Program 279
Omniscience: a divine attribute

Scripture establishes that Yahushua had to learn; he did not have omniscience which is an attribute of divinity.

Welcome to WLC Radio, a subsidiary of WLC Radio Ministry, an online ministry dedicated to learning how to live in constant readiness for the Savior's return.

For two thousand years, believers of every generation have longed to be the last generation. Contrary to popular belief, though, Christ did not give believers “signs of the times” to watch for. Instead, he repeatedly warned that his coming would take even the faithful by surprise. Yahushua urgently warned believers to be ready because, he said, “The Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.” [Matthew 24:44]

WLC Radio: Teaching minds and preparing hearts for Christ's sudden return.

* * *Part 1: (Miles & Dave)

Miles Robey: When talking about divinity, the one true God is always described as having three specific attributes. He is:

• Omniscient
• Omnipotent and
• Omnipresent

In other words, the one true God is the only god that is all-knowing, all-powerful, and present everywhere at all times. These are qualities that only the true and living God possesses. This is why Christians, and Jews, and Muslims—the three Abrahamic religions—can declare with such assurance that their God is the only true God; all other gods are false. Why? Because only the God of Abraham is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent.

But now we’ve got a dilemma. Because while Christians will all agree that God is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent … is Yahushua?

Hi, I’m Miles Robey and you’re listening to World’s Last Chance Radio where we cover a variety of topics related to Scripture, prophecy, practical piety, Biblical beliefs, and living in constant readiness for the Savior’s unexpected return, whenever that might be. Today, Dave Wright is going to be taking us through a study of Scripture’s description of Yahushua. What does the Bible have to say about Yahushua? This is a fair question because if Yahushua possesses the three attributes of the one true God, then Scripture will say so, thus proving he is divine. But if Scripture says something else, we’ve got a problem.

Then, later, Jane Lamb will share a promise for anyone longing for compassion and kindness. Speaking for myself, in the busyness and stress of today’s world, getting a little kindness and understanding can help a lot. When you’re feeling overwhelmed, a little compassion can go a long way to strengthen you, so I’m sure you’ll want to stay tuned for that.

Dave? I can just hear some of our listeners indignantly exclaiming, “Well, of course he wasn’t omniscient, omnipotent, or omnipresent while on earth! He laid all of that aside when he took on human nature!” What would you say to that?

Dave Wright: I would have to say, even if that were true, then how could he still be considered “God” if those are the attributes that define and identify the only true God?

We’ve covered in other programs how no one has more than one nature. Everyone, from angels to Yahuwah Himself, has only one nature. No one has a “dual” nature. That’s ridiculous and is part of the confusion of error. It’s why even trinitarians admit the doctrine of the trinity cannot be explained or understood.

Miles: Confusion’s one of the identifying marks of error, isn’t it? If something’s “too deep for human minds to grasp.”

Dave: Absolutely. Yahuwah’s truth is always logical. He invites us to come to Him for answers to what confuses us.

Let’s start with taking a few minutes to see how Scripture defines “God.” Then we’ll look at how Scripture describes Yahushua. I am sure by the end of today’s program you’ll agree that the two descriptions are incompatible which means that only Yahuwah is divine. Only He is “God.” Yahushua is His only begotten but fully human son.

Would you please turn to 1 John 3 and read verses 20. Now, in the original Greek, it simply uses the title of “God.” This isn’t saying just who “God” is, but it’s giving us one of the divine attributes.

Go ahead.

Miles: “If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.”

Dave: Okay. “God”—whether that’s just Yahuwah or a three-in-one godhead—knows everything. God is omniscient. Read Isaiah 40 verse 28 now.

Miles:

Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Yahuwah is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.

Dave: All right. So this passage identifies God by name as being Yahuwah. If Yahushua were also God, he should be named here since, in order to be divine, he’d have to have had a pre-existence.

This verse says that Yahuwah’s understanding is infinite. Turn now to Psalm 44 and read verses 20 and 21.

Miles:

If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
would not God have discovered it,
since he knows the secrets of the heart?

Dave: Daniel, in being shown what Nebuchadnezzar had dreamed, stated that Yahuwah, quote, “reveals deep and hidden things; He knows what lies in darkness, and light dwells with Him.” He even knows what we’re going to say before we say it. What does Psalm 139 verse 4 say?

Miles: “Before a word is on my tongue you, Yahuwah, know it completely.”

Dave: Notice again that in the original Hebrew, Yahuwah is identified by name.

Miles: This verse reminds me of where, in the sermon on the mount, Yahushua said that our Father knows what we need before we ask Him. He didn’t say that he, Yahushua, knows it; but the Father does. [Matthew 6:8]

Dave: Because He’s God.

Would you please look up the definition of omniscience for us? What does the dictionary say?

Miles: Uhh … “The quality of knowing all things at once; universal knowledge; knowledge unbounded or infinite. Omniscience is an attribute peculiar to God.”

Dave: It says that in the dictionary: “Omniscience is an attribute peculiar to God”?

Miles: Yep.

Dave: And by “peculiar,” it doesn’t mean “strange.” It means this is an attribute that only He possesses. It’s an old-fashioned use of the word we don’t hear much anymore.

Now. When we go back and read through the various creeds established by the early, ecumenical Church councils, we find that it is assumed that each member of the triune godhead is, individually, omniscient. It’s not stated. It is assumed as fact.

Miles: Well, sure. Because Yahuwah is all-knowing, if you believe God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are equal with God the Father, they’re going to be omniscient, too.

Dave: And yet … was Yahushua truly omniscient? Let’s see what Scripture says. Turn to Luke 8. Here, Yahushua is making his way through a very large crowd of people. Suddenly, he asks a strange question. What was it? Verses 45 and 46.

Miles:

Yahushua said, “Who touched me?”

When all denied it, Peter and those with him said, “Master, the multitudes throng and press you, and you say, ‘Who touched me?’”

But Yahushua said, “Somebody touched me, for I perceived power going out from me.”

Dave: Good old Peter! You have to love how he’s always so ready to just blurt out what everyone else is thinking but are too shy or too well-mannered to say!

But this shows that Yahushua didn’t know everything. And this is just one example. When Lazarus died, Yahushua asked Mary a question that he wouldn’t have had to ask if he were omniscient.

Would you read it, please? John 11 verses 32 to 34.

Miles:

When Mary reached the place where Yahushua was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

When Yahushua saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. “Where have you laid him?” he asked.

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

Dave: Yahushua wasn’t being deceitfully disingenuous here. He wasn’t pretending not to know something he actually knew. He asked because he really didn’t know!

That’s not the sign of omniscience.

Miles laughs: Good point! And you have to ask yourself: between knowing where he was buried and raising him back to life, which was harder? And yet, he had to ask.

Dave: Sure. Because Yahuwah worked through Christ to raise Lazarus. But Yahushua didn’t know where he was buried because he’s not divine. He had to ask.

Miles: I like what you said about Yahushua not being disingenuous. He wasn’t pretending to not know. That wouldn’t be honest. He truly didn’t know!

Dave: Saying he was just pretending not to know demeans the dignity of Christ.

One area in which people often think that Yahushua was just feigning ignorance is found in Luke 2. Would you turn there please? This is the story of Yahushua’s first trip to Jerusalem when he was 12.

Miles: When he taught the scholars?

Dave: Well, that’s how we like to think of it. But what does Luke say? Read verses 46 and 47.

Miles: “After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.”

Dave: We’ve extrapolated from the scholars being amazed at his understanding and answers to the young boy teaching the scholars. But just because they were amazed at his level of understanding at his age doesn’t mean his questions were just pretend, that they weren’t genuine.

With his level of understanding, I’m sure his questions were deep. That alone, coming from a 12-year-old, would be astonishing. But there’s nothing in Luke’s account to suggest Yahushua was just play-acting at being ignorant. Instead, it says he was asking them questions. Clearly, there were things he didn’t know, that he wondered about.

Miles: Hm. I guess I always assumed Yahushua’s questions were just a diplomatic way to, I don’t know, subtly lead the adults to consider a different perspective? New light?

Dave: Remember, though, that when this happened, he was only 12 years old. You’re ascribing to him skills in logic and debate only trained adults have.

Miles: That’s true. And the chapter ends with the comment that, after returning home with Mary and Joseph, he “grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.” Clearly, he grew and developed in a natural progression of maturation.

Dave: This isn’t the only place where Yahushua’s less than perfect, less than omniscient knowledge is documented. Perhaps the clearest place is found in John 14. Would you please read verse 24 for us?

Miles: Uhhh … “Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me.”

Dave: John, who was the closest of the disciples, repeatedly quotes Yahushua as admitting that he had to be taught by Yahuwah. Read John 8 verse 28 next.

Miles:

So Yahushua said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me.”

Dave: If you look up the phrase “Son of Man” in a concordance, it comes from the same Greek word for human. He’s emphasizing his humanity. He didn’t know everything any more than we do.

What about John 7, verses 16 to17?

Miles:

Yahushua answered, “My teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me. Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.”

Dave: Note that Yahushua here uses the title, “God.” If he were himself also “God,” this statement wouldn’t even make sense. But such inconsistencies are just glossed over or ignored.

Aiden Wilson Tozer was an American pastor and magazine editor. He also authored a number of books. I brought a copy of his book, The Knowledge of the Holy. Would you—yes, that one. There’s a slip of paper there … yes. Could you please read the marked paragraph?

Miles:

To say that God is omniscient, he possesses perfect knowledge and, therefore, has no need to learn. But it is more: it is to say that God has never learned and cannot learn. The Scriptures teach that God has never learned from anyone … From there it is only one step to the conclusion that God cannot learn. Could God at any time or in any manner receive into His knowledge that He did not possess and had not possessed from eternity, He would be imperfect and less than himself. To think of a God who must sit at the feet of a teacher, even though that teacher be an archangel or a seraph, is to think of someone other than the Most High God, maker of heaven and earth.

Okay. I’m not seeing the problem with this statement. He just described how I envision Yahuwah.

Dave: The problem is that Tozer wasn’t speaking of Yahuwah alone. As a trinitarian, Tozer was speaking of God in the trinitarian sense, so he was including both “God the Holy Spirit” and “God the Son” in this statement. But as you just read from Luke and John, those statements just aren’t true of Yahushua, even if they are of the Father.

Miles: Hmmm. And by his own definition of “God,” he’s just disqualified Yahushua from being “God,” hasn’t he?

Dave: Absolutely. Part of Yahushua’s mission was to … wait for it … learn. I’ve never heard a sermon preached on this, but it’s an important point. What does Hebrews 5, verses 7 to 10 say?

Miles:

During the days of Yahushua’s life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

Dave: This passage is significant. We see that Yahushua “learned obedience” through what he suffered. This, in turn, “made” him perfect. But when is God ever not perfect? If God weren’t perfect, He couldn’t be God!

And finally, “God” designated him to be a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. Clearly this title refers to Yahuwah. It can’t refer to Yahushua because: Number 1 – he learned. Number 2, he was “made perfect.” And 3: Yahushua was designated by God to be a high priest forever.

If he were God, then … what? He designated himself?

Miles: Good point. And then you’ve got that really damning statement in Matthew 24 where Yahushua said, “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the son, but the Father only.”

If Yahushua were “God” just like Yahuwah, he couldn’t have said this.

Dave laughs: Right? But notice, too, that the supposed third person of the Godhead, God the Holy Spirit, is excluded from this knowledge as well. But if they’re all co-equal partners, how is that even possible? How could God the Father know something that God the Spirit doesn’t? Even if you tried to explain it away as Yahushua’s human nature didn’t know, his divine nature would, so you still couldn’t say that he didn’t know.

Miles: We’re going to take a very brief break, but let’s keep talking about this when we come back.

Dave: Sure!

* * *

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* * *Part 2: (Miles & Dave)

Miles: So, obviously, it doesn’t make sense that Yahushua, if he’s truly God, could say that he doesn’t know the hour of his return but “God” does. That’s ridiculous.

But I do have one question for you and that is, what do you do about those passages of Scripture where it seems that Yahushua knows things that, as a human, he shouldn’t be able to know?

Dave: Do you have an example?

Miles: Yeah, sure. Give me just a second to find it … it’s, uh … here! Matthew 9 verses 2 to 4. It says:

Some men brought to him a paralyzed man, lying on a mat. When Yahushua saw their faith, he said to the man, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.”

At this, some of the teachers of the law said to themselves, “This fellow is blaspheming!”

Knowing their thoughts, Yahushua said, “Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts?”

How could you know their private thoughts unless he were God?

Dave: That’s a fair question but I think this is an area where we can hold the Bible to impossibly high standards by imposing a literal meaning on a passage that is just a casual expression.

Miles: What do you mean?

Dave: Well, most people can read another person’s body language. We can read someone’s expressions. It doesn’t mean we’re divine! Have you ever said something to a friend, and he didn’t have to say a word. You could tell from his expression what he was thinking?

Miles laughs: Yes!

Dave: Me, too. I’ve even said, “I know what you’re thinking!”

Miles: Me, too.

Dave: That doesn’t make either of us divine. It just means we can read facial expressions.

Miles: Okay, I can see that.

Dave: To meet the definition of omniscient, you have to be able to know everything, not just extraordinary things, like another person’s inner thoughts. Even if Christ were a mind-reader, the very fact that there were some things he clearly didn’t know, prevents him, by definition, from being omniscient.

Miles: So how do most Christians resolve this contradiction?

Dave: There are several ways. The most common is by dismissing any contradiction on the theory that Yahushua had two natures. The technical term for this is “hypostatic union.”

Miles: Oh, yeah. We talked about that. I was taught that as well: supposedly Yahushua was fully human and fully divine. So, anything that contradicts his divinity is just attributed to his human nature.

Dave: Exactly. But in the mental gymnastics trinitarians have to go through to try and make sense of their beliefs, they end up painting Yahushua in a very bad light.

I have here a quote from Athanasius of Alexandria. It’s from his work, Discourse Against the Arians. Arians believed that Yahushua was created and not co-eternal or of the same substance as Yahuwah.

Miles: Sooo … not trinitarians.

Dave: No. But listen to his “logic” as he tries to make error logical. Hint: he doesn’t succeed.

Miles chuckles: Okay, uh, in talking about Yahushua not knowing the time of his return, Athanasius says:

Now, why it was that, though He knew, He did not tell His disciples plainly at that time, no one may be curious where He has been silent; for Who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counselor? But why, though He knew, He said, ‘no, not the Son knows,” this I think none of the faithful is ignorant [namely] that He made this as those other declarations as man by reason of the flesh. For this as before is not the Word’s deficiency, but of the human nature whose property it is to be ignorant.

Dave: In other words, he’s saying that Christ really did know when he’d return. It was only his human nature that didn’t know. But this is splitting verbal hairs. Either he knew, or he didn’t know. Athanasius’ statement makes Yahushua look disingenuous at best and deceitful at worst!

Miles: The apostolic Christians didn’t believe in a split nature like that. They all believed Yahushua was fully human.

Dave: Right. The idea of a split nature—I like how you put that—came in with the early Church Fathers that had been heavily influenced by Greek philosophy. They tended to view the Savior in a metaphysical framework. This is why it’s so important, whenever we read Scripture, that we do so from a Jewish mindset. We can’t impose on Scripture a Hellenized perspective that the Bible writers themselves didn’t have.

Miles: How would you respond to someone, though, who said that Yahushua “laid aside” his divinity when he took on humanity?

Dave: This idea is based on Philippians 2 verse 7 where Paul speaks of Yahushua “emptying” himself and taking on the form of a servant, “being born in the likeness of men.”

But again, we run into difficulties. For example, if Yahushua truly emptied himself of all divine qualities, how could he still be considered divine? If he did indeed have a dual nature, how did he keep his human nature from accessing the abilities or knowledge that would be natural to his divine nature? Let’s talk practicalities! How’d he do it?

To use this verse to create an entire theology of a dual-natured Christ is to read into this passage what isn’t there. Furthermore, Paul isn’t saying just what Yahushua emptied himself of.

Miles: That’s true. He just says Christ emptied himself. And you’re right: if he emptied himself of divinity, could he honestly still be considered divine?

Dave: The apostolic Christians never viewed Yahushua as God incarnate in human flesh. That was a pagan concept. The Greeks would have their gods appear as humans. The Israelites never did. Instead, they viewed Yahushua as a … man … sent by Yahuwah.

In that stack of books there, would you please grab Incarnation and Myth by Michael Goulder? Turn to page 143 and read the bracketed quote.

Miles:

The truth is that Jewish sources never thought of Messiah as divine or pre-existent—in mainstream Judaism, he is the descendant of David’s covenant in 2 Samuel 7… If . . . [Yahushua] thought of himself as Messiah it is this human figure that he had in mind, with the traditional terms “the Son of God,” “the Son of Man,” “Lord”—all used of human Jewish kings in the Psalter … Being a monotheist, . . . [Yahushua] cannot have thought of himself sanely as being God and in the more primitive traditions he always speaks of himself in the human, messianic categories… [He did not think] he was God, but that he was God’s viceroy… It is the bias of orthodoxy constantly to overlook middle terms. The earliest church [did not view him] as God the Son, but as the man whom God raised up and [assigned] the Holy Spirit to pour out upon the church ([see] Acts 2:33).

Dave: Yahushua was Yahuwah’s duly appointed agent. This was a legal designation. He was Yah’s legal representative. This didn’t make him in any way divine and Yahushua never claimed to be on an equal footing with Yahuwah. In fact, just the opposite. What did he tell his disciples in John 14:28?

Miles: Umm … “You heard me say, ‘I am going away and I am coming back to you.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.”

Dave: “The Father is greater than I.” If Yahushua had a dual nature or if, as you were taught, he was 100% divine while still being 100% human, this statement would have been factually incorrect. Because, even with a human nature, he would still have been considered “God” and on an equal footing with Yahuwah.

Turn over to John 17. This is a prayer Yahushua prayed just before his betrayal in Gethsemane. It’s an interesting passage to look at because in this chapter he clarified his relationship with Yahuwah. Read the first three verses, if you would, please, of John 17.

Miles:

After Yahushua said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed:

“Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your son, that Your son may glorify You. For You granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those You have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they know You, the only true God, and Yahushua Christ, whom You have sent.”

Dave: We need to pay attention to this passage because Yahushua is making clear that his relationship to the Father is one of subordination. He was sent by Yahuwah. He didn’t send himself, which is what he’d have said if he were “God.” He could have said, “We determined together that I would come to save mankind.” Instead, he says that Yahuwah sent him.

Miles: It’s the subordinate that’s always sent by the superior.

Dave: That’s the point he’s making.

Turn now to John 8 and read verses 40 and 41. This is Yahushua speaking here with the scribes and Pharisees.

Miles:

As it is, you are looking for a way to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do such things. …

Yahushua said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me.”

Dave: First, I want you to notice that Yahushua is stating that he learned truth from …?

Miles: Yahuwah.

Dave: No, that’s not what it says. Yes, he’s speaking of Yahuwah here, but he uses the title, “God.” I think sometimes in our eagerness to honor Yahuwah and use the divine name, we can go too far and insert it where even the Bible writers used titles. This is significant because every time Yahushua refers to Yahuwah by a title, he is underscoring the fact that he himself is not “God.” And that’s emphasized in his last sentence. Read that again?

Miles: Uh, “I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me.”

Dave: The apostles clearly understood this fact. Over and over again they claimed that Yahushua … was a man … sent by … God. Or, they’d say he was a man “chosen by” God. The repeated use of the title here reinforces that Yahushua was not the God being spoken of. He wasn’t even one-third of it.

Read what Peter had to say about Christ on the Day of Pentecost. It’s in Acts 2 verses 22 to 24.

Miles:

Men of Israel, hear these words: Yahushua of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know—this Yahushua, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.

Dave: Peter says that Yahushua was “attested to” by God. Another translation says “accredited to.” In other words, Yahuwah vouched for him. And this was all according to the … what?

Miles: “Definite plan and foreknowledge.”

Dave: Of whom? Yahushua?

Miles: No, “God.” Yahuwah.

Dave: And then finally, who raised up the crucified Lord? Did his divine nature raise up his human nature?

Miles: No. “God” raised him up.

Dave: Turn now to Acts 17. We have here Paul’s sermon on Mars Hill. And what does he say about Yahushua and Yahuwah there? Verses 30 and 31.

Miles:

Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead.

Dave: Paul agrees with Peter: Yahuwah has appointed a—man—to judge the world and He has reassured us of this by raising that man from the dead. These are all the acts of a superior to a subordinate.

* * *

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WLC Radio: Teaching minds and preparing hearts for Christ's sudden return.

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* * *Part 3: (Miles & Dave)

Dave: Scholars always know more about the inconsistencies in their theology than laymen do. You’re never going to hear a sermon on the problematic areas scholars know about!

This subject is no different. I have here a quote by Dr. Kerry McRoberts. He’s both a pastor and Professor of Theology. This is from a book entitled Systematic Theology. Would you read that for us, please?

Miles: “In the second century the apostolic fathers displayed an undeveloped Christology. The relationship between the two natures in Christ, the human and the divine, is not clearly articulated in their works.”

Dave: In other words, this idea that Yahushua had a dual nature, one of which was divine and omniscient, was a doctrine that developed over time.

Miles: That’s interesting. Because obviously if it were in Scripture, it wouldn’t have needed to develop over time as the apostles and New Testament writers would have believed and taught it.

Dave: As late as the second century, this idea of a dual-natured Christ isn’t spelled out in the writings of the early Church Fathers. As late as the 12-century, this topic was still being argued about!

Miles: Wow, that’s really late! So, the idea that Yahushua’s divine nature was omniscient, but his human nature wasn’t, was a concept that came in a lot later.

Dave: Much later. And even today, trinitarian Christians struggle to explain the nuances of this belief.

Miles: Error’s always hard to explain.

Dave: On Catholic TV, in a presentation called, fittingly enough, “Jesus didn’t know everything,” Father Jim Martin made an insightful statement. I transcribed it. Would you read that for us, please?

Miles:

Now here is a tough theological question. If [Yahushua] is fully divine, which he is, wouldn’t he know all things? On the other hand, if [Yahushua] is fully human, which he is, he had a human consciousness, and so he needed to be taught something before he could know it…The question of [Yahushua’s] knowledge is a very complicated one.

Dave: It’s really not all that complicated … if … you stick to the truth as taught in Scripture. And, sure. There were things that Yahushua knew that the average person wouldn’t know. But the Bible explains just how he knew those things!

John 3:34 gives a very clear explanation of how Yahushua knew the “unknowable” things he did. Would you read that, please?

Miles: “For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives the Spirit without limit.”

Dave: Again, Christ is not “God,” because “God” (Yahwuah) sent him. And gave him the words he was to speak.

Miles: I find it exciting that this experience is also available to anyone who will consent to being used by Yahuwah to do His work.

Dave: Absolutely!

We find this same theme in a prophecy of the Messiah. Please read Isaiah 11 verses 1 and 2 and then we’ll discuss it.

Miles:

A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;
from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
The Spirit of Yahuwah will rest on him—
the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and of might,
the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of Yahuwah.

Dave: So, tell me: why would God need to be anointed with the Holy Spirit?

Miles laughs: He wouldn’t!

Dave: If Yahushua is “God,” he wouldn’t need to be anointed by the Holy Spirit. But a fully human Yahushua of Nazareth? Yes. He would need that very much in order to do Yah’s work.

Interestingly enough, even exalted to the right hand of Yahuwah, Yahushua still needs to be enlightened by—he needs to learn from—Yahuwah. He wasn’t made divine just because he was resurrected. He’s still fully human and as such, he still learns from Yahuwah.

Miles: Where do you get that? I guess I always assumed the risen Lord had more power or knowledge or something.

Dave: It says so! Read Revelation 1 verse 1.

Miles: All right, uh … “The revelation from Yahushua Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John.”

Dave: If Yahushua were “God,” this should properly read: “The revelation from God which God gave God to show God’s servants what must soon take place.” But that’s not what it says. And because he’s not divine, he’s not omniscient.

Miles: Yeah, even if he’d “laid aside” his human nature as I was taught, you’d expect that power to be returned to him at his ascension or, at the very least, his exaltation to the right hand of power. But obviously he’s still learning from Yahuwah.

Dave: Same with the letters to the seven churches. He repeatedly states, “Hear what the Spirit says.” It’s not, “Hear me.”

Now, one of the roles of Yahushua as the Messiah that we don’t often talk about is his role as a prophet.

Miles: Huh. Yeah, can’t say I’ve ever thought of Christ as a prophet before.

Dave: I know. We don’t view him that way, but the Jewish believers did. Turn to Luke 24. This records a conversation that took place between Yahushua and two of his followers the evening after his resurrection on the walk to Emmaus. Would you read verses 15 to 19, please?

Miles:

As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Yahushua himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.

He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”

They stood still, their faces downcast. One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

“What things?” he asked.

“About Yahushua of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people.”

Dave: As Yahuwah’s prophet, Yahushua would of course be given information not commonly known by other humans. It doesn’t make him divine; it makes him Yah’s prophet.

This is what the woman at the well called him. Let’s read it: John 4:16 to 19.

Miles:

He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

“I have no husband,” she replied.

Yahushua said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet.

Dave: And Yahushua didn’t deny being a prophet! It’s part of the work of a prophet to know things outside of their natural ability to know things. It doesn’t mean that, say, Peter was divine because he knew what Ananias and Saphira were up to when they planned on cheating Yahuwah.

We’ve got another example in Acts 11. Read verses 27 and 28, would you please? And note that these are all New Testament examples! The Old Testament is full of other times prophets knew more than they could naturally be expected to know.

Miles:

During this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them, named Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. (This happened during the reign of Claudius.)

Dave: I like this passage because it states clearly where Agabus got his information from and that’s Yah’s spirit.

Another way Yahushua had special knowledge is simply he knew his Bible! Turn to John 18 and read verse 4. This is in the Garden of Gethsemane when Judas and the soldiers came to arrest him.

Miles: “Yahushua, knowing all that was going to happen to him, went out and asked them, ‘Who is it you want?’”

Dave: How did Yahushua know everything that was going to happen to him? He’d studied his Bible. He knew all the Old Testament prophecies that pointed to not only his work and his mission, but all the manner of his betrayal and death.

This point is important to John because in the very next chapter, he repeats it. Read John 19:28, please. This is talking about when he was hanging on the cross.

Miles: “Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Yahushua said, ‘I am thirsty.’”

Dave: Again: Christ knew his Bible.

Miles: Okay, but what about … give me just a second to find it here … what about John 16? Listen to this. The disciples tell Christ in verse 30, quote: “Now we can see that you know all things and that you do not even need to have anyone ask you questions. This makes us believe that you came from God.” How can he know “all things” unless he’s omniscient?

Dave: If the disciples believed Yahushua knew all things because he was “God,” this would have been the perfect place to express that—either in what they said, or some commentary by John. But they didn’t. Instead, his knowing “all things” was taken as proof that he came from God. He came from God; he wasn’t, himself, God.

If “knowing all things” is an identifying characteristic of intrinsic divinity, then that must mean you and I are God as well.

Miles laughs: My wife will be the first one to assure you that I am not divine!

Dave: But what does Jude say? Jude 1 verse 5.

Miles: Uhh … “Though you already know all this, I want to remind you that the Lord at one time delivered His people out of Egypt, but later destroyed those who did not believe.”

Dave: So apparently, believers can know all this and still not be divine.

Miles laughs: Okay, I see your point.

Dave: Yahushua was never one to usurp glory that belongs exclusively to Yahuwah. Knowledge—omniscient knowledge—as one of those attributes that are exclusively divine, can’t be claimed by anyone, not even Yahushua. And he didn’t.

Turn to Luke 16. Yahushua was patiently trying to teach the Pharisees but what he was saying was unpopular with them. They didn’t want to hear. They didn’t agree with his values and were very quick to scoff at him. In response, Yahushua makes a very telling statement.

Let’s read it: Luke 16 verses 13 to 15.

Miles:

“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Yahushua. He said to them, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.”

Dave: If Yahushua inherently had omniscient knowledge, this would have been a logical place to say so. In fact, if Yahushua were “God,” the way this statement is phrased would be very awkward. But the title here refers to Yahuwah, not Yahushua and not a triune godhead.

He’s not claiming that he knows their hearts; he’s saying that Yahuwah knows their hearts. And this is a theme we find throughout Scripture: Yahuwah knows the heart. What does Hebrews 4 verses 12 and 13 tell us about divine knowledge?

Miles:

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Dave: He’s obviously talking about Yahuwah here, not Yahushua. And, what’s more, this is in the New Testament! There are a lot of statements in the Old Testament about Yah’s omniscience and omnipotence, and that theme carries over into the New. All such statements always refer to Yahuwah, never Yahushua.

* * *Daily Promise:

Hello! This is Jane Lamb with your daily promise from Yah’s word.

Millions of people around the world enjoy watching videos on YouTube, a website where anyone can upload and share videos. Many of them are only 5 or 10 minutes long, but there are some videos that run for up to 12 hours. At least, that’s the longest I’ve ever seen on YouTube. YouTube shorts are on the other end of the scale. They’re vertical videos, often shot from someone’s phone, that are less than 60 seconds long. It’s very easy to get sucked into scrolling through these often-humorous video clips.

One such video shows the amazing sight of a mother moose leading a man in a boat to where her baby was stuck in the river. The riverbanks were too steep, and the calf was too small and weak to climb out by itself. The man gingerly helped the young animal out of the water and quickly backed away.

Now the thing you have to understand about moose is that they can be extremely dangerous animals. They are the world’s tallest, largest, and heaviest species of deer still in existence. Moose are known for having short tempers and their sheer size and mass make them a very real threat. Particularly a mother protecting its young can be very dangerous. Moose are the tallest land animal in North America, second only to the American bison in body mass. A full-grown bull moose can weigh anywhere from 800 to 1200 pounds. That’s 363 to 544 kilos. Anyone who lives in moose country knows to stay well away from these colossal, volatile creatures.

So, it’s perhaps not surprising that the man who rescued the little moose calf was shocked the next day to find the baby—and its mother—in his yard! The pair kept returning. Slowly, the man was able to gain the trust of the mother while the calf grew up knowing that this human was a friend. The last few seconds of the video show the man riding bareback on the now-adolescent moose calf.

Kindness is a language that transcends species boundaries. And in thinking of this man’s experience, how his kindness paved the way for typically wary wild animals to learn to trust him, I was reminded of Yahuwah’s kindness to us. The Creator is so far above humans, I think it’s safe to say we’re an entirely different species! But it’s Yahuwah’s kindness, His compassion for sinners, that draws hearts to Him.

In Isaiah 54, Yahuwah tells us:

“For a mere moment I have forsaken you,
But with great mercies I will gather you.
With a little wrath I hid My face from you for a moment;
But with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you,”
Says Yahuwah, your Redeemer.

“For this is like the waters of Noah to Me;
For as I have sworn
That the waters of Noah would no longer cover the earth,
So have I sworn
That I would not be angry with you, nor rebuke you.
For the mountains shall depart
And the hills be removed,
But My kindness shall not depart from you,
Nor shall My covenant of peace be removed,”
Says Yahuwah, who has mercy on you. [Isaiah 54:7-10]

We have been given great and precious promises. Go and start claiming.

* * *Part 4: (Miles & Dave)

Dave: Christian tradition has invested Yahushua with divinity. It’s invested Yahushua with omniscience when Scripture itself repeatedly makes it clear that Yahushua was not omniscient.

Miles: Not to mention omnipotent or omnipresent. If he were omnipresent, a lot of those stories in the Bible wouldn’t make sense. Like Joseph and Mary losing him for three days. Or the disciples not believing Mary Magdalene when she told them he was risen. If he were omnipresent, he’d be right there with them!

Dave: It’s true. Yahushua had only human understanding. Anything he had beyond that, was a gift from Yahuwah.

I have here a quote I’d like you to read. It’s from an article called “Was Jesus Omniscient and Omnipotent on Earth?” Would you read that, please?

Miles:

Scripture reveals that Christ only knew what he had learned as a man and what his Father revealed to him through His Spirit. Since our Father in Heaven knows all things, then Christ could also effectively know all things “if” the Spirit of God revealed it to him. Thus, if Yahushua did not know the hour of his return, it could only be because his Father had not revealed this to him, and we are not told the reason why this was the case.

Dave: There are lots of theories about how Yahushua could be both divine and human, how he could have the attributes of divinity and yet still be fully human.

Miles: I was always taught he was fully human and fully divine. Which, when you think about it, doesn’t really make sense. We were told he “laid his divinity aside.” But even then if you “lay it aside,” you’re no longer divine!

Dave: Right! What’s more, none of these theories appear in Scripture. They were developed later after Christianity was corrupted with the pagan trinity doctrine. Once they accepted that as part of standard theology, they started running into problems and contradictions—

Miles: As you do when you’re trying to reconcile truth with error!

Dave: It was in trying to come up with logical resolutions for these problems and contradictions that further explanations were made. But these further explanations don’t make sense, either!

Here. Read this. It’s a statement made by Pope Damascus in 382 CE. That’s just one year after the doctrine of a triune godhead was established as official Church theology. It’s from Canon 12. Read what he says.

Miles: “If anyone does not say that the Son of God is the true God just as [His] Father is the true God [and] He is all-powerful and omniscient and equal to the Father, he is a heretic.” Wow. They were always so quick to denounce other beliefs as heresy, weren’t they?

Dave: Still are. How many denominations that reject the trinity are accepted by other Christians as true Christians?

Miles: None. They’re viewed as cults.

Dave: And yet, none of the Bible writers, none of the apostles or early Christians believed in a triune godhead. You can’t find it in Scripture. And when you need to turn to apologetics to make sense of it, that’s a red flag that there’s something incorrect in your beliefs. Truth is always logical and consistent.

I want to close with one final quote. This is a statement from William Whiston. He was a mathematician, succeeding Sir Isaac Newton as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge in 1703. Like Newton, he also had a deep interest in theology and was actually an Anglican priest. He worked to reconcile science and theology, so his insights are fascinating. Go ahead and read that one quote.

Miles: “There is but One Supreme, Living, Eternal, Infinite, Omniscient, Omnipotent, and Invisible God; the Father of our Lord Yahushua Christ.”

Thank you for joining us today. If you’d like to share today’s program with a friend, you can find it on our website at WorldsLastChance.com. Just click on the WLC Radio icon and scroll down to Program 279 called “Omniscience: a divine attribute.” That’s “Omniscience: a divine attribute” on WorldsLastChance.com.

We hope you can join us again tomorrow, and until then, remember: Yahuwah loves you . . . and He is safe to trust!

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This program and past episodes of WLC Radio are available for downloading on our website. They're great for sharing with friends and for use in Bible studies! They're also an excellent resource for those worshipping Yahuwah alone at home. To listen to previously aired programs, visit our website at WorldsLastChance.com. Click on the WLC Radio icon displayed on our homepage.

In his teachings and parables, the Savior gave no “signs of the times” to watch for. Instead, the thrust of his message was constant … vigilance. Join us again tomorrow for another truth-filled message as we explore various topics focused on the Savior's return and how to live in constant readiness to welcome him warmly when he comes.

WLC Radio: Teaching minds and preparing hearts for Christ's sudden return.