What Is the Principle of BINDING & LOOSING?

When the Lord taught the disciples how to pray in Matthew 6:9-13, one of the types of prayer noted in this line:

Your kingdom come, your will be done

on earth as it is in heaven

Matthew 6:10

This kind of prayer refers to binding & loosing or intercession, that is, releasing God’s will and kingdom into people’s lives and situations on Earth, including your own.

It does not refer to praying for the Millennium to come. It refers to releasing God’s will into people’s lives on Earth, including your own, through prayer. It’s binding & loosing or intercession.

If the idea that prayer “looses” God and his kingdom to function in people’s lives sounds strange to you, it’s in line with the principle of binding & loosing, as taught by the Mighty Christ:

“I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

Matthew 16:19

“I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

¹⁹“Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.”

Matthew 18:18–19

In the first passage Jesus said he was going to give believers the “keys of the kingdom of heaven.” “Keys” refer to authority or power. If you have the keys to a vehicle, you wield the power to take advantage of it. The “kingdom of heaven” of course refers to God’s kingdom, the kingdom of light. The Lord was saying that he was giving his disciples the power to take advantage of God’s kingdom. This is driven home with the second part of the verse: “whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” You could put it like this: Heaven will back you up in any legitimate effort to manifest God’s kingdom on Earth via faith and love, which are the terms of the New Testament. “Faith works in love” (Galatians 5:6).

What exactly does it mean to “bind” or to “loose”? The Greek word for “bind” is deo (DAY-oh), which means to literally bind up or figuratively in the sense of prohibiting or hindering; “loose” is luo (LOO-oh), which means to unbind or release. So deo means to lock up whereas luo means to unlock. As such, believers have the authority to hinder or prohibit the kingdom of darkness on Earth and to release God’s kingdom. The kingdom of darkness is prohibited in Heaven so we can prohibit it on Earth; the kingdom of light reigns in Heaven so we can loose it on Earth.

In the second passage Christ links the principle of binding & loosing to prayer. We bind the kingdom of darkness and loose the kingdom of light through our prayers.

Do you want God’s kingdom to reign in your life and the lives of others? Of course you do, but it has to be released through prayer. Do you want God’s will to be done in your life and the lives of others? You have to loose it via prayer. In other words, God’s kingdom will not come and reign on this Earth unless a believer releases it through prayer and action; and God’s will is not done on Earth unless the Church looses it via prayer and action. Simply put, believers have the power to bind the kingdom of darkness in this fallen world and loose the kingdom of light.

When you grasp this, you understand why the apostle stressed: “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective” (James 5:16).

Someone might understandably respond: “Well if God’s so Almighty why doesn’t he just automatically do everything? Why does he need believers to ‘release’ his will through prayer and service?”

It is true that the LORD is Sovereign, which means he “reigns supreme.” The Bible describes God as “the king of all the earth” (Psalm 47:7) who owns the Earth and everything in it (Psalm 24:1, 50:12 & 1 Corinthians 10:26). Christ himself called Father God “Lord of heaven and earth” (Matthew 11:25). So there’s no disputing that the Almighty reigns supreme and “does whatever pleases him” (Psalm 103:19 & 135:5-6).

However, it’s also clear in Scripture that the devil is the “god of this age” and the “prince of this world” who rules the kingdom of darkness or Underworld, which is the dark spiritual dimension that underpins the world (John 12:31 & 14:30). Anyone who’s not part of God’s kingdom is subject to this dark kingdom because they’re “by nature objects of wrath” (Ephesians 2:3); this includes everyone who doesn’t have a covenant with the Almighty, meaning all unbelievers. The following verses verify this: 1 John 5:19, Revelation 12:9, 2 Corinthians 4:4 and Ephesians 2:1-2.

These passages show that the “whole world” is presently under the control of the kingdom of darkness, which is why the Bible refers to this current era as “the present evil age” (Galatians 1:4).

This doesn’t, of course, mean that all unbelievers are frothing at the mouth with evil, but rather that they’re subject to the kingdom of darkness, whether they realize it or not. The depth of their subjugation is dependent upon how far they choose to embrace the flesh, which is the satanic nature. It’s also dependent on how far their belief system (noéma) deviates from biblical truth.

We see evidence of Satan’s rule and influence all around us constantly: wars, crime, corruption, broken families, immorality, injustice, poverty, false religion, legalism, harmful ideologies, disunity, disease, addiction, death, etc. Don’t be alarmed, however, because the above passages show that the devil’s control is limited to those designated as “the world,” which doesn’t include blood-bought, spiritually regenerated believers, Hallelujah! Christians are the “church” of Jesus Christ, which literally means “the called-out ones” in the Greek. This signifies that believers have been rescued from satan’s kingdom:

For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves,

Colossians 1:13

Not only have we been rescued from bondage to the kingdom of darkness, we’ve been transplanted into God’s kingdom as his beloved sons and daughters!

When you pray for yourself and those linked to you—family, neighbors and people at school or work—you’re binding up the kingdom of darkness and loosing the kingdom of light, which includes loosing the angels assigned to them (Matthew 18:10). Some of the people you intercede for are lost and some are Christians who are ignorant of these things; as such, the angels assigned to them are limited in helping them, to say the least. But your prayers can release them to work in their lives, one way or another.

This doesn’t negate freewill, of course. No matter how much you pray for someone and no matter how much they’re exposed to the Word of God, the moving of the Holy Spirit and the service of angels, he or she can still stubbornly resist. And that’s their choice. You did your part; they have to do theirs. If they refuse, that’s their problem and they’ll be held accountable for it when they stand before the LORD.

Praying for those whom you regularly come in contact with is to your social relations what oil is to a bike chain. Without your prayers, the kingdom of light is hindered in these people’s lives, which includes the service of angels. When this occurs the kingdom of darkness takes advantage of the situation: Unclean spirits will naturally have more freedom of movement and therefore more negative influence, which isn’t good for the individual in question or for your relationship with him/her. Since godly believers are guaranteed to be persecuted, why open the door to unnecessary problems due to skipping out on your duty to intercede? See 1 Timothy 2:1-4.

This article was edited from chapter 18 of…