able to hold something she’d once held and run his fingers over her chicken-scratch notes and doodles.

When he returned to his dormitory, Jim found the final gift he would receive.  A delicate parcel he found by his bedside.  On a small card attached to it, written in shimmering green ink, were the words:

To Jim Lake Jr.

To protect you as it did your mother and I on our wanderings of the castle

May you have just as many adventures

There was no name signed anywhere on the card, but it did smell strongly of the Potions classroom (though this only occurred to Jim some time later, when classes started again). Jim unwrapped the parcel to discover a fine Invisibility Cloak.  His first use of it was to play a prank on Claire.

Then, one night, Jim woke in a panic and rushed from his dormitory.  Something was wrong, something with the Amulet of Daylight (he wasn’t sure how he knew that).  He threw the cloak over himself to traverse the castle undetected until he reached the Vault.  Outside it, unseen, he witnessed a standoff between Kanjigar and a figure concealed in shadow.  He couldn’t catch most of what they were saying before they left, but he knew what was happening.

Kanjigar was trying to steal the Amulet.  Jim was sure of it.  And he had to be stopped.

The next night, Jim used the Invisibility Cloak to sneak into the Restricted Section of the library, looking for clues on the Amulet of Daylight (and how to keep it safe).  Alone, because, if he got in trouble, he didn’t want to get Claire in trouble with him.

Jim opened one book, which screamed at him.  Jim ran.

Panicked, Jim didn’t look where he was going and end up in a room he’d never been in before.  One with a strange mirror.

The mirror called to Jim in, drawing him in close.

Rather than see his own reflection, Jim saw a young woman, one a few years older than the 7th years, in the mirror.

At first, Jim didn’t recognize her.  He’d never actually seen the woman before in his life.  He found the way she smiled at him a little bit unnerving.  But then he’d look at her eyes and know.

All his life, Jim had been told he had his mother’s eyes.  He’d never really understood why.  Sure, his eyes were blue, but lots of people had blue eyes.  They weren’t that special.  Except that they were.  His mother had had blue eyes, like him, but the shade of blue they were was deeper and a bit more indigo that what was usual.  They stood out in such a way that people noticed, and, more importantly, remembered.  Jim had inherited those same eyes.  He’d just never thought them unusual before because they were his.  But looking at them on someone else, he began to understand.

“Mom?”  Jim whispered.  The woman in the Mirror of Erised, Barbara Lake, nodded.

Tentatively, Jim walked to the mirror.  His gaze never left Barbara, who watched him in return.

“umm…hi?”  He offered her in greeting.  Jim bit his lip and adverted his gaze.  What did you say to the mother you never knew?  When that mother also happened to be in a mirror?  “You…you aren’t real, are you?  You’re just a magic mirror.”  His voice choked up.

Barbara knelt down so she was at Jim’s level.  She smiled at him in the way he always thought a mother would smile, but said nothing like Jim so desperately wanted.

He didn’t know what he wanted her to say exactly.  Something motherly.  Something…once, while in Diagon Alley buying groceries, Jim had witnessed a boy his own age being fitted for new robes.  The boy had stepped off the fitting stool and his mother had hugged him.  Jim stared at Barbara, knowing it was impossible.  He flattened his hand against the mirror’s cold surface.  

On the other side, Barbara’s hand met his own.

Jim’s vision swam before his eyes.  Tears trickled down his face.

“I just want to know you.”  He sobbed.  But there was no reply.  The mirror only showed desires.  It did not grant them.

365News Headlines Today Sun-09-Jun-2019

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Alright, so today was good, not exhausting probably because I got to sleep in which was like 🙌🏻 even though I was extra lazy and took a Lyft to Ulta to get my hair cut so I could get another 45 minutes of sleep 😂 at least I didn't blow off anything actually important, and I was SOOOO overdue for a haircut, like omg. So I got to catch up with my stylist who I love and we always trade crazy stories, so I was telling her about all the mayhem that is juvenile court and all the fun we've been having there (that's a pretty loose definitely of fun, of course). But I finished up there around 3 and walked a few blocks down to the blue line and took it back to school. I dumped my stuff in the PAD office because I always have way too much stuff with me, then went searching for where I was supposed to turn in my appellate briefs because I didn't want to be responsible for holding them anymore like here just take them haha I literally was keeping them in a plastic ziploc bag in an attempt to keep them undamaged. So I was happy when I accomplished that. Back to the PAD office, and had barely a few minutes to copy case briefs for this week's crim pro reading into my notes (because lol who does the reading anymore what am I a 1L? And that was the only class I was actually reading for to start with 😂) and then had to meet my spring break friend because they were doing the pro bono service awards for the students that hit the most hours. As of now I'm at 148 and I still have some more to log from this year, but the highest award is just for 3L's who've broken 200 so I'll definitely get that next year haha but I got the 100 hour one for this year. I hung out with my friend and the two guys from the public interest law board that we're friends with. The ceremony was nice enough, the lady like forgot to call my name which I thought was more amusing than anything else haha because I really did not care but she was like "omg I'm so sorry!!!" and freaking out and I was like haha it's fine really. So we hung out there for a little bit longer before heading back to school (it was in the building next door that's still owned by our university but isn't the "college of law" building), and I copied the rest of the case briefs before heading to class. It was fairly interesting, all 6th amendment right to confront your accuser stuff and there was one case that was substantially similar to a case we cited in the motion I wrote at work about a child abuse victim testifying via closed circuit TV and everyone was talking about protecting the defendants rights to a face to face confrontation of their accuser and I was just like ".....so you guys know in juvenile court we do this stuff literally all the time right?" Lol like I know juvenile court is technically civil court but it quasi-criminal enough that you get a public defender. So that at least was somewhat interesting. Our prof just like, gave us a random 20 minute break and said it was so we could do our professor evaluation but it looked like she really just needed a minute haha it seemed her thoughts were getting a bit jumbled there. But then we finished up pretty quickly and she let us out like 45 minutes early (I just think she doesn't like classes being that long) so I got home a bit earlier than I would've. Nothing new recorded, so I watched crazy ex-girlfriend which is of course reaching whole knew levels of craziness and I do love the show, but I also want to be done with it because there's so much I want to watch right now, lol. I want to catch up on APB which I haven't started at all but have a bunch of recorded episodes of, and I need to see 24: Legacy at least as long to when my bby Tony shows up, and then there's the pressing Netflix shows I really want to drop everything and watch because everyone is talking about them. I know Iron Fist was getting pretty mixed reviews, at least in the comic-media world I frequent, but I'd very much like to see it. And then of course everyone's been going nuts over 13 Reasons Why, which I find interesting because what's gotta be like 8 or 9 years ago now (I was 16 I think) my friend lent me that book to read (I was highly suicidal at the time and I guess she thought maybe it would help? Idk) and I remember reading it, and then starting the lovely bones right after that. It's interesting to see the different feedback to it, and I know there's been some pushback from the mental health advocacy community based on some aspects of the story so I just really want to watch it for myself so I can share my thoughts on it (post-finals, probably). I think I always may have more thoughts on the bullying angle now because of my experiences on tour with that subject. So I'd like to do that. But yeah, that ended my day but I think I had a few more things I wanted to talk about. One would be classes for next semester. The school, for whatever reason, significantly cut down on how many classes they were offering which is a major wtf for all of us, but I'm basically just worried I'm not taking enough bar-tested courses (only certain areas of the law are tested on the bar exam) and more like the ones I'm interesting in, which are great, but may not help on the bar. Tbh though it's not like I'm very worried about not passing the bar. I've always been an excellent test taker, and I know if I prep correctly and give myself enough time to grasp the concepts of the tested classes I didn't take (like how I taught myself all of property in two weeks) I'll be just fine. But as it stands right now, I have adoption law, poverty law (both of which would be very good additions for my line of work), business organizations (which is obviously bleh but it's a must for the bar) and then a legal drafting class we have to take. They have different topic ones you can take, and I didn't really want to do the family law one because I knew it really just meant divorce and I don't really want to do that, so I picked civil litigation on the hopes that maybe I will end up in the outside the govt civil sector fighting for child rights, like I'd really really like to be doing....but we'll see. I'm also seeing the timing work out pretty well, right now I have adoption law and poverty law on Monday and Wednesday nights (one on each night, I just can't remember which night is which), then bus orgs on Tuesday and Thursday from 1-2:40 (my only meets twice a week class, bleh), and then legal drafting on Thursday right after from 3-4:30, that way I figure I can still get home to enjoy a Thursday night. I'm trying to make it so I do have bit more breathing room and I'm not coming home late every single night of the week. This plan would presumably have me at work then class on Monday, one afternoon class on Tuesday, one night class on Wednesday, two afternoon classes on Thursday (and somewhere between those last 3 days slip in my DVLC shift) and work on Friday, which sounds pretty good to me, so hopefully that will work out well. The other thing I wanted to talk about is once again my fucking back, because it was killing me again today and now I'm wondering if I shouldn't go to the grappling class I'm signed up for at the kickboxing gym tomorrow night, but like at the same time it's super easy to talk myself out of these things if I'm not like super strict about it so I don't want it to just be like an excuse, but I also don't want to aggravate it.....idk, I haven't made up my mind yet. We'll see how I'm feeling in the morning and how the day goes. Okay, that's about all I got. Goodnight darlings. Sleep well.