Anxiety and Relationships: Restoring Hope with God’s Help

These days, anxiety is everywhere you look, and our culture doesn’t shy away from showing it. Anxiety plays a prominent role in films such as Inside Out 2 and in television shows like The Big Bang Theory. But Anxiety is often shown as something “in your head” or biological. It’s depicted as a trait that the character is born with or perhaps a result of chemical imbalances.

While these and the thousands of other portrayals of anxiety in pop culture can help people recognize anxiety and can bring it into conversations, they often overlook a critical aspect. Anxiety is rarely caused by biology alone. Relationships, environment, and life experiences are major contributors that the media doesn’t always show.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), anxiety is the most prevalent mental health condition in the world. Approximately 4% of the global population, which equals about 301 million people, were affected by anxiety in 2019. And there’s no sign of it letting up. In fact, anxiety disorders have been increasing over time and have risen rather drastically in recent years.

There are myriad reasons that someone might suffer from anxiety, including biological factors, unhealthy thought patterns, everyday stress, and past trauma. Broken relationships are a major factor, too. Pop culture, which often focuses on anxiety as a “brain problem,” rarely shows how distance, conflict, or unresolved tension in relationships can spur or worsen anxiety.

Relationships in the Bible

Are relationships really that powerful? That important? From the beginning, the Bible is a story about relationships. It goes into detail about our connection with God and with one another. David and Jonathan (1 Samuel 18-20) had a deep trust and encouraged each other in their spiritual walk. Ruth and Naomi (Ruth 1-4) give us an example of devotion and loyalty. And of course, the most important relationship in history unfolds in the pages of the Bible.

Right after the fall of Adam and Eve in Genesis chapter 3, Scripture offers a love story about God’s relentless pursuit to restore us. He longs to bring us, His creation, back into a whole, healthy relationship with Him. And He wants us to have deep, meaningful connections with each other.

That story continues throughout Scripture as we see how God provided His only Son, Jesus, to die on a cross to restore our relationship with our Heavenly Father. Jesus talked a lot about relationships, as well.

When someone asked Him which commandment was the most important, His answer was straightforward and clear: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” There is no commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31 NIV).

If God went to all this effort to create relationships and restore ours to Him, it must mean that our connections are important. Our relationships matter. Our relationship with God first, and then with each other, is the foundation of our identity.

Anxiety, the Thief

How does anxiety fit into relationships? Anxiety is the thief that can rob you of the peace God wants you to have. But just like any thief, anxiety is sneaky. Of course, it doesn’t usually come out of nowhere. There might be a biological seed or stressful circumstance at the helm. But anxiety can truly grow where there is distance from God and from a healthy support system.

It’s not surprising that anxiety is a thief and enemy to our peace when we trace its lineage. If anxiety is partially caused by brokenness and separation, we have to look at the origins of those causes.

The story in Genesis shows us how brokenness entered the world. Satan, the serpent, deceived Eve about God’s intentions, creating doubt and fear. This deception led to conflict, division, and a rupture not only between humans but between us and God Himself (Genesis 3:1-19). This brokenness from generations ago still affects us today and often shows up as anxiety, because anxiety is a symptom of that deep separation.

Anxiety and Relationships

Similar to the old question of which came first, the chicken or the egg, you might wonder if broken relationships cause anxiety or if anxiety causes broken relationships. Both are true. People with anxiety disorders often face relationship challenges and poor relationship quality. They might engage in behavior that triggers negative reactions and may sabotage their own opportunities for close connections.

Conversely, having broken relationships can cause anxiety, too. When someone you care about (and who you thought cared about you) lets you down or when tension sprouts, distance can grow. In that gap is where anxiety thrives. It makes you doubt yourself, causes you to overthink what you did or said, and makes you worry that things will never get better. It’s a cycle because anxiety grows from broken connections, and it also makes those broken connections harder to repair.

Anxiety tries to keep you stuck in that alone, lonely place. Being removed from God and others can cause anxiety, and anxiety wants to keep it that way. It tries to convince you that you’re alone because you’re not good enough to be loved. And this causes more anxiety, which keeps you from relationships and keeps you stuck.

Hope and Restoration

It doesn’t have to stay that way. What a wonderful God we serve! Our human story doesn’t end in brokenness. God’s story is one of restoration. He pursues you with unwavering love, inviting you into healing and wholeness.

When you take those important first steps back toward God’s presence, not only are you promised eternal life, but anxiety begins to lose its powerful grip. And hope begins to form as you start to see that peace is possible, even among your messy and broken relationships.

God provided a way for us to restore ourselves to Him through the redemptive blood of Jesus, but He can guide us in restoring our human relationships, too. Remember, it was God who saw that Adam needed a companion, and He created one just for him.

God can see when you feel alone, too, and He can repair those strained relationships in your life. He can soften hearts, provide opportunities for reconciliation, and guide you toward bridging those invisible, but real, gaps.

Not only is God the God of the supernatural, but He can use practical tools, too. Therapy and counseling are some of those tools that God can use to help you. Therapy can also help you to restore relationships. Your Christian therapist can help you identify the areas in your life that could be causing relationship issues and help you gain skills to make new connections.

While therapy doesn’t replace your need for God’s grace or a healthy community, it can complement them and give you a way to take action toward reducing anxiety and restoring your relationships (and making new, healthy ones).

When you can break free from the anxiety and strained relationship loop, you will find that restoration happens in the form of restored or new human relationships. Healthy, God-centered relationships. He places friends and family members, mentors, and even strangers who will love you well and remind you that God loves you, even when anxiety makes you feel distant.

While mass media wants to tell you that your anxiety is strictly biological or internal and beyond your control, God has a different message. If you acknowledge the relational and external causes of anxiety and pair that with faith, community, and therapy, you will see that achieving peace from anxiety and restoration of relationships are possible.

For more information and to schedule an appointment with a Christian counselor near you, call us today.