Good Debate

[Skandelon]

It is like asking why God chose to use gravity to hold us to the earth instead of making everything contain metal and using magnetism.

No, its like asking why God would need to confuse a man using a parable who was born unable to understand the clearly proclaimed gospel without a parable.

You'd just rather substitute that question with an absurd one so as to dismiss them both as 'silly.'

It is MEANINGLESS- utterly MEANINGLESS to ask why God does things that he does when God does not choose to reveal these things to us.

So why would God tell us His motive for hardening Pharaoh and later Israel? Both of which were to display God's glory and accomplish the Passover...a redemptive purpose indeed.

However, it is OK to speculate if one chooses. But you should not need an answer to the question "why God does...." to accept and believe the clear revelation "THAT God does..."

But 'that God does' is the point being debated. In other words, you haven't proven (at least to my satisfaction) that God does blind everyone from birth (Total Depravity) and then again from the gospel (parables). This question is there to reveal the contradiction of that view, and your appeal to mystery only validates the point that either Total Depravity is an error OR God's use of parables to prevent the possibility of regeneration is in error. You want to affirm both and call any question about the apparent and obvious contradiction 'silly.'