John 14:28
John 14:2828You heard Me say, ‘I am going away, and I am coming back to you.’ If you loved Me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I.
("the Father is greater than I") is one of the JW's strongest single-verse arguments against the deity of Christ. Jesus himself appears to settle the question: he says the Father is greater. JWs read "greater" ontologically — greater in being, in nature, in power — and conclude that whatever Jesus is, he cannot be coequal with the Father. The verse is paired with ("the only true God") and ("the head of Christ is God") as the standard JW package against the Trinity, and is often the first proof text offered in doorstep encounters about Christ's identity.
The crux is whether "greater" means greater in role and position or greater in being and nature. settles the question: Jesus was "in the form of God" and "equality with God" was already his — he did not consider it something to be grasped because it was already his — and then he "emptied himself" and "took the form of a servant." Jesus speaks from inside that voluntary self-emptying. The Father is "greater" in the same sense that a husband is "greater" than his wife in the headship pattern of — equal in essence, distinct in role. The Son's incarnational submission does not cancel the equality asserts; it reveals what divine love looks like. The same Gospel that contains also contains (the Word was God), (all are to honour the Son just as they honour the Father — see John 5 equal-honour argument), (I and the Father are one), and (Thomas's "My Lord and my God"). John would be contradicting himself within a few chapters if 14:28 meant ontological inferiority. Read alongside , where Jesus prays to be glorified "with the glory I had with you before the world existed," the picture is restoration to a pre-incarnate equality, not promotion of a created being.