How to Recognize God’s Voice When Fear Sounds Convincing | 036

Have you ever wondered whether the voice you’re hearing is really God—or fear speaking in a convincing disguise?

For years, I believed God’s voice sounded disappointed, demanding, and ready to punish me when I failed. My prayers were filled with apologies, begging, and fear that I might eventually run out of grace. What I did not realize was that Christian perfectionism had distorted the way I heard God.

In this deeply personal episode, I share the speech I delivered on stage about the moment God began exposing the counterfeit voice I had mistaken for His. We’ll explore how fear-based faith turns conviction into condemnation, why trying harder cannot produce lasting freedom, and how grace changes the way we approach God after we sin or struggle.

You’ll discover:

•  How fear, shame, striving, and exhaustion create a repeating perfectionism cycle 
•  Why God’s compassion can feel suspicious when you are accustomed to performance-based love 
•  The difference between conviction that leads you toward God and condemnation that drives you away 
•  Three questions that can reveal what you truly believe about God’s heart 
•  How to approach the throne of grace as a beloved daughter instead of begging like an outsider 

God’s voice may correct you, but it will never contradict His loving and redemptive nature. You do not have to overcome fear, weakness, or temptation through your own strength. Grace invites you to come closer.

Take the Grace Scale Quiz through the link in the show notes to discover how perfectionism may be affecting your faith, relationships, decisions, and ability to rest.

Your worth is not based on your ability to perform for God. The fact that Jesus died for you reveals the value He has already placed upon you.

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Transcript

How to Recognize God’s Voice When Fear Sounds Convincing | 036

[00:00:00] God, I, I am so sorry. I am so sorry that I keep sinning, and I'm asking you to please forgive me. Please don't kick me out. Please just give me another chance

I'm sorry is not repentance, Leneé. Your actions tell me everything I need to know about where your heart really is

But God, I, I love you. Please I know your love for me by your obedience to my commands

God, I will try harder, I swear God God, are you there? I don't know what to do

What you just heard was my perception of God's voice to [00:01:00] me Can anyone relate?

 Hey there. If this is your first time to The Redeemed Perfectionist podcast, welcome. I'm your host, Leneé Pisano, and this is my very real story of how I related to God as I shared it on stage in front of an audience. First and foremost, my prayers, more often than not, were apologies, oftentimes begging God for forgiveness.

I had such a fear of punishment that there was no room for mercy and grace. And of course, that fear fueled my perfectionism. Then when He began to reveal Himself in that tender, compassionate way, well, as I've shared in previous episodes, I thought it was a counterfeit. And now I am incredibly passionate about 

exposing the lie upon which my foundation had been built so that you can gain freedom in your own journey. 

[00:02:00] Today, you will get to experience my speech, and with God's help, you will walk away better equipped to discern the authentic voice of God and the counterfeit that is rampant in the Christian community.

Quick heads-up before we dive in. I've got a little something new in the works that I'll share more about toward the end of the episode, but for now, let's get back to the speech 

How many of you have experienced that brutal cycle of sinning, repenting, and then sinning again? And no matter how much effort you put forth, you can't seem to get breakthrough. And depending on how many days go by between your wrongdoings, you wonder if there's enough grace in your account to cover your next sin.

Or worse, you're concerned that your account is completely depleted with no chance of ever being restored. I mean, if you're really a Christian, you wouldn't be habitually sinning, right? 

[00:03:00] Maybe, but it was much more complicated for me.

I want to pause here for a moment and expand on the part that says, if you're really a Christian, you wouldn't be habitually sinning. I want to be careful here because I'm very aware that the entire time I struggled with my habitual sin, it was reflective of my choice to obey my flesh versus my spirit.

I make no excuse at all for that. It was truly an addiction that I could not seem to stop long-term. I would have moments, seasons of victory, and in those moments, I would be free from condemnation and oppression, but I would always return to my vomit. I remember an old mentor of mine preaching one day, and he literally said that there was no way a person was truly saved if he or she was in habitual sin.

To him, it meant no real conversion had taken

[00:04:00] place. I was devastated by that. I felt even more defeated and strove even harder to do better. The broken cycle continued, and my inability to repent led me deeper into despair. As you have already heard, God was not happy with me according to the way I interpreted his voice.

But then, one day, he showed up and said to me, Daughter, I don't rule with an iron fist. I am not here to punish you. I was a bit stunned and somewhat confused. My mind raced between the two realities that were now in direct conflict with one another. This was not the God I thought I knew. It was the first time I remember starting to hear his voice differently.

It was as unsettling as it was comforting. This part matters, especially if you have felt similarly. 

[00:05:00] Lean in and hear how my story unfolds. It may be the very perspective you needed today to help set you free.

When I came to the Lord almost 30 years ago, I was on fire. I was passionate and so full of zeal.

I loved to learn about Him and His ways, the thou shalts and the thou shall nots. And the more I learned of His standards, the harder I worked at keeping them. But then, with every failed attempt at maintaining righteousness, I sank deeper and deeper into despair and defeat and condemnation. And so then, I would work harder at getting back into His good graces.

I'd do all the right things. I'd read more and pray more and study scripture and memorize it. And at times, I would even treat my earthly brother really well And if I could string together enough days in a row 

[00:06:00] doing the right thing and not sinning, then I was back in His good graces. But the reality, I had fallen from grace.

 We gotta pause here, my friend. I don't want you to miss a very important connection. That right there is the cycle. Fear leads to shame. Shame leads to withdrawal. Withdrawal leads to striving harder, and striving leads straight to exhaustion. And then, because you're exhausted, the fear creeps back in, and you're right back at the start.

I lived that loop on repeat, and back then, I didn't even know falling from grace was a real thing you could experience as a believer. What does it even mean to fall from grace, and how is that even possible? I thought I was saved when I became a Christian. Well, yes. When you surrender your heart, genuinely believe in what He did for 

[00:07:00] you on the cross, and respond to the call, you're now adopted into the kingdom.

But what many of us lose along the way is the reality that grace isn't just for salvation.it's also the power to help us maintain that salvation. I recommend listening to episode five for a deeper dive into this. But suffice it to say that I resonate with what Paul said to the Galatians in chapter two, verse 16, when he said, "A person is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ."

You see, I had reverted back to a law-based relationship with the Lord, as if my works justified me as His child. And we know that Paul also said, "If you accept circumcision, you're obligated to keep the whole law." Except you and I are not capable of keeping the whole 

[00:08:00] law, which is why we needed the blood of Jesus to fill in the gap, also known as grace.

Are you starting to see the difference? Let's keep going so you can hear how this played out in my life.

Now, don't get me wrong, I had received salvation through faith in the blood of Jesus, so in that sense, I was saved. But my faith was dominated by the belief that I had to perfectly adhere to His laws in order to maintain my status as His child, and that I was only allotted so many chances before I'd be kicked out.

And that belief system impacted how I showed up in every area of my life. Every thought, every behavior, every conversation, every decision was completely rooted in fear. And worse, every time I faced the temptation to sin, I faced it alone, 

[00:09:00] with nothing but the hope that my own white knuckles would save me

Let's pause here for a moment just in case the phrase white knuckles has become so familiar that we almost lose the essence of it. You know when you're riding a roller coaster and you're so afraid that you hang on even tighter in order to protect yourself? Or maybe as a child, you were holding something that was valuable in your sight that someone was trying to take away from you.

So you squeezed harder to keep from losing grip. And in doing so, your knuckles turned white. The more of your own strength you exert, the whiter the knuckles. That is how I describe my attempt to hold on to acting sin-free. There was no part of me that turned to God for help, for grace to deny the 

[00:10:00] sin. I was attempting to do it completely in my own strength.

But here is where everything began to change.

But then God began to show up, and He began to reveal Himself in a way I wasn't familiar with, and the conversation went something like this.

" I give up, God. I cannot do what you are asking me to do. I'm sorry, but I just cannot do this." And then I heard it, that still, small voice. " Daughter, come to me. Come to me and receive the grace I have for you. I love you. I am here for you. I'm not looking to beat you up or condemn you. I want you to know that the same power that raised me from the dead is available to you, too.

But you can't do it in your own strength, so come to me just as you are, and let's do this 

[00:11:00] together." Wait, say what? That can't be Him. That was way too compassionate, way too tender. I, I rebuke that. I rebuke the deception that is trying to come at me. I have to obey. I must obey.

And here it is. Two natures within, now in direct conflict. This is the heart of what I teach. The place where the authentic collided with the counterfeit and exposed the faulty foundation my faith had been built upon. All that I had known from childhood was that acceptance and love were based on performance.

Weakness, imperfections, being seen just as I was, none of that was safe. My mind perceived vulnerability and authenticity as a threat resulting in fear. 

[00:12:00] And fear led to control in the form of perfectionism, striving, and so on. I was hardwired to believe that this was the way. But then God interrupted the pattern and I was faced with the crossroads of either considering a new way or continue in the pattern that was now becoming death to me.

Holy Spirit was leading me into all truth as John 16, 13 says. Let's listen to how the transition sounded.

But with each repeated cycle, that still small voice kept showing up.

It was Him. Perfect love began to cast out all fear and the torment that went with it. I was not willfully abusing grace. That is not where my heart posture was, and I am not saying that we should condone sin. But in my [00:13:00] situation, I had a fractured foundation. I lacked a very essential element, the understanding of His heart for me, and He chose to overlook my sin for a time to restore that foundation.

Okay, this might not sit well with some Christians, in all honesty, especially if they value law over life. Take, for instance, when Jesus challenged the Pharisees in Luke fourteen five about saving their animal on the Sabbath if it falls into a well. They were far more concerned with breaking the rule than showing mercy.

When I say that the Lord chose to overlook my sin for a time to restore my foundation, well, that's the very place where he valued relationship and mercy over legalism. First Peter four eight says it well when it says love 

[00:14:00] covers a multitude of sins. This is an important point because one perspective points to the redemptive heart of God, and it leads to life, and the other to the counterfeit that brings condemnation.

As we go further today, this will begin to make sense for you personally. Let's keep going.

let me ask you, what fuels your obedience to the Lord?

How would you describe his reaction to your sin?

How would you describe his heart for you?

Friends, if you're tormented by the demands to perform more and do more and be more and and be perfect and sin less then I suggest that you might be serving another gospel I believe there's a counterfeit spirit in the earth. It's got a form of godliness, but it is not leading you to overcoming, to 

[00:15:00] joy, and to freedom.

It is a taskmaster, and it's burdening you with oppression and fear and condemnation, and it's a religious spirit, and it's a counterfeit

You know, I have to jump in here for just a moment. When you see it, you can't unsee it, and that is my hope for you. Can you identify where your beliefs actually are? Not what your knowledge of scripture says. If you and I sat down for coffee right now, how might you describe the fruit in your life? Peace, joy, freedom, or pressure and striving, fear and torment?

As you prepare to finish listening to this speech, I might suggest grabbing pen and paper or press pause as you take these next steps.

[00:16:00] Remember the three questions that I just asked you? Here's what I want you to do. I'm gonna invite you to take those questions. One, what fuels your obedience to the Lord? Two, how would you describe His reaction to your sin? And three, how would you describe His heart for you?

I want you to prayerfully and authentically answer those questions and ask the Lord to reveal if there's anything in your foundation that needs healed, and he will show you Wanna hear what it sounds like today when I talk to the Lord?

Papa God, I love you and I come in the mighty name of Jesus, Lord, and I thank you for the blood Father, I am struggling and I need your help, and I can't do this without you. But I know as a daughter of the King, you said I can approach your throne of grace with confidence. And so Father, I do that today, and I come 

[00:17:00] and I ask for your strength to get me through, and I thank you in advance for the victory.

In Jesus' name.

 Did you hear a difference between how my prayer sounds today versus what it used to sound like? One said, I don't belong here. I'm going to be severely punished. I may or may not hear from him. I may or may not be forgiven. My posture was one of begging. My expectation, fearful. Now I approach from a place of belief that he is my father.

I am his daughter. He desires for me to succeed. He knows I cannot succeed on my own and he wants me to know that I can tap into his power and strength to conquer. There is a clear shift in the acceptance of my identity and a solid foundation of grace upon 

[00:18:00] which I now stand. My prayer is that you too will gain clarity on this perspective and that you will begin to be transformed, renewing your mind to align with this revealed truth that applies also to you.

All right, let's bring this home.

If your conversation with God doesn't sound similarly, press into that and ask Him. Ask Him to heal you, and He will. Romans 5:20 says, "Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." So my friends, run to Jesus with all of your fractures, all of your weakness, all of your fears, and He will meet you where you are and take you beyond where you thought you could go.

Because we serve the King of all kings and the Lord of all lords, and greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world. Let Him change your perception of how He talks to you. In the meantime, I 

[00:19:00] leave you with this. May the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you.

The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. 

Sis, if you've ever wondered whether the voice correcting you is really God or a distorted version of Him built from fear, today's episode was for you. My hope is that you walk away able to recognize the difference so you can trade striving for rest and fear for confidence in who He says you are. This is what The Redeemed Perfectionist podcast is all about, helping women exchange a performance-based relationship with God for one built on grace so they can finally rest in who they already are in Christ.

If this episode stirred something in you, I would love for you to subscribe so you don't miss what's

[00:20:00] coming next. And if you wanna go deeper, The Grace Scale Quiz is a great next step to see how much perfectionism might be impacting every area of your life.

The link is in the show notes. Oh, and PS, remember that something new I mentioned at the top? Here's a hint. Have you ever wished there was a faster way to release old emotional triggers without years of talk therapy or having to relive every painful memory to move past it?

Keep an eye out because God has been leading me toward building exactly that for you. I'm gonna bring you along as it unfolds. Until next time, remember... Your worth is not based on your ability to perform for God

The mere fact that he died for you communicates the value he already places on you. See you next time

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