Love and Grace vs Hardness of Heart

As I was reading through John chapter 12, I stumbled across a verse which confused me. In John 12:40 the Bible states:
“He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they see with their eyes, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them.” -ESV Version
Does this mean that God hardened their heart? If so , how do the following verses correlate with each other: John 6:37, 2 Peter 3:9, and 2 Chronicles 7:14. I know that God is sovereign and can do all things, but I also know that God is a gracious and loving father. Doesn't he want all people to repent and turn to him? The bible demonstrates his love in the story of the prodigal son and he's tells us that he will forgive us if we confess our sons. Did this hardening have something to due with the fact that Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? How does John 12:40 stand with God's grace?

John 12:40 is telling us that God set in motion the "Law of Unbelief," which, in effect, is the "Law of Sowing and Reaping." Because they willfully refused to believe, God willed a judicial blindness and hardness accordingly.

Isaiah the Prophet might be fulfilled, which he spoke (Isa. Chpt. 53), Lord, who has believed our report?

JSM

I believe John 12:40 has to do with God's long term plan for Israel, further explained in Romans 10 and 11.
No, God does not harden will-nilly, but in this case He is following through what He had already foretold hundreds of years earlier regarding Israel's unbelief, and is blinding and hardening what has already been opposing Him.

Looks to me the cross has something to do with it, yes, since this fulfilled Isaiah 6:10 which chapter concludes with Isaiah asking, "How long, O Lord?" And the He answers, "Until....the holy seed will be a stump in the land."

This is about Israel and Their rejection and disobedience. The blindness is temporary .12¶Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech:
13And not as Moses, which put a vail over his face, that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that which is abolished:
14But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which vail is done away in Christ.
15But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their heart.
16Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away.
2 cor 3.16
It s not About us Gentiles in 2020 of course .

rom 2
3 And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?
4 Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?
5 But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;
Matthew 12:36
But I tell you that everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken.

Loving people includes telling them about their need to repent. People sometimes get angry at that. So in that sense, their hearts are hardened by God (telling them to repent).

Depends what you mean by repent ?

Believe what the Lord is saying, instead of thinking you know better,

The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here. Mt.12:41

And after the cross?

He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” Act.19:2

If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Lk.11:13

People harden their own hearts to even hearing truth. Look at every belief group on the planet. Pick one, any one. Do they not have:

1.) tons of data to prove their views are correct.
2.) Tons of proof that all opposing beliefs are false.
3.) Tons of interpretations of the data in 1-2 above that fully align with what they want to believe as truth?
4.) Ways to Interpret everything else in the light of 1-3 above?
5.) Ways of explaining away, discrediting, ignoring, reinterpreting ... anything that does not seem to support their views?
6.) Other reasons for holding fast to their beliefs> Speaking in tongues, burning in the bosom, statues of Mary coming to life, our belief group is the oldest, largest, fastest growing, has the most highly educated experts, we have been in this belief group for 15 generations...

The point is, the more you do the things in 1-6 the more your eyes and ears are closed to considering that your current beliefs might be wrong, and the less likely that you are to accept anything contrary to them as truth. Effectively closing your eyes and ears. But here's the point. The truth is offered, even given. Romans 1:18-32 the non-religious lost. Romans 10:1-3 the religious non-Christian lost who seek to justify their beliefs, not subject them to the truth. Mat. 7 those that believe Jesus is their Lord, God, Savior ... with all their heart, mind, soul and strength but are wrong... all of them hardened into false beliefs by their own choices to love their beliefs over truth. And what do they all get? A deluding influence from God to believe what they want to believe. Why? They love their beliefs, not truth.

2Th 2:10 and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved.
2Th 2:11 For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false,
2Th 2:12 in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.

One example of the reason our Maker :hardened the hearts and blinded the eys," is seen in the prophecy how in the latter times God will pour out a spirit of delusion so that those who loved *pas( evil would believe lies.. It says the people had chosen evil over good, thus they were the ones affected to believe lies. Also the evil of our age would prefer their own lies to the truth everlasting from above.

If God chooses to do anything, it is good for He is incapable of doing evil. I make it my practice to believe what is written especially when I do not quite understand what it is truly based upon.

The old testament tells us about the Lord and what His policies are. It gives lots of ways to live in harmony with those policies. It would be possible to obey the letter of these laws but without love. That is not true obedience.

Then God gave us the new covenant, putting those policies in our hearts and mind. Christ told us "you have been told", and he repeated God;s commandments. Then Christ said "but I tell you" and he gave us a way to live with those policies in our hearts and minds.

In the gospels it tells of men praying in the streets as an example of legalistic obedience without any of the heart and mind involved. Matt. 6:5.

Hey Jimmy .