A pastor gets up on Sunday and announces to her congregation that she has good news and bad news. “The good news,” she says, “is that we have enough money to fix our steeple, repair the front steps, and repaint the church.” “

“That’s great,” they all say. “What’s the bad news?”

“The bad news is that it’s still in your pockets.”

***

A teen comes home late one Friday night and tells his parents he has good news and bad news.

“Tell us the good news,” says mom.

"The good news is that your car's airbags work perfectly.”

***

A gallery owner calls up his favorite artist to tell him he has good news and bad news.

“A man came in the other day and asked me if you were the painter whose work would become more valuable once you died. When I told him I thought you were, he bought up everything you had in the gallery.

“That’s terrific!,” said the artist. “What’s the bad news?

“I think he was your doctor.”

***

For more good news/bad news jokes, please see any dad or pastor in the congregation.  There’s a significant overlap when it comes to the jokes we’re allowed to tell in public. But for now, you tell me - by a show of hands - if someone says, “I’ve got good news and bad news,” which news do you want to hear first?

You want to hear the good news….or the bad news?

Good to know. Well my friends, I’ve got good news and bad news for you today, and I’m afraid it’s no joke. The good news is that the events Jesus predicted 2000 years ago - events like the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, the rise of false messiahs, war and insurrection - have already passed.

Roughly 40 years after Jesus uttered these words, in the year 70 CE, Jerusalem was attacked.

And yes, there were earthquakes and famines, plagues and portents amidst war and rumors of wars. It was as horrific as Jesus’ predicted it would be. I think you know that the nation of Israel rose up against Rome and that the emperors’ son Titus was sent to crush their rebellion.

What you may not know is that in spite of the fact that they challenged the greatest superpower of their day, the Jews might have actually won were it not for the amount of infighting they engaged in.

As Titus bore down on Jerusalem, they made the Roman’s job a whole lot easier by splitting up into at least 3 factions and turning on each other long before his army arrived to deliver the death blow. Relatives betrayed relatives. Friends betrayed friends. Jews turned on their fellow Jews and thinned the ranks by viciously attacking those with whom they disagreed.

The rebels refused offers of peace within and without and multiple attempts on the part of Rome to bring the conflict to an end without destroying the temple. They chose instead to fight to the death - fight each other and fight Rome - fight and fight and fight until all was lost.

Anyway that’s the good news. This whole thing already happened. The bad news is that it’s hard to read the words of this prophecy that has already been fulfilled and not feel like we are teetering on the edge of something eerily similar.

Did any of you feel that as you listened to the reading? Me too. So allow me to tell you a little more about what was happening back then before I connect it to what I can't help but see happening right now.

Before it was destroyed, the temple in Jerusalem was known the world over for its strength and grandeur. It was an immense structure of white marble gilded with gold; a symbol of God’s blessing and presence with the Jewish people. The foundation stones alone were so immense - literally 35 feet long by 18 feet wide by 12 feet high - that it was hard to imagine how mere humans had set them in place and all but impossible to imagine that mere humans could tear them down.

The temple was meant to be a testament to the faith, freedom, and resilience of God’s chosen people; a people blessed to be a light to the world.

But the temple, for all it’s architectural splendor and religious significance, was built by a vain and paranoid ruler whose primary concern was projecting power and dominance. Herod designed the temple to shock and awe all who beheld it.

It was his greatest architectural achievement, so much so, that people called it “Herod’s temple;” at least they did when he was listening. He didn’t put his name right on it in gold because that would be tacky, but he wanted everyone to know he built it and he built it to endure forever in the hopes that his name would endure as well.    

The temple was just one of many examples of Herod’s ability to manipulate the religion of his people to further his own political agenda. His primary goal was to be seen as a major power player within the Roman Empire and he was willing to do as the Romans did - rather than as God commanded - to achieve his ends.

Like his Roman counterparts, Herod believed that the only way to keep the peace was by means of power and control, violence and intimidation, victory and domination. He was notorious for taking out his enemies and he ruthlessly quelled any internal dissent through targeted assassinations and state sanctioned violence. Herod was willing to live by the sword and as a result his people and all that he built eventually died by the sword.

And the same goes for Rome. Yes they sacked Jerusalem, but 400 years later Rome itself was sacked and then sacked again and then sacked again. Because here is the thing we all know and still refuse to accept. Peace and stability can always be achieved through violence but only and ever for one side and only and ever for a limited amount of time.

It doesn’t matter how firm your foundation or how strong your grip on power, no institution or empire, ruler or kingdom, lasts forever. Eventually someone comes along who is stronger than you, tears it all down, and claims what’s left for themselves. And when they do, it’s always the people who come to harm. When war comes, history bears witness that everyone suffers.

The good news, according to Jesus, is that there is another way. We don’t just have to rinse and repeat. We can break the cycle of violence and domination with grace and creativity. All throughout history there have been Christians with the courage to advocate for this alternate way - Jesus' way - of radical love and peace; even as those in power - whether they call themselves Christian or not - have continued to bully each other into submission.

Since the time of Jesus there has been a constant push and pull between his way and our way, and it feels like we are fast approaching another inflection point.

I don’t mean to be alarmist. The good news is that I’m not the sort of Christian that pours over the scriptures looking for signs of the end times. The bad news is that it’s hard not to see so many signs in our own times that mirror this prophecy.

After all, just like the temple in Jerusalem, our nation’s capital was built to be a city on a hill and a light to the nations. In our case it was meant to be a temple of freedom and democracy that would spread hope to the world. Now, I’m not a naive believer in American exceptionalism, but still, to see the capital stormed by insurrectionists on January 6th shook me to my core. It was a bad sign.

I have little affection for neoclassical architecture, but when I saw images of the East Wing being torn down to create a gilded ballroom, at first I did not believe they were real. I may be a 21st century American rather than a 1st century Jew, but there were some things I thought you couldn’t possibly tear down, even if you wanted to.

And yet, as I scan the headlines day after day I am confronted by the actions of a vain and paranoid president who is tearing down institutions we cherish, both literally and metaphorically, even as he tries to secure a legacy he hopes will endure forever.

This president wants a Nobel prize for securing peace deals, but like Herod and, to be fair, every American president before him, he still believes that the only way to achieve peace is through threats of violence backed up by our Department of Defense that he now calls the Department of War. Kudos to him for at least laying the irony and hypocrisy of it all bare.

I see a president who takes delight and destroying his enemies and is more than willing to turn the military on his own people to quell dissent.

I see a president who commands a messianic level of devotion amongst people who should know better and an administration unafraid to mix religion and politics in a way that is harming both and fomenting a rising tide of violent Christian nationalism in the process.

And while we’re ticking off similarities between those days Jesus’ warned about and our own, it bears mentioning that measles is back and childhood diseases we had all but eradicated will not be far behind. We may not be experiencing famine but climate change, gross income inequality, and threats to the funding of social programs like food banks and SNAP are leaving people hungry.

All of which is leading to more and more instability and division amongst a people - our people, the American people - who need to be united if we are to have any hope of facing the inevitable challenges that lie ahead.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that we are not without hope, because here’s the thing about Biblical prophecy that not everyone understands. The prophets never claimed to predict a future that would come about no matter what. They spoke instead of what would happen if people didn’t change their ways.

I still think there is room to turn the tide here. I don’t think the fall of democracy is inevitable. I hope and pray we are not on the brink of something terrible.

But whether I am right or wrong, the way Jesus calls us to show up in moments like these is the same. To quote Anne Lamott, "We may not know what the future holds, but we know who holds the future" (In Nadia Bolz-Weber's most recent substack).

So first, let us not be afraid or, in this case, “terrified.” Given how dire things have become, I appreciate the upgrade from fear to terror, but we still need to resist it. Not because there is nothing to be afraid of. There absolutely is. But because fear doesn’t help. Nor, for that matter, does worry. Not that there isn’t anything to worry about. There’s plenty. But worry doesn’t help either.

What helps is looking to Jesus: grounding ourselves in his truth and his way and his life right now. Jesus who was unafraid to speak truth to power. Jesus who stood up for the persecuted. Jesus who consistently reached across the social divisions of his day to break bread with people who regarded him as an enemy. Jesus who taught us to love our neighbor and bless everyone, even those who persecute us. Jesus who forgave even the ones who crucified him. Jesus who refused to dehumanize anyone, but saw each and every person as a child of God.

Hewing to that way of radical love, grace, peace, and inclusion still has the potential to save us all.

In "Living Buddha, Living Christ" Thích Nhất Hạnh, says that “The best way to take care of the future” - to avert disaster if you will -  “is to take care of the present moment.”

I think we can expand that idea and say that the best way to take care of each other in the future is to take care of each other in the present. And the good news is that I have more hope than fear in this moment because at every turn I see how this congregation, in partnership with all the good people in our community- does that.

Manna, the Friday Breakfast, doubling the capacity of our local shelter in time for winter, efforts to stay educated and aware, build networks of solidarity so our neighbors have someone to accompany them to ice check ins or document the fact that they have been taken, the money you gave to the pastor’s fund and to send a grocery card home with every kid whose family missed their snap benefits, the scholarships we will provide for kids in Haiti - you know I can go on and on about this.

My point is that in response to our worries about the future, we are faithfully showing up in the present, and I believe that how we show up in the present actually has the power to change the future for the better.

The bad news is that we can’t control what’s coming.

The good news is that we can control ourselves.

So for now, we keep reaching across the social divide to break bread and have difficult conversations with our friends and family who have bought into false teachings just like people did back in Jesus’ day. That's why God gave us Thanksgiving.

We reach out to one another for support and keep showing up together with our signs and our casseroles and our check books and our prayers.

We do what we can to find common ground, like the Republicans and Democrats of Easthampton did last week when they all agreed to bring food for the local pantry with them when they came out to the polls.

We can and we will keep finding creative ways to counter the manipulation, cruelty, and overreach of this administration. And if they come out to quell our peaceful resistance, we will show up on the streets of Northampton the same way they showed up on the war torn streets of Portland.

We will meet them, not dressed for battle but dressed to party, an army of inflatable frogs and rainbow unicorns determined to dance in the face of authoritarianism and love in the face of hate.

For that is what Jesus did, minus the inflatables - though the donkey he rode into Jerusalem was equally absurd. Jesus confronted the powers that be with love, creativity, and an unshakable faith in his vision of a better world.

When all seemed lost, he stood firm and he stayed soft, trusting that God can make a way where there seems no way, trusting that the worst thing is not the last thing, trusting that even something as awful as the cross would not mark the end of his story.

And the good news is that we can too. Come what may, the good news is that our love will get the last word. The good news is that nothing, not even death, lasts forever.

The good news is that this regime too shall pass. It may pass like a kidney stone, but it will pass.

And in time our God, who refuses to give up on this world, will remove every last tyrant from their throne to make room for a new kind of kingdom, a kin-dom where God’s will is done here on earth as it is in heaven. It’s only a matter of time, and that, my friends, is the best news of all. Amen.