And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.
(Isaiah 10:27)

Summer is coming soon! And with it, all of God’s creatures come out to work their magic in and among us on the earth. One of God’s fascinating creatures is the spider. How many of you have been going on your way or coming into your doorway, and you without knowing it walked right into a spider’s web? You sputter, trying to clear the sticky web bits from your face and hair, as you look around to make sure the spider didn’t come with it!
But the spider is actually an amazing creature in its ability to build intricate webs that can trap potential food. The more the unsuspecting creature struggles, the more tangled in the spider’s web it gets until it lies immobile and suspended, waiting for its predator to come.
Now that sounds like a terrible way to start out a sermon on the Holy Spirit, doesn’t it? Except….for the part in which we find ourselves entrapped in similar situations!
We may not be the victim of a giant spider. Goodness, let’s hope that never comes to pass! But we do as human beings tend to get caught up in webs, usually of our own making, and just as treacherous to our lives. And just like the creatures in the story, we struggle and curse until we have entirely immobilized ourselves within our unfortunate predicament. Often, we don’t know how to get out.
I want you to imagine an image for a moment when you found yourself in just one of those situations. Maybe you said something to someone that rubbed them the wrong way, and instead of simply apologizing, you kept trying to explain your way out of it, digging yourself a deeper and deeper hole.
Maybe you did something wrong and instead of admitting your mistake, you tried to hide it or cover it up, trapping yourself in more and more lies until you feel all bound up in the tangles of your deed.
Maybe you sent out invitations to an event and forgot to invite someone whose feelings were deeply hurt, and instead of saying you forgot, you made up an elaborate story about how they were overlooked, only to have it backfire on your later when the truth came out.
Maybe you tried a little drink or a drug. You reasoned with yourself that it would be only once! But “only once” happened the next time again, and the time after that, until you found yourself caught in a web of addiction that became too hard to break.
You know your story. We all have them. The truth is…..our lives are filled with barriers, webs, ropes, and constraints, and most of the time, we’ve walked straight into them all by ourselves, and have wrestled within them, until we have gotten ourselves into an unsightly mess!
This is when we need God the most! This is when we need the Holy Spirit of Christ to come into our lives and free us. Because we cannot do it ourselves. We simply cannot.
The good news: God is in the business of deliverance! God delivers us from the yokes that keep us bound up in the tangled ropes of our own making. God breaks through those ropes that bind us as easily as we walk through a spider’s web. God is powerful. God is masterful! God is absolutely astute and brilliant at “breaking through” every mess we can possibly make!
Praise God, our redeemer, for God frees us from ties that bind! All kinds of ties!
That’s the good news of the gospel in Jesus’ message! Jesus is a liberator! From the time Jesus stood up that day in his hometown synagogue and read the words of Isaiah, we knew who he was. God our liberator. The same God who liberated us from slavery in Egypt. The same God who liberated us from destruction from enemies. The same God who liberated us from those who would exile and exclude us. The same God who does so still today!
God is in the business of deliverance!
God breaks down barriers that separate us from our neighbors and others. God breaks down divisions that threaten to allow us to categorize each other rather than recognizing our common humanity. God breaks down walls that separate communities from each other. God breaks down hearts that have spent too many years angry or hostile to our neighbors and those who look differently or think differently than we do.
Most of all, God breaks down barriers that we suffer at our own hands!
Doubts, inhibitions, pain, fears, hesitations, self-consciousness, defenses, assumptions.
God breaks down and breaks through our toughest webs of self deceit and liberates us from ourselves! For we are our own worst enemies when it comes to flourishing in our lives!
When we allow God entry into our hearts, God will break us down. God will break through and reveal our authentic identity as a child of God, and God will break down our past hurts and pain and trauma and addictions and bring us into a new and free place.
God is in the business of deliverance!
Today is the Day of Pentecost, the day we celebrate God’s identity as a “break-through” God!
For when the Holy Spirit comes upon a people and a church, God pours out God’s love and power and presence upon that people. And you can feel the chains and ropes that have bound you and inhibited you fall away.
You can feel them fall away!
And God gives us a glimpse of a different kind of life, a life filled not with ropes and webs, but a life of authenticity, and love, and joy, and hope for a different future in which you will not just get by….but you will flourish!
The question is…are you ready to allow God to infiltrate your life? Are you ready to allow the Holy Spirit of Christ to break through the barriers that hold you captive and the walls that separate you from your communities and your relationships? Are you ready to allow Jesus to guide your life forward in a new and exciting path? Are you ready to let go of everything that has held you back in your life, so you can embrace the legacy that Jesus wants to give to you?
If you do, I invite you to come forward today. I invite you to feel the presence of the Holy Spirit around you and to invite that Spirit of Christ into your heart. Open your heart to him and receive him into your life in a new and exhilarating way that will change you and mold you and relieve you and free you!
Are you ready to be freed?
When you allow God to free you, to unbind you, to break through your webs of defense and deceit and inhibition and fear, your life will change. You will change.
If you are hearing the Spirit’s call in your life today, come forward to the altar. You can receive a blessing, an anointing, you can receive a laying on of hands in prayer for your life and your future. You can be baptized if you were not baptized in the past. You can be received into membership in God’s holy church. You can simply feel the healing power of the Spirit within you, as you encounter God in this holy place.
But whatever you do, know that this day God wants to free you. Be with you. Dwell in you. Guide you.
The Spirit of God is here on this day of Pentecost. The Spirit of Deliverance is ready to call you to a new life in Christ.
May you experience the gifts of the Spirit today. And may your life never be the same again!
Amen.