Came to in amazement having received approval (5)
I believe the answer is:
awoke
'came to' is the definition.
(to come to is to awake from sleep or a faint)
'amazement having received approval' is the wordplay.
'amazement' becomes 'awe' (awe is a kind of amazement).
'having received' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'approval' becomes 'OK' (OK is an example).
'awe' placed around 'ok' is 'AWOKE'.
'in' is the link.
(Other definitions for awoke that I've seen before include "Stirred" , "Became active again" , "raised" , "Enlivened" , "Stopped sleeping" .)