Repentance is a gift

 repentance is not circumstantially produced. Repentance is not produced by showing a person the terror of judgment. You know, there are some folks that think you can cause someone to repent by showing them hell. Well, my friends, God has shown Pharaoh hell. Everything but the fire, and there’s no repentance. Because repentance is a grace, it’s a mercy, it’s a gift of God, it’s a work wrought of the Holy Spirit. And it is not one that is commonly bestowed. And so, my friends, we see here the lunacy of sin and the hardness of an unrepentant heart, as Pharaoh sees the judgment of God displayed before him, and he will not turn.

--Ligon Duncan