The propriety of the disciples' gladness at Christ's exaltation.
HIS DEPARTURE CALCULATED TO CAUSE JOY, NOT SORROW. "If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto my Father!"
1. True love rejoices in another's good rather than in one's own. Our Lord's words imply that the disciples were selfish in seeking his further continuance with them on earth.
2. The ground of a legitimate joy at his departure. "For my Father is greater than I."
(a) The words, "My Father is greater than I," are not inconsistent with the Son's Deity, as Arians affirm; for what mere man or mere creature would ever think of saying that God is greater than himself? Is it not a truism to say so? The very fact that Christ used these words implies his consciousness of possessing a Divine nature.
(b) The Lord refers here,
( α) not to the inferiority of his human nature,
( β) nor to his mere Mediator-ship, as implying a servant's position,
( γ) but to his subordination as a Son to the Father, in his essential Godhead. He asserts, in fact, his Divine essence.