{10} Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is {l} greater than I.

(10) We should in no way be sorry for the departing of Christ from us according to the flesh, but rather we should rejoice in it, seeing that all the blessing of the body depends upon the glorifying of the head.

(l) This is spoken in that Christ is mediator, for in this regard the Father is greater than he, in as much as the person to whom request is made is greater than he that makes the request.

People's New Testament

14:28 If ye loved me, ye would rejoice. A gentle rebuke. Their desire that he should not go away was due, in part at least, to selfish motives.

Wesley's Notes

14:28 God the Father is greater than I - As he was man. As God, neither is greater nor less than the other.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

28. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father, for my Father is greater than I-These words, which Arians and Socinians perpetually quote as triumphant evidence against the proper Divinity of Christ, really yield no intelligible sense on their principles. Were a holy man on his deathbed, beholding his friends in tears at the prospect of losing him, to say, "Ye ought rather to joy than weep for me, and would if ye really loved me, "the speech would be quite natural. But if they should ask him, why joy at his departure was more suitable than sorrow, would they not start back with astonishment, if not horror, were he to reply, "Because my Father is greater than I?" Does not this strange speech from Christ's lips, then, presuppose such teaching on His part as would make it extremely difficult for them to think He could gain anything by departing to the Father, and make it necessary for Him to say expressly that there was a sense in which He could do so? Thus, this startling explanation seems plainly intended to correct such misapprehensions as might arise from the emphatic and reiterated teaching of His proper equality with the Father-as if so Exalted a Person were incapable of any accession by transition from this dismal scene to a cloudless heaven and the very bosom of the Father-and by assuring them that this was not the case, to make them forget their own sorrow in His approaching joy.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

14:28-31 Christ raises the expectations of his disciples to something beyond what they thought was their greatest happiness. His time was now short, he therefore spake largely to them. When we come to be sick, and to die, we may not be capable of talking much to those about us; such good counsel as we have to give, let us give while in health. Observe the prospect Christ had of an approaching conflict, not only with men, but with the powers of darkness. Satan has something in us to perplex us with, for we have all sinned; but when he would disturb Christ, he found nothing sinful to help him. The best evidence of our love to the Father is, our doing as he has commanded us. Let us rejoice in the Saviour's victories over Satan the prince of this world. Let us copy the example of his love and obedience.