Binding and Loosing

By DeeDee Winter

This was originally written to a friend who asked about a spouse….

You asked about “binding and loosing”…it is simply what we 'say' about a person or situation. We either hold/bind them or free/loose them by our word...what we say about them and their situation. An example would be a friend with a drinking problem. I can say, "She is an alcoholic and that is all she will ever be" or I can say, "She is not an alcoholic...Christ is her life and He knows the way through for her". The first holds her there...binds...and the second frees her to the Life within her and Christ revealing the freedom in His finished work of the Cross that is hers.

We may have many more times when outward evidence (the appearance) screams at us that what we said and are believing for her is rubbish. Never mind that. It is good practice and only strengthens our word. As we come to know the “still small voice” within ourselves and begin to truly 'hear' His voice we understand that our word is really agreeing with what He has spoken in our heart. His voice and our desires, which are His also, accomplish all He has for our friend.

How does this apply to our unsaved ones? I think we would begin by stating the basic truths. Even if a person is unsaved the Gospel of John in the first few verses states that there IS “the light that lighteth every man who comes into the world” residing in him. That light is Christ. For the born-again we see Christ as their life; for those who have not yet received Him we see Him in His un-lit, so to say, form….like a pilot light verses a full flame.

See nothing less than the truth about that person. It is very difficult to say that a person is unsaved…unless they would say that about themselves. We can never know just what goes on in a person’s heart and mind. That is totally between him and the Holy Spirit. So many churches judge by standards that are far from Biblical standards. Don’t be held by any denominational teachings….God is not! He judges the heart. There is even a passage in Romans 2:14-16 where Paul gives a wide birth to folks of many different religions or no ‘religion’ at all. It was transformative to me when the Spirit illuminated this Romans passage to me some years ago.

You also pose the question about our spouses who are His, but who do not ‘see’ their union with God. For your husband or wife stand that he or she IS in union with Christ Jesus and that he or she is only expressing the life of Christ…sometimes even in a negative form. “There You are, Lord.” The Spirit will reveal his or her oneness/union in due time…when he or she is ready. Many times they are held in their unknowing in order that we might get settled in faith. Meanwhile know that God is accomplishing eternal glories in these negatives …nothing wasted…all meant for good!

I was raised Catholic and came to know the Lord through the baptism of the Holy Spirit in 1974. God revealed union to me in 1980. My husband has been a Christian since he was a young child, but wanted little to do with Catholicism or the baptism of the HS. But when God took me the next step into union Gary saw something different about me. Since then he has been fully supportive of me in every way, but is not one to go to Bible studies or sit around and talk doctrine…but he LIVES Christ. From the day that I saw Christ as my life, I had to say the same about him…that Christ was his life and the fact that he did NOT want to go to Bible studies or sit around and talk about what he believed was God’s way/life in Gary. As I began to see him rightly he became even more fully his wonderful, God-created self! My judgments of him had held him in some places that were less that what God had for us both.

This is a perfect example of binding and loosing. I was well-trained in the deliverance ministry in my charismatic days and my new understanding of binding and loosing was far superior to what we had been taught. Our statements of FAITH bind OR loose a person.

A brilliant truth Norman Grubb imparted to us was “the greater the negative, the greater the positive”. Just as a pebble in a slingshot is thrust forward farther (positive) when it is pulled farther back (negative) so are our circumstances of life. As we begin to see this and trust God in these right negatives, we will begin to be excited when they surface. We will begin to say, “Well, Lord, here You are. Now let’s see just how You are going to bring good from this!!!” WE will be transformed as well as the object of our faith!