How Can Jesus Be All-knowing If He Said He Didn't Know the Day or Hour?
1) Direct answer
Jesus is all‑knowing as God, but when He said He didn’t know the day or hour, He was speaking from the position of the Son—the servant role in flesh—where that knowledge was veiled and not given to be revealed through that office.
2) Scriptural explanation
- The Bible says, “Of that day and that hour knoweth no man… neither the Son, but the Father” (Mark 13:32). That’s Jesus speaking as the Son.
- Yet the same Scripture declares, “God was manifested in the flesh” (1 Timothy 3:16), and “in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9). So the One in Him—the Father—knew all things.
- Jesus said, “The Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works” (John 14:10). The indwelling Father is the all‑knowing God.
- The disciples confessed to Jesus, “Now are we sure that Thou knowest all things” (John 16:30); and Peter said, “Lord, Thou knowest all things” (John 21:17). So He is not ignorant in His Godhead.
- As the Son, He took the form of a servant and humbled Himself (Philippians 2:7-8), grew in wisdom (Luke 2:52), hungered, slept, and wept. That shows the true human vessel.
- After the resurrection He said, “All power is given unto Me” (Matthew 28:18), and He told them, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power” (Acts 1:7). The times are held in the Father’s authority—God’s own counsel.
3) Simple clarifying logic
- There is one God. He was above us as Father, came among us in a body as the Son, and now dwells in us as the Holy Spirit. It’s not three Gods, and it’s not three persons—it’s one God revealing Himself in different offices.
- As man, Jesus could say, “I thirst,” and sleep in the boat; as God, He stilled the storm. As man, He wept at Lazarus’ tomb; as God, He called Lazarus out by name. So when He said the Son didn’t know that day and hour, He spoke from the servant position where that mystery was not to be made known.
- If He were merely a limited second person, how could Scripture say He “knows all things”? The answer is simple: the body is the Son; the indwelling is God. The Father in Him knew; the Son, as the obedient servant, did not reveal it.
Short reinforcement
No contradiction—just the mystery of God veiled in flesh. The same Jesus is truly man and truly God manifested: as the Son He submitted; as God He is all‑knowing.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
The works that I do bear witness of me
51-0413 §9
Now, get the order of it. Now, he wanted Him to come down and pray for him. But Jesus kind of give him a stoppage. He said, "Except you see signs and wonders, you won't believe." Said, "Sir, come ere my son--my child would die." He said, "Go your way; your son liveth." And the man believed what Jesus said. And as he was now going down, his servants met him, and told him, saying, Thy son liveth. And then inquired he of them the hour ... he begin to amend. And they said unto him, Yesterday at the seventh hour the fev...
When their eyes were opened, they knew Him
64-0312 §18
"Why," they said, "are you a stranger here?", looking Him right in the face. "Are you a stranger here, and don't know what's happened? Why, Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet approved of God... And we hoped that He would be the one that would deliver Israel. And this is the third day, and they crucified Him," and all these things. And He just, He said, "What things happened?", just like He knowed nothing about it. See, He just acted as if He didn't know nothing about it.
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 8:E-14
Wesley was a remarkably strong man. He says of himself that he could not remember to have felt lowness of spirits for even a quarter hour since he was born. He slept no more than six hours a day; arose in time to start preaching at five practically every day of his ministry; preached up to four times on a single day so that in a year he would average over 800 sermons.
Christ is the mystery of God revealed
63-0728 §57
God's great mystery of how... It's a secret. He kept it a secret. Nobody knowed nothing about it; even the angels didn't understand it, see. He didn't reveal it. That's the reason under our seventh mystery, when the seventh seal was opened, there was silence. Jesus, when He was on earth, they wanted to know when He would come. He said, "It's not... Even the Son Himself don't know when it's going to happen." See, God has this all to Himself. It's a secret. And that's the reason there was silence in heaven for a spac...
We would see Jesus
61-0208 §10
Did not Jesus say about John...? The disciples said, "Why do the scribes say that Elias must first come?" He said, "He's already come and they didn't know him." That's it. They never did know Elijah was a prophet, really, but just the church. They wouldn't have treated him ... wouldn't have called him "bald-head," and carried on like that. They didn't know it. They didn't know that John was really truly the prophet of God. They thought he was some crazy man out there in the wilderness, trying to drown the people in...