The Approval Trap – Fear That Shaped My Faith for Years

I got out of a toxic relationship.

It was with God.

I do not say that for shock value. It is simply the most honest way I know how to describe it.

For a long time, my inner life with God functioned like a relationship where love had to be earned. Approval could be lost. And disappointment was the default posture. Deep down, I had absorbed the belief that if I obeyed well enough, tried hard enough, and avoided enough mistakes, then maybe God would be pleased with me.

Looking back, I would never have said this out loud. Theologically, I believed in grace. But behavior reveals belief. And my behavior told a different story.

I lived with a quiet pressure to get everything right.

When Obedience Became Anxiety

My faith became an endless pursuit of obedience, not out of joy, but out of fear. I did not want to disappoint God. I did not want to make the wrong move. I would sometimes delay decisions, even small ones, because I felt responsible to confirm that God was pushing me in a specific direction. Should I do this? Should I go there? Should I say yes or no?

And when I failed, confession became a kind of groveling. I would replay mistakes in my mind, rehearse my apologies, and carry around the feeling that I had somehow fallen short of what God expected. Then, once the guilt faded, I would jump back on the obedience train and try harder the next time.

It was exhausting.

The strange irony was that I had endless grace for other people. I believed deeply that God was patient with them, compassionate with them, and eager to forgive them. But when it came to myself, my imagination of God’s posture was far more suspicious.

When Scripture Confronts Our Assumptions

Scripture was always there, quietly contradicting that belief.

“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16)

For years, that verse felt risky. Not intellectually risky, but emotionally risky. It required me to believe that God’s posture toward me was open arms rather than crossed arms. It required me to trust that His throne was actually a throne of grace.

Mostly out of exhaustion, I started testing that truth.

Unfiltered Version Before God

I began bringing the real version of myself into God’s presence. Not the polished version. Not the spiritualized version that knows the right things to say. The real one.

• The one that doubts.
• The one that overthinks.
• The one that sometimes wonders if I am getting any of this right.

And every time I come honestly before Him, I am forced to trust something that still feels almost unbelievable. God already sees all of it, and He loves me anyway. Not reluctantly. Not with a sigh. But fully.

The apostle Paul says it plainly: “God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” (Ephesians 2:4–5)

Notice the timing. God’s love did not begin after we improved ourselves. It began while we were still dead in our trespasses.

The gospel tells us we are more sinful than we ever dared believe and more loved than we ever dared hope. Both are true at the same time.

Learning to live inside that reality has changed my understanding of surrender. Obedience still matters. Holiness still matters. But now they flow from love, not anxiety.

And that changes everything.

Now What

Find yourself in this same pattern?
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Want to learn more about living in God’s grace?
Pick up the book The Prodigal God by Timothy Keller