John 16:5-6

John 16:5-6. But now I go away to him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou away? But because I have spoken these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. It was in the joyful consciousness that His ‘going away' was really a going to the Father, that Jesus had been speaking. But the disciples had not sufficiently considered this. They Had looked upon His departure simply as a departure from themselves, and had failed to enter into all the glorious consequences connected with it. Thus they had been overwhelmed with sorrow. It is true that, at chap. John 13:36, Peter had asked ‘Whither goest Thou away?' But he had done this with no sufficient thought of the ‘Whither': the parting, not the goal to which Jesus went, had been in his mind. It was with no proper sense of its real meaning, therefore, that the question had been put. The suitable words might have been used, but not with the spirit and feeling which they ought to have expressed. This state of mind, not the failing to use certain words, is that which Jesus has now in view, and to which He refers with a certain sadness before He points out (as He does in the following verses) that, truly considered, His departure was not less a cause of rejoicing to His disciples than it was to Himself (comp. chaps. John 16:22; John 17:13).