As we can see, the story of the Evangelist Mark is based on these two key words. The Gospel of John describes five appearances of the Risen One, but if we bear in mind the testimony of the Apostle Paul in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, there were many more of these appearances.

The first appearance of Jesus was to Mary Magdalene. Meeting the Resurrected One at the tomb, Mary mistakes Him for a gardener. He calls her by name, and at that moment Maria suddenly realizes that the Teacher is in front of her. Jesus exclaims: "Do not touch me" – this is how these words are usually translated. But in Greek, the phrase means a prohibition to do something, an order to stop what you have begun, so Jesus' words could be translated, "Don't grab hold of me, let me go." It is easier for Mary to regain her former relationship with the Master than to establish a new one. She is ready to weep over the body of the Departed, but she is not yet ready to meet the Resurrected One and follow Him.

There is a fundamental difference between the resurrection of Jesus and the resurrection of Lazarus. Lazarus returns to his former life, while Jesus takes a step into a new existence, unknown to us from our experience. His Resurrection is not a step back, as in the case of Lazarus, but a step forward somewhere, into a life that is inaccessible and incomprehensible to us.

Jesus says to Mary, "I . . . I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God" (John 20:17). He reminds us of the unique relationship between Him and God that He spoke of earlier, for example, in the Sermon on the Mount.

It is important to understand that the entire Gospel is devoted to the theme of the uniqueness of the relationship between God as Father and Jesus, who reveals it to us through His preaching and His life, through everything He says and does. This relationship of the Son with the Father, while remaining unique, also becomes a relationship with God and His disciples. Now God is not only His Father, but also the Father of the disciples to whom He is addressing, He is the Father and God of every disciple of Jesus.

The second appearance of Jesus is His reappearance in a closed room. His students locked the doors, apparently afraid that they would be captured, beaten, or do something else bad to them. And suddenly Jesus appeared and showed them His wounds (cf. John 20:19-20). This is said in almost the same words in the Gospel of Luke. The Resurrected One appears before them as He was on the Cross. The sores on His hands and feet, the blood caked on His ribs, remind us of His suffering. He says, "Peace be unto you." The 14th chapter of the Gospel of John comes to mind, where Jesus says: "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives, I give unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid" (v. 27). The word "peace" (in Hebrew shalom) does not mean the peace of which Greek literature speaks, nor is it an antonym to the word "war." Shalom is openness to each other, the fulfillment of the commandment of love for enemies, it is prayer for those who curse us. Jesus' words "Peace be unto you" are reminiscent not only of the farewell discourse, but also of the Sermon on the Mount with its words: "Love your enemies."

This theme of peace as something very deep, not just a state without war, but a state of complete openness to each other, is already present in the Old Testament.

"If you find an ox of your enemy, or his donkey that is lost, bring him to him. If you see the donkey of your enemy fallen under its burden, do not leave it; unpack with him." —Exodus 23:4-5.

This means that the call to return a lost animal to the enemy or to help unpack it is the seed from which new relationships between people grow. When friendship or enmity fades into the background, something much more important is revealed—the need to respect the other person, to help him—what may be called the theology of an outstretched hand, a hand given not only to a friend but also to an enemy.

This theme, one of the main ones in the Gospel, finds its culmination in the second appearance of Jesus in the Gospel of John. Jesus here reminds us of what he said in the Sermon on the Mount. Appearing in the book of Exodus, this theme undergoes a series of transformations in the books of Wisdom and in the prophets, until it finally results in the Sermon on the Mount into a formula about love for enemies.

Of course, it is very difficult, almost impossible, to love the enemy. But Jesus does not offer the morality of prohibitions and permissions, as it was before Him and as it is now: this is forbidden, and this is permitted. Jesus gives us the morality of direction, the morality of the ideal, which is important to strive for, the road to which we must go, but which, like the peaks of the Himalayas, remains inaccessible to the majority. And, nevertheless, a landmark outside of which Christianity is impossible.

This morality is largely related to the word shalom. Jesus says: "As the Father has sent me, so I also send you" (John 20:21). But this has already been mentioned in the 17th chapter, in the farewell discourse. The peace that Jesus leaves to His disciples, the uniqueness of the relationship between Him and the Father are the main topics of the farewell conversation. The high priestly prayer of Jesus contains the theme of messengership.

This is also what is spoken of in the Gospel of Matthew. The fact is that in the Gospel the messenger – in Greek apostolos – is equal to the one who sent him, in the figure of the messenger there is the fullness of the sender, so the messenger must be treated as the one who sent him. Jesus leaves the disciples as His deputies, messengers. And since each of the disciples is His deputy, then the relationship between them (and consequently between people in general) begins to develop in a completely different way than it did before. We must remember that every person is left by Jesus as His substitute, whoever he may be. This is probably very difficult to understand and even more difficult to accept, but this is the meaning of what Christ tells us.

The Resurrected One gives the disciples the gift of the Holy Spirit. "Receive ye the Holy Spirit," He says (John 20:22). In the Acts of the Apostles, we will talk about a similar event. The disciples are gathered in a room, and tongues of flame descend on them — the gift of the Holy Spirit is given to them (ch. 1). Do the Acts of the Holy Apostles and the Gospel of John speak of different events or of the same thing? Acts says nothing about Jesus appearing to the disciples at this point, and the Gospel of John says nothing about tongues of fire. Nevertheless, the situation is the same: the disciples are gathered together, and the gift of the Holy Spirit is given to them. The reason for the differences in the stories is most likely that the narrator is touching on something almost inexpressible, so although the setting is the same—the room where the disciples are gathered—the touch of God is conveyed in different ways.