Since the Lord saw that the apostles did not fully hope in His resurrection, and did not even know what it was, and therefore grieved greatly and were troubled at the thought of separation from Him, He condescends to their weakness and says: "I told you that I would go and come again; and yet you still grieve, for you do not trust Me that, although I will die, I will not abandon you in your sorrows. Now, having heard that I am going to My Father, whom you consider great and greater than Me, you should rejoice that I am departing to Him who is greater than Me and able to destroy all calamities." Do you see what a sequence of thought this is?
"My Father is greater than I" — He said this for the consolation of the disciples. They were grieving because Christ supposedly could not protect them. And He says: "If even I cannot, then My Father, whom you consider greater than Me, will in all likelihood help you." Likewise in another place He says: "Do you not think that I cannot beseech the Father, and He will send Me twelve legions of angels?" (Matt. 26:53). Here He speaks this way not because He cannot do this (for how is He not powerful, who by a single word alone, which He spoke to the Jews, suddenly threw them all backward? (John 18:4–6)), but because they thought of Him as a man. So this too — "My Father is greater than I" — He said in accordance with their understanding, since they considered Him weak, and the Father able to strengthen them in times of sorrows.
Some think that He called the Father greater in the sense that He is the cause of the Son. "The Father," He says, "is greater because He is my cause and origin, for I was born from Him." But that the Father is greater does not mean that He is of a different essence. For even among men, one could say, a father is greater than his son, but not of a different essence. Then let the heretics say, in what respect was Christ departing to the Father: in His divinity or in His humanity? Without doubt, in His humanity. For as God, He was always in the heavens and was not separated from the Father. Thus, the Father is called greater than Him as Man.
Jn. 14:29. And now I have told you before it comes to pass, so that when it comes to pass, you may believe.
That is: I am so calm, I do not fear death and do not grieve, that I even foretell it; therefore I command you also to rejoice, so that when it comes to pass, you may believe Me, that just as I knew about the sorrows that would befall you and, having foretold them, did not lie, so also in My prediction concerning your consolation and guidance I will not prove false, but all joyful things will come to you.
Jn. 14:30. Hereafter I will not talk much with you, for the prince of this world is coming, and has nothing in Me.
Having comforted the disciples with the foregoing discourse, the Lord again speaks of His death. "For the prince of this world is coming," He says, that is, the devil. That he is the prince of this world, understand this not of creation in general, but of wicked people who are worldly-minded. For he has dominion not over heaven and earth—otherwise he would have overthrown and ruined everything—but over those who give themselves over to him. For this reason he is also called the prince of darkness, and by darkness understand evil deeds.
But since some might think that Christ too is being handed over to death for sins, He added: "And has nothing in Me"; I am not deserving of death, I owe nothing to the devil, but I accept suffering voluntarily, out of love for the Father.
Jn. 14:31. But that the world may know that I love the Father
He frequently mentions death, adding words of consolation as well, so as to make it more acceptable to them. For, hearing that He will die, they also learn that He voluntarily disregards the devil and dies out of love for the Father. Therefore, if the sufferings were destructive and not salvific, the loving Father would not have consented to this, nor would the beloved Son have taken them upon Himself. How then are we to understand that He dies out of love for the Father? "The Father," He says, "loves the world and delivers Me to death for its sake. I, loving the Father, agree with His good pleasure and will, and I demonstrate that I love the Father by taking upon Myself and fulfilling what He has commanded, that is, His good pleasure and decree."
Jn. 14:31. "and, as the Father has commanded Me, so I do."
Tell me, you Arians, if the Son were a slave, would He have said that I am dying out of love for the Father? A slave fulfills the will of his master not because he loves him, but because he is a slave and fears punishment. But the Lord Jesus, since He does the will of God out of love, is not a slave, not a creature, but truly the Son, fulfilling the will of the Father. Therefore, when you hear "the Father commanded Me," do not look upon the Lord as a subordinate because of the word "commanded," but because of the word "Father" acknowledge Him as the Son consubstantial with the Father. And understand "commanded" as meaning: He willed, He spoke, He determined, He was well-pleased.
Jn. 14:31. Rise, let us go from here.
By His repeated discourse about His sufferings, the Lord fully convinced the disciples of their necessity. After this, He perceived that they were afraid of being seized soon, and from great fear were no longer even listening to His words. Therefore He apparently wishes to lead them to a hidden place where they would not be seized. But He departs from the place where they were in order to calm the turmoil in their souls and then impart to them the most mystical teaching. He leads them, as we learn from what follows, to that garden which was known to Judas. This action was, in appearance, a withdrawal, but in reality a voluntary delivering of Himself; for He withdraws to a place that Judas knew.