Question about how your faith helps you

My faith has evolved as I began to treat my OCD. in a way ERP became a kind of spiritual practice. In my experience, faith can help you with conquering OCD if you embrace uncertainty about God , good, evil, heaven and hell, have no ridigidity in following rules, and realize that faith is a journey more than a destination. That faith should be open to difficult questions that do not have an answer. This keeps things open ended enough for OCD to starve itself of reassurance. Also a faith that welcomes differences in opinion and expression. However when I embraced an expression of Christianity that was overly rigid, rule following, and required absolute certainty about all questions and doubts and a sense of security about the future that isn't possible, that really caused my OCD to get way worse. If I worshipped a God that wanted to control my every move, my OCD constantly was afraid I wasn't doing God's will. When I changed and realized God wanted to walk with me and allow me to make my own choices and have agency, my OCD would lose its power.

For me, my OCD certainly confused my faith. But I definitely notice throughout my struggles, it was times I isolated myself that the OCD really took over. I highly recommend getting involved in a good Bible believing and teaching church, because we need community. It also provides opportunities to serve others, to get outside of our thoughts and discover our gifts. God is so good and His promises are real and can be experienced in our lives in a real way.

The more I've grown in my relationship with God, the more I've had to grapple with the fact that He is so far beyond my comprehension. I can't predict how He will choose to act in any given situation. I can't control Him. This used to drive my OCD bonkers since it leaves so much uncertain. But as I've walked with God, He has proven Himself patient, compassionate, faithful, and loving. He welcomes my questions and doubts, though He usually doesn't give clear answers. I guess He knows that certainty isn't what I really need. Religion that tries to treat God as a problem to be solved will only feed OCD as it tries to follow all the right rules in an attempt to earn God's favor and blessing. A healthy relationship with God is based on His unconditional love. It knows that striving for perfection is an impossible task. It knows that God is the only one who has ultimate control, and that He is trustworthy. God knows that we will make mistakes all of the time. He knows we will misunderstand Him. But if we are genuinely pursuing Him, He won't let us stray far. God knows that on our own we can't be perfect. The more we try, the more we will realize that we can't do everything right. God invites us to let go and allow Him to slowly transform our thoughts and actions, and to trust that He has abundant grace for us in the process. We don't even need to "Just have more faith" when we are afraid! God will faithfully work in our lives to grow our faith one step at a time, just like the exposure hierarchies where you start with the smallest things and work to more difficult things

I have religious ocd and have been a Christian all my life. This is genuinely such a good question and I admire how you are so open to religion, it’s so beautiful!