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The comfort of Christ's going away:
v. 5. But now I go My way to Him that sent Me; and none of you asketh Me, Whither goest Thou?
v. 6. But because I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart.
v. 7. Nevertheless I tell you the truth: It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you.
So long has Jesus been with them as Guide and Protector; but now the time for departure has come. But instead of provoking all manner of inquiries on their part, the announcement has stunned them with sorrow. The Lord has discharged the mission for which He was sent, and, in a manner of speaking, goes to report on a duty properly performed. But His words concerning His leaving find no interest on the part of the disciples as to His future welfare. Their attitude savors strongly of selfishness at the loss of the Master and grief at His departure. They are insensible to the real issue involved. And therefore He gives them the comforting, cheering assurance that His going away is expedient for them, that it will accrue to their advantage, that they will reap only benefit from it. If He should stay in their midst with His bodily presence, then the other, greater event would be rendered impossible: the Comforter would not come. The sending of the Spirit depended upon the fact that Christ should enter into the glory of His Father according to His human nature. As the exalted Son of Man He would have and make use of the power to send them the Comforter. "This is the meaning of these words: If I go not away, that is, if I do not die and be removed from this corporeal essence and life, nothing is gained, but you remain where you are now, and everything will remain in the old way as it was formerly and still is: the Jews under the Law of Moses, the heathen in their blindness; all under sin and death, and no one can be delivered there from nor be saved. Thus no scripture would be fulfilled and I should have come in vain, and all would be useless, both what the holy fathers before you and you yourselves believed and hoped. But if I depart and die and carry out what God has decided in His counsel to perform through Me, then the Holy Ghost will come to you, and work in you, and give you such courage that you will become My officers and coregents, change the whole world, abrogate the Law, or Jewry, destroy the heathen idolatry, and rebuke and change the whole world, so that your doctrine will remain and penetrate everlastingly, though it will displease the devil and the whole world. That is the gift and the glory which My going away brings to you. " Note: It appears from these words of Christ that we Christians of the present time have more benefit from the work of the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, than the disciples had of the personal, visible presence of the Lord when He dwelt among them in the form of a servant.