“Break Every Chain” was already a church song when Tasha Cobbs recorded it. Her version won a Grammy

The song that made Tasha Cobbs Leonard a star was not written by her. “Break Every Chain” came from Will Reagan, a worship leader with the band United Pursuit, and was already being sung in churches when she recorded it.

Her version, recorded live and released on the 2013 album Grace, turned the song into one of the most sung gospel anthems of the decade. It won Tasha Cobbs the Grammy Award for Best Gospel/Contemporary Christian Music Performance in 2014.

From Georgia to the charts

Tasha Cobbs grew up in Jesup, Georgia, where her father was a pastor, and she led worship at church from a young age. Before the major-label breakthrough she built a following through church ministry and an independent release. Her signing to Motown Gospel brought her to a national audience, and Grace was her first major-label project.

Her voice is the key to her version of “Break Every Chain”. She starts the song quietly and builds it with repetition, as she does in live worship, until the final section of the recording becomes a long, rising declaration: “There is power in the name of Jesus to break every chain.” The live recording captures a congregation joining her, which is exactly how the song came to be used in churches.

A song about deliverance

The lyrics are short. They speak of power in the name of Jesus, an army rising up, and chains being broken. The simplicity is the point. It is written to be sung many times over, and churches use it at the point of a service where people come forward for prayer.

That made the song cross denominations and countries. It is sung in Pentecostal churches in Accra and Lagos, in charismatic churches in London, and in Baptist churches across the United States, often with little change from Cobbs’ arrangement.

What came next

The Grammy launched a steady career. Tasha Cobbs Leonard, as she has been known since her marriage to Kenneth Leonard, has released more albums and a string of songs that are staples of church worship, including “Gracefully Broken” and “You Know My Name”. She has recorded with Nicki Minaj on “I’m Getting Ready”, a collaboration that drew a lot of attention in 2017 because it put a gospel singer and a rapper on the same track.

In September 2026 she released Tasha Unscripted, a 34-track live album through Motown Gospel and Capitol Christian Music Group, returning to the live, extended style that made her name.

The writer’s credit

The story of “Break Every Chain” is a reminder of how worship music travels. A song can come out of one small worship movement, be picked up by a bigger artist, and become known through the cover. Will Reagan’s name is on the songwriting credit. The version most congregations learned is the one Tasha Cobbs recorded live, with a church choir answering her on every repeat of the last line.