Where in the Bible does God say only he knows the time the world will end?

Answer 1

Mar 13:31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.

Mar 13:32 "No one knows, however, when that day or hour will come---neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son; only the Father knows.

Mar 13:33 Be on watch, be alert, for you do not know when the time will come.

In the verses above Jesus is talking about his return to earth he mentions the heaven and earth passing away and only the Father knows but if you look at the context you will see 'that day' is his return.

I think The Bible doesn't say only God knows when the world will end.

Answer 2

Mark's Gospel, speaks about the end of the world and the return of Jesus in the lifetimes of those still living. Having given the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple as a sign of his imminent return, Mark 13:24-26 continues, "But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light and the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken and then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory." He concluded by saying that he would return within the lifetimes of some of his own generation: "Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done." So, around 70 CE, this gospel is confident that the end of the world was imminent - within perhaps four years of writing. However, Mark 13:32 warns that no one but the Father knows the very hour or day the world would end, so cautions the disciples to be constantly on their guard for when it would happen.

By the 80s of the first century, the time when Matthew's Gospel was written, the return predicted in Mark's Gospel was becoming unlikely - the generation had already passed - and the author of Matthew had to change the emphasis away from an impending end of the world. While copying as faithfully as possible from Mark, he changed the position of the sentence about "this generation", relative to the destruction of the great buildings, so that it referred to something else altogether. He added, and emphasised, material where Jesus told the disciples that the end is not yet, and (24:36) that no man knows when the end of the world will occur. This is the most unambiguous statement that only God knows when the world will end, but Luke makes a similar reference.

Luke was somewhat later than Matthew and even more clearly could not say that the destruction of Jerusalem meant the end of the world. This gospel talks about the end of the world as vaguely in the future, keeping the reference to this generation, but in reference to the need to preach the gospel.