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Fluctuations of surfaces that harbor reactive molecules interacting across the intervening space strongly influence the reaction kinetics. One such paradigmatic system is the cell membrane, with associated proteins, binding to an interior or an exterior scaffold—for example, the cytoskeleton in the former and the extracellular matrix in the latter case. Given that membrane fluctuations are significant and regulated by the activity of the cell, we hypothesize that these active fluctuations can be tuned to influence ligand-receptor-mediated adhesion. However, a comprehensive model, deriving both binding and unbinding rates from first principles, has not yet been established, and as such, the effect of the membrane activity on the rates remains an open problem. Here, we solve this issue by establishing a systematic coarse graining procedure, providing a cascade of expressions for rates appropriate for the observed …