What Causes a Hardened Heart?

What is more plausible – a Creator God who always existed and brought the physical universe into existence by the shear force of his spoken word, or the universe suddenly exploding into existence on its own in one tremendous blast?

I think most people who believe they know the answer to this question will say that the answer is obvious. Yet those who believe the answer to be obvious often have opposite opinions on just what that answer would be, as was demonstrated in a conversation I had with a man named Chip while he was out grilling for his family in the alley behind his garage.

Chip said he has grown up without much exposure to or much interest in religion. He seemed to have learned enough to fuel his distaste for Christianity, however, and was much more interested in the many alternative ideas floating around cyberspace. To him, it seemed obvious to take scientists at their word when they describe a “Big Bang” that brought everything into existence.

To me, it seems obvious that creation must have a Creator. The idea that Something creating everything is more plausible than to believe that nothing creating everything. It also leads to other conclusions, such as the idea that this “Something” created everything for a purpose, and that if rational, thinking creatures like ourselves were created, then that purpose would likely be communicated to us as well.

For many reasons I don’t have the space to list, it seems obvious to me that the Bible, with its universal message and its collection of historical works from a wide variety of authors over a long period of time, would be a likely place for that Creator and His purposes to be revealed, and the more I read it and live it out the more convinced I am that this is the case.

The Bible also reveals why these truths that seem so obvious to believers seem so implausible to sceptics. Ephesians 4:18 tells us “They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.”

This darkened understanding and ignorance toward the things of God begins with a “hardened heart” to the foundational idea that there is a Creator in the first place. A cross-reference to this passage is found in 1 Tim. 4, where those with this hardness of heart are described as people “whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.”

But what does it mean to have a “seared conscience”?

Those with barbecuing experience, like Chip was doing in the alley as we talked, would understand that this refers to the high heat one uses when they begin to cook in order to create a sort of outer barrier or skin on the meat that serves to seal in the juices and flavor while it continues to cook more slowly.

A person whose conscience is “seared” and whose heart becomes hardened or calloused is indifferent and unaffected even to obvious truths, such as the implausibility of nothing creating everything as compared to the plausibility of a Creator, made obvious by all the evidence around us. Friendly as he was, I sensed this indifference and rejection of biblical truths in Chip; yet he seemed to have an interest in almost anything but the Bible when it came to spiritual things.

Paul attributed these sorts of alternative teachings to “deceiving spirits and things taught by demons”, and said that they come “through hypocritical liars”. These would be people who purposely reject obvious truths in order to support their own selfish agenda.

For his part, Chip seemed like a sincere sort of guy who simply wants to enjoy life without the burdens of religion. He didn’t seem to be one of the hypocritical liars Paul was writing about, who go out of their way to deceive others. Yet, his indifference told me he might be headed in that direction, and it started with the rejection of the most obvious truth of all, our Creator God made evident by His creation.