If Jesus was God, why did He say "The Father is greater than I" in John 14:28?

The last words of this verse, "My Father is greater than I," have been made into an occasion of stumbling to some. But here we have speaking the Word made flesh, and He speaks in His estate as the lowly Man upon earth. Hence in position or station the Father was greater than He, whilst as to being and nature He and the Father were one.

“My Father!” From the lips of our Lord Jesus Christ those two precious words often fell. Their full meaning we may not yet have grasped, but the Spirit is here to lead us into all truth. It is plainly evident that Jesus must have been speaking as a Man when He said, “MY Father is greater than I” This therefore explains to us how He stood in relation to His Father as “the Son of the Father,” for when He spake of Himself as the Son, one with the Father, He did not then say “My Father,” but speaking as God the Son He told those who listened to His words, “I and THE Father are one” (N.Tr.). There is therefore no contradiction between John 14:28 and 10:30, but each Scripture glows with divine beauty, one revealing Him to us as Man and the other as God, the first in His obedient place as the Son of the Father, the second in His equality as the Son with the Father.

Though He was going away, this should not discourage them. In fact, they ought to have rejoiced for His sake, because He was going to the Father. Real love for Him would rejoice that His time of rejection and suffering in the world was at an end, to be exchanged for the unspeakable joy of the Father's own presence. “For,” He says, “My Father is greater than I.” Though in eternal deity Father and Son are one, yet the Father's position was greater, because He had not come down to a path of voluntary humiliation on earth. Certainly the Son's moral and spiritual greatness are equal with that of the Father, but He had taken a place of humiliation in coming down, not a place of greatness.

The words of the Lord Jesus above may seem a contradiction to His words in John 14:28, "My Father is greater than I." But there He is not speaking of the Father being personally greater than He, but rather that He had taken a place in manhood on earth lower than the Father, and He speaks there of His returning to the Father.

280 John 14:28. — "The Father is greater than I." Cf., of course, the words of the Athanasian Creed so-called: "inferior to the Father as touching His manhood." Men of intellectual pretension — Unitarians and their followers — sometimes read Scripture very superficially. These words in the fourth Gospel are constantly used by such in support of their theory that our Lord was inferior in essence (nature) to the Father. But He is here speaking of station. "I go unto the Father." The reference is plainly to His exaltation on Ascension, after that He had first humbled Himself in becoming Son of man. He is then given a name above every name (Phil. 2:9). It has nothing whatever to do with His nature. Cf. Bernard, p. 171. The alleged repudiation of Ascension in the Johannine record (cf. note on 20:17) is part of current rubbish of "critical exposition" popularised in such books as the last of Wernle.

"Ye have heard how I said, I go away, and come again to you." This removed their uneasiness as to themselves. It was not disappointment or death, but going to return. But if they had loved Him they would have rejoiced because He was going to the Father. For the Church looking at Jesus (at Christ officially) is given as one with Him an interest and delight in His full joy. If they had loved Him they would have rejoiced He was going from sorrow to full joy at God's right hand. In all these things Christ is spoken of as the complex Person whom we know, whereby we have communion and fellowship with Him, the incarnate One. In the same way we see the Jewish Church's joys and interest in Psalms 20 and 21, beautifully illustrating and expressing this, as for them. Nothing can be more beautiful than giving the Church an interest in His happiness at such a moment, in its sorrow, of giving it such express identity with Himself. It was not as though they were left, but He was going to the place of His glory and blessing. They were so one with Him; that was their happiness.

256 And with what delicacy and (to them) exalting condescension does He bring them into identity with Himself then, instead of leaving them with their thoughts here, where only their sorrowful and undignified selves would be found! I am going to greater glory, and you are one with Me in affection and interest. "My Father is greater than I," Jesus incarnate, in office and position in this revelation of glory of which I am assuming the Head; and you are made heirs in blessing, and so in this covenant, as men call it. It is so in the way in which we know God revealed in dispensation in this wondrous economy in which all the Trinity is revealed. Not that which is essentially in Godhead is here spoken of; the difference of Persons in Trinity is never so spoken of; but revealed in knowledge. Ye would rejoice because I; for My Father is greater than Me. Of course nothing else could be sound. It is not in office properly; for in one sense the Father takes the office of Servant of Christ about His people; nor in Godhead, for that is not the question; but as known to the disciples in the revelation of diathecal relationship.

This love is both upward and downward—love to the Father and to those given to Him of the Father. In speaking of love upward I do not desire the reader to come to the conclusion that Jesus was ever less than “God blessed for ever” (Rom. 9:5), but in becoming a man He took a place less than God, so that He could say, “My Father is greater than I” (John 14:28); and therefore I speak of His love to the Father as having an upward aspect, as His love to us is love to those beneath Him.

Speaking as Man, the Son who was in Himself equal with the Father, said, “My Father is greater than I.” What a sight it must have been for heaven, to see Him here in His lowly loveliness and obedience thus. A Man of grace and holiness, the supreme delight of the Father’s heart, walking and working amongst those who had sinned against heaven and in God’s sight; glorifying Him and making Him known amongst those who had dishonoured Him! Wonder of wonders! Divine dignity and grace shining in the presence of human degradation and pride!

Going and coming. So would it be. The Lord would go away — go to the Father. But He would come to His disciples likewise (18). Sorrow was filling their hearts as they thought of His departure; but they should rejoice, if they loved Him, because He was going to His Father. He would leave this scene of trouble and opposition, and be with His Father in the unruffled atmosphere of peace and rest, which surrounds the throne above. Yet not just to rest for Himself would He go. He would care for His own, and ask the Father on their behalf — His Father, who was greater than He, the Son. And telling them all this beforehand, their faith was to be strengthened as it came to pass.

What an illustrious testimony to the true, proper, intrinsic deity of Christ! It is all the stronger because, like many more, it is indirect. Who but a person consciously God in the highest sense could adopt not merely the unhesitating assumption of such language as "Before Abraham was, I am," or, "I and my Father are one," but the no less real, though hidden, claim to Godhead which lies under the very words which unbelief so eagerly seizes against Him? Where would be the sense of any other man (and man He surely was and is) saying, "My Father is greater than I"? A strange piece of information in the mouth (I will not say of a Socrates or a Bacon merely, but) of a Moses or a Daniel, a Peter or a Paul; but in Him, how suitable and even needful, yet only so because He was truly God and equal with the Father, as He was man, the sent One, and so the Father was greater than He! Take again that striking declaration in John 17:3, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." Of course He was man, He deigned to be born of woman, else unbelief would have no ground of argument on that score. But what mere man ever dared, save the vilest imposter, calmly to class himself with God, yea, to speak of the knowledge of the only true God, and of Him, as life everlasting?