And suddenly Martha, the same Martha who rattles dishes in the Gospel of Luke, exclaims: "I believe!"

We all know a lot about God, but often we have little faith in it. Moreover, the more we know, the less we believe. The troublemaker Martha took a step that the prayerful Mary was unable to take: a step from knowledge of God to faith in Him.

Probably, each of us should follow the path of Martha. This path is very difficult, but Martha walks it, perhaps precisely because when the Savior came to her house, she thought that first of all she needed to feed Him. And we very often do the opposite: we want to listen to Christ first of all and forget that the Savior says: "... I hungered, and you gave Me to eat; I thirsted, and you gave Me to drink..." (Matthew 25:35).

That's what Martha did. Her rootedness in real life gave her the mystical power to come from knowledge of God "from a book" to real faith in God, to a real encounter with Him. It is important to understand after what words Martha, renouncing her "I know," exclaims: "I believe!" Christ answers this: "I am the resurrection." It is here that Martha exclaims: "I believe!" She shows her conviction and faith not in some abstract resurrection (as in the case of N.N. Fyodorov – people will be resurrected, but Christ has nothing to do with it), but in the resurrection in Christ, through a personal meeting with Him. Only such a resurrection leads from knowledge of God to faith in God.

Very often people do not believe for only one reason: they have read a lot of books, learned everything, somehow systematized them in their minds, in their memory, but Christ Himself found Himself somewhere "on the margins" of this knowledge. Martha, on the other hand, feels that it is not a matter of the "technique" or "mechanism" of the resurrection, but simply of Christ. In this Man Who stands before her and says the strange words at first glance: "I am the resurrection" ("the resurrection is I").

Thus, the Gospel of John (in the 4th chapter of which, we should add, Jesus talks to the Samaritan woman at the well) can also be called the Gospel of women. As well as the Gospel of Matthew, where on the very first page, in the genealogy of Jesus, four female names are mentioned among the male names: Zara, Tamar, Rahaba and Ruth. It would seem that from the point of view of the Jewish tradition, this is impossible – a female name in the genealogy. But nevertheless, women are named – and not by chance! — on the first page of the New Testament. However, to a greater extent, it is the Gospel of Luke that is the Gospel of women. Here the female theme seems to be brought to the fore. When we note some features of this or that Gospel, this does not mean that the same is not at all in the other Gospels. It is there, but not so brightly highlighted - that's all the difference.

The Gospel of the Children

The Gospel of Luke is also the Gospel of children. It is here that we read that the Forerunner, who has not yet been born, dances in his mother's womb, rejoicing that the Mother of God and the Child Jesus, also unborn, have come to them. The Forerunner dancing in his mother's womb is an absolutely amazing image in the New Testament, an amazing sign that human life begins even before birth.

In the Old Testament, King David dances before the ark, and in the New Testament the Forerunner dances before the Mother of God, who from the first centuries of the Christian Church has been called the Ark of the New Testament in hymnography. "Rejoice, great of the saints, rejoice, Ark gilded with the Spirit," says the Byzantine akathist. "Pray for us, Ark of the Covenant," says the Latin litany. In the tradition of the Eastern Church (to a lesser extent the Western Church), the Mother of God is perceived as the Ark of the Covenant for us.

Младенца Иисуса в яслях и двенадцатилетнего Иисуса в храме мы встречаем только в Евангелии от Луки.

Спаситель благословляет детей. Эта сцена есть у всех трёх синоптиков — Матфея, Марка и Луки, но в Евангелии от Луки ей предшествуют сцены, о которых шла речь выше: пляшущий во чреве матери Предтеча, Христос в яслях и двенадцатилетний Иисус в храме.

Евангелие молитв, храма и Церкви

Евангелие от Луки — это Евангелие молитв. Именно здесь подчёркивается, как молится Сам Христос. Именно здесь ученики просят Иисуса: Господи, научи нас молиться. Именно Евангелие от Луки содержит такие удивительные молитвенные тексты, как «Ныне отпущаеши», или «Благословен Бог» или «Величит душа Моя Господа». Именно в этом Евангелии когда совершается чудо Боговознесения, свидетели его начинают хвалить и славить Бога. Эти слова хвалы вообще характерны для Евангелия от Луки.

Коль скоро Евангелие от Луки — это Евангелие молитв, а место молитв — это храм, то третье Евангелие, вероятно, можно назвать и Евангелием храма, потому что здесь буквально с первых и до последних строк постоянно упоминается храм. Первая сцена Евангелия от Луки происходит в храме. И в конце Евангелия мы тоже оказываемся в храме: именно здесь после вознесения Иисуса пребывают Его ученики, прославляя и благословляя Господа.