Family Talk

Dr. James Dobson: Welcome everyone to Family Talk. It's a ministry of the James Dobson Family Institute, supported by listeners just like you. I'm Dr. James Dobson and I'm thrilled that you've joined us.

Roger Marsh: Welcome to Family Talk. I'm Roger Marsh and today's edition of the program comes to you from the convention floor at the 2026 National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Shannon Bream, anchor of Fox News Sunday with Shannon Bream, also chief legal correspondent for Fox News Channel, and a New York Times bestselling author.

Her most recent book is called Nothing Is Impossible with God, and it is the subject of today's conversation here on Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk. Shannon shares her journey of faith, a battle with chronic pain, and why overcoming it is at the heart of the Christian life. So let's get into our conversation right now on today's edition of Family Talk.

Well today here on Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk, a very, very special guest. I believe this is Shannon Bream's first time to the Family Talk studio.

Shannon Bream: Yes, and I'm so excited to be with you!

Roger Marsh: Thank you. I have noticed that over the past three or four years, every time we get close to Lent and Easter, Shannon Bream has a new book or thereabouts. That seems to be your season. I think it's wonderful that Fox News is partnering with you on this publishing. How did that process start for you?

Shannon Bream: They actually, when they started to get into the book business a few years ago, came to me and said we're thinking of getting into this space, we know your faith is very important to you and we're thinking about doing a book of women and religion and faith. Would you be interested?

I always say to people normally you would say I need to pray about this because it's a big undertaking, but I immediately said yes. I probably should have sought some counsel, but I felt like the Lord just provided such a wonderful opportunity.

So it was Fox's idea with this first book. We had no idea how well our viewers and listeners and readers would respond to it. And so now this is book number four.

Roger Marsh: Let's talk first, the book is called Nothing Is Impossible with God: 11 Heroes, One God, Endless Lessons in Overcoming. Even before its official release, it's already in the top 1,000 on Amazon and moving. Those numbers keep getting smaller and smaller because people like that. What was the genesis of this? Like I mentioned, you do tell some personal things in the story about you.

Shannon Bream: I do. I've always loved this group of stories, this collection. To me, the theme is overcoming because we all have things to overcome in life. I've always loved the story of Gideon. So he starts out the book and he was kind of the peg for the whole book. This idea that when God comes to him with his big assignment, he's like, "I'm the least in my clan, the least in my family, the least in the tribe. I'm not the guy for this."

So he's already arguing with God. God addresses him as a mighty warrior. He already sees him for what is possible and for what the Lord knows he can do through him. I love that story as a jumping-off point, but I felt like this thread of all these different stories, there's something to overcome. Sometimes it's within your own self. It's your self-doubt, it's your rebellion. We see that with Jonah.

Sometimes it's people on the outside, naysayers and people who are doubters or working against you. I just love that theme of overcoming. The key verse for the book is when Jesus is talking to the disciples and he says you're going to have trouble in this world. So he doesn't ever say that's not going to happen but he says, "But take heart because I've overcome the world." And that's the closing chapter to the book, that Christ has overcome sin and death.

Roger Marsh: Quite frankly, many of us in the body of Christ would benefit from meditating on that verse a lot more because I get the sense that there are people who are frustrated in their faith simply because it seems like the enemy's winning. Ultimately, Jesus won the war so we're going to have battles. But the fact that he says you're going to have trials but I've overcome it makes overcoming a lot easier to deal with, doesn't it?

Shannon Bream: It does. It does because the thing that you would fear most in life, sin and death, the things that we have no control over, he has already won that war for us and he's overcome. So we can rest in that.

I have to sometimes pull back from the anxious things of the day, the things that seem insurmountable, our own challenges, a tough diagnosis, the loss of someone you love, the loss of your job. We all face different things at different times in life. But if I can stop and calm myself and spend time with the Lord and remember that I'm eternally secure, it helps to put these other challenges in perspective.

Roger Marsh: When did faith become a reality for you? A lot of us who grew up in the church will say oh yeah when I was three or when I was four. I know for me it was 19 because I had to work through all that and then run away from it and then come back to it. What was it like for Shannon Bream?

Shannon Bream: I grew up blessed to grow up in a home where Christ was front and center. I was in church, I was in a Christian school. But it took being at a summer camp when I was 12 years old in middle school where I realized this has to be a personal commitment.

This isn't just memorizing verses or knowing about Jesus or going to church. This is saying I understand your sacrifice for my sins and that I need a Savior and that I accept you for that and I give you my life. So that was when it became concrete for me and personal for me.

Roger Marsh: Thank you for sharing the gospel. I mean that sincerely because you hear that so often, don't you? "My pastor preaches the gospel." And then they can't articulate what you just said. It's amazing to me how when you spell that out for people, Shannon Bream needs a Savior every day. Your marriage needs salvation. It's the basis for everything.

I wonder how many people have what George Barna calls a syncretistic faith where they'll take a little of Buddhism and a little Christianity, and as long as I feel good about it. And yet you're saying, "I grew up in this, I had to basically take off my parents' armor and put my own armor on when I was in middle school." And now God has led you exceedingly abundantly far beyond what you could ever ask or imagine. Is that how you'd describe it?

Shannon Bream: Absolutely true. As a kid I had big dreams. My parents would say I was definitely sort of a dreamer, but never what I'm doing now. He is so faithful. There've been times that have been really hard along the way. If you've gotten to any successful place in your business or your life or your family or whatever it is, there were real valleys and detours where you wouldn't have expected you would get there. But God was working through all of that, teaching me humility and persistence.

Really I'm such an independent person that I have to let that go. It really is about leaning on him. We aren't built to be super independent and accomplish everything and handle every situation on our own. My mom is not joking when she says this, but as I was growing up, she always says The Strong-Willed Child was her number one book that got her through parenting because of me. It's true when you're so independent you think you can handle everything, but I think the Lord lets us realize at some point that we can't and we're made to be dependent on him.

Roger Marsh: Right. We have received so many letters here at Family Talk from people over the years who've said, "Yeah, Strong-Willed Child, you wrote that for my daughter." Parenting is Not for Cowards, yeah you wrote that for mine. It's practical, it's biblical, and it's eternal, which is why we're thrilled that Dr. Dobson's legacy continues to live on.

Let's talk about one of the struggles that you face where people who watch you on Fox News Sunday, they see you as the main correspondent on Fox News Channel. They know you have a legal background. You present perfectly on camera and you look the same in person. It's not like there is a lot of lighting and whatever, you're still the same person. And yet you've had some really serious health challenges that would have kept a lot of people from doing what you do. Talk about what this is all about.

Shannon Bream: Yeah, this started years ago for me. I awoke one night in excruciating pain with one of my eyes and thought that was a really weird thing, what could I have done in my sleep? Stumbling around the cabinet looking for eye drops and trying to put on a compress and figure out what went on. It was really terrible pain and I spent the next day with double vision and a migraine. I thought gosh that was so strange.

It healed up and I didn't think much more about it. But it began to happen over a matter of weeks and months in both eyes. It was happening repeatedly. It was always at night, it was kind of this mysterious thing. But it was a 10 out of 10. I didn't know what to do. I went to my eye doctor, he said well you're going to start having drier eyes as you age, that's going to be part of it. But I went back a second time and he said I think we need to get you to a specialist. I don't know exactly what's happening here.

I found an amazing specialist, very highly recommended. Second or third time I went to him, I was at the end of my rope. I was having this searing pain all the time and trying to hide it from my coworkers and my bosses and my job. My husband was the only one who really knew what was going on.

This doctor, this specialist said to me, "You seem very emotional." And I was because I was living in a lot of pain and I kind of gave up on medicine at that point. I thought he can't help me and I don't know where to go with it. And just got into a really dark place. If you've lived with chronic pain, emotional, physical, whatever it is, you know that you're just trying to survive. That's where I had gotten to was just trying to exist.

I finally went online, which I tell people do not do, but I was looking for some symptoms and trying to figure out what's going on. Found a message board where people were sharing similar stories of being turned away from the ER, doctors not believing them or not being able to help them and living in this pain. Some of them said, "I just don't see any way out of this other than taking my life." And I thought that doesn't sound crazy to me.

It took me a little bit of time to realize that should sound crazy to me. I never doubted that the Lord was with me or that he knew what was happening. I never was angry at him, I was just desperate for help. But I said to my husband, "I've gotten to this really dark place and I just desperately need help. I need some kind of lifeline."

I remember praying that night, Sunday night sitting on the side of our bed praying. I was always going back to 2 Corinthians 12 where Paul is like "I've got this thorn in my side," and the Lord says to him, "My strength is made perfect in your weakness." I had clung to that chapter and those verses there. I said to the Lord, "If you're not going to heal me then would you please lead me to a physician, someone who can help me?"

Prayed and prayed, found this new doctor within a couple of days, got in with him and he immediately knew what I had. It was such a relief to me to hear, but before I left his office he said, "But you have to know that there's no cure." It's a genetic condition, which just took the wind out of me all over again.

As I prayed and cried, sobbing in my car, I heard the Lord say to me, not audibly but in my spirit unmistakably, "I will be with you." Not, "I'm going to heal you, there's going to be a miracle here, I'm going to get the glory it's going to be great, this story just tied up in a neat bow." It was "I'll walk through this with you."

That was enough to keep me going and to get the treatments and eventually the surgery that has come as close to a cure as I'm going to get. It's a pretty good place to be. It just taught me so much about the Lord is always going to be there in your darkest valley. You're going to learn things through it. I think God is too good to let us suffer without purpose in it. I found a lot of purpose in it.

Roger Marsh: It's been my experience that God is not a God of dead ends but cul-de-sacs. Sometimes you get to the end of that thing before you realize wait there's a curve, there's a bend, it's going to go back to the road you need to be on. When you describe this sensation, I get ocular migraines every now and again. Part of it. But not the pain part. There's the inconvenience, there's the dizziness. But there's not the pain. How do you describe the pain to somebody who doesn't know what you're talking about?

Shannon Bream: If you've ever scratched your eye or got a piece of dust in your eye, you've gotten a piece of sand, that grit in your eye, what was happening I was tearing my cornea. Because of this genetic disease that I have, my corneas don't root back into my eyeball the way that they're supposed to. They're constantly pulling off.

When I was sleeping at night your eyes dry out when you're sleeping. My eyelid would adhere to my eyeball. So when my eye would move I would tear my cornea. My doctor who eventually was so kind and wonderful and diagnosed me said it's like you're playing soccer on a field with cleats and no one ever repairs the field. Your cleats are tearing apart that grass over and over again. That's what you've been doing to your eye. So 10 out of 10 is the only way I know how to describe it, but if you've done it once you know what it's like. To live with that for almost two years was a really tough place.

Roger Marsh: Wow. How long ago was this and you're not completely pain-free but at least it's more.

Shannon Bream: I would say 98 or 99 percent of the time I'm in great shape. I'm so thankful and there were a lot of therapies and things that I could do. This surgery is not a guarantee but it's pretty close and in probably 70 percent of the cases it works. I knew it was going to be very difficult but the doctor said to me, "You'll know when you get there. You'll know when we've exhausted everything else and you're ready to do the surgery."

I was in such pain at some point I said, "Okay let's do the surgery." Thankfully I had a tough recovery, but I'm in such a great place after that. I'm just super grateful for every bird I can see, every tree I can see, every leaf because my vision was improved with the surgery as well. Getting rid of the pain would have been enough for me, but it was just a blessing that I can see now so much better than I could before too.

Roger Marsh: That's remarkable. The new book is called Nothing Is Impossible with God by Shannon Bream: 11 Heroes, One God, Endless Lessons in Overcoming. We've got a link for it at JDFI.net. We encourage you to take a look at this book, especially if you're going through a painful season right now, if you've had a faith crisis as many people have had, maybe if you are in a season of life where there's a family member that's estranged from you. I see this happen a lot with the gray divorce phenomenon and all of a sudden people in their 50s and 60s are taking sides they never thought they'd have to take. You ask the question, like you said, "God why? Where are you? I'll do anything to get rid of this pain." In your case it was with your eyes.

Talk about why the 11 that you have profiled here were so important. You mention Gideon earlier, but talk about why they were so important to you because I think a lot of us will read through Jonah, for example, and we'll go "Well he was an idiot and he tried to disobey God, he preached the gospel, all of Nineveh got saved and then he was mad." So you have to ask the question okay so did he overcome anything? Talk about what your criteria were.

Shannon Bream: I think too with all of these stories, until we get to that final chapter with Jesus as the ultimate overcomer, we see again and again these different people from the Bible, whether the nation of Israel or different churches, were susceptible to sinning again. We're always going to need another sacrifice. We're going to need another round of redemption until we get to heaven. We're not going to be perfected this side of earth.

I love that the Bible does tell the rest of the story where people sometimes backslide again or they have more trouble because it reminds us that until Jesus came and paid that ultimate sacrifice and that ultimate price, we're always going to need a sacrifice to get us back into alignment with the Lord, forgiven and in fellowship with him.

I love that the Bible doesn't write that part of the story out. Whether it's Moses or Noah or Jonah or whoever it is, they're still human, they're still sinners, they're still flawed. And yet like David, they can be described as a man after God's own heart. So he can still redeem and help us overcome, but we won't ultimately overcome until we're resting in Christ.

Roger Marsh: When you were in law school did you ever imagine you'd be where you are right now?

Shannon Bream: No. No, no, no. My parents thought I would be good at law school because they said I liked to argue, which is probably true. But man, it changed the way that I thought about things, the way I used logic, the way that I tracked down answers and found the truth. To me whether you go to original documents or you go to the original witness to a crime, whatever it is, there's a way to research.

I didn't realize I'd be using that in journalism, tracking down answers and trying to get to the truth of things. But law school expanded my brain in so many ways and it was really a difficult experience for me. I think a lot of people feel that way going through law school, but I know it was laying the path for me to be able to do what I do now.

Roger Marsh: Talk to our believing friends who are listening right now who say I'm so happy for you Shannon and I'm glad that you do what you do so I can just watch you on Fox News and I don't have to worry about thinking myself. I get the sense from a lot of pastors, for example, they're like I need to be kind of part litigator, part counselor, part, it's a lot more comprehensive.

The world that we inhabit right now is, I use the expression that we used to look at a mirror and now people are satisfied looking at shattered glass. I can still see a reflection but it's not the clearest picture. How do you encourage people in their faith in the weird times that we live in? How do we stay grounded? How do you stay grounded? What kind of example are you hoping to set for people?

Shannon Bream: I am a sinner saved by grace. So I have the reset every day and I'm so grateful for that. COVID really rattled me in a different way than some other things had because when you report on a story you have a bit of objectivity. You're not part of the story. But in COVID every single one of us was part of the story.

I understood weeks before the general public did what was coming. I was talking to doctors and scientists and people and we knew this tidal wave that was sort of coming to the world. It was difficult to sit in that knowledge and that information. I said to myself, I've always been somebody who's in the word and praying and journaling, it has to be the very first thing I do in the morning. I can't even look at my phone, I can't see what's important or what's happening there.

I have to get rooted and anchored for the day before I can face whatever is coming. That's always been my space but COVID made it my number one priority first thing in the morning. Now some people studying in the evening or over lunchtime is better, whenever your time is your time. But for me not knowing what I'm going to walk into for the day, whatever I'm coming professionally, what I'm going to face personally, I don't know, just that morning rooting time in scripture.

I do a lot of days journal. If I don't have time that may not get done, but in prayer, interceding for other people, for myself, for my family, for our leaders. I just feel like if you start your day there it gives you perspective on everything else that you're going to face. And you mentioned pastors and my goodness they've got some of the toughest jobs in the world to lead their flock to be asked to be taking positions on current events and difficult topics. That's a really difficult job, people who are in ministry. So good to include them in our prayers.

Roger Marsh: Absolutely. When you are reporting the news, there's so much subjectivity. There's a lot of opinionating and bloviating in that world. You are part of a network that mercifully is probably the most objective of the rest and yet there's a lot of opinion on there too.

How do you encourage people of faith to look at the headlines, see what's being reported and understand look everyone has a bias, everyone has an ulterior motive as to what story they're trying to show. They only show this part of the picture, that part of the headline. A lot of kids get frustrated and parents get frustrated and fearful. How do you encourage people to discern the signs of the times rather than just say, "Well I watch Fox News or CNN, this is what they say and so I guess I'm host."

Shannon Bream: People are in a couple of different camps. Either they do that because they think I'm not going to do a deep dive into all of these things, it's too polarizing, it's too irritating and divided, so I'll go to my favorite news source and I'll get my news there. Or I've got a lot of people telling me now I'm just completely checked out. I just can't, it's so divisive and so frustrating and depressing for a lot of people I can't do it.

What I do, first of all is that rooting in the truth because that supersedes everything and anything that you would go to for a news source. If you have that foundation and that rooting you'll be able to I think more rightly hear God's voice and test things against that. But I personally intake a lot of different sources across the spectrum.

My TV in my office in Washington has got Fox, CNN, MSNBC, FBN or CBN, CNBC. I try to look at all these different news sources and networks and I flip between some other ones too, those are the primary ones. I read the New York Times, but I also read the Federalist. I try to have a very broad swath of what I intake because I need to know what all these different viewpoints and takes are. So I encourage people don't just stick to what feels comfortable to you or is your comfort zone. Go read and listen to other places and other people to get some perspective.

Roger Marsh: Which leads us back to Shannon Bream's brand new book. It's called Nothing Is Impossible with God, just now out: 11 Heroes, One God, Endless Lessons in Overcoming. The reason why this book is so important right now, Shannon Bream, is.

Shannon Bream: Because you will always have something to overcome in your life. It's not always going to be a negative. It could be your own self-doubt. It could be your rebellion. It could be, Peter is one of my favorite stories in the book too, his own failures. But God still redeemed and used him to build the early church.

It can be positive things too. Maybe you're overcoming the fear of starting something new, getting into parenthood or a business or a Bible study. I think you're always going to be in a season of overcoming until we get home. I mean that by our heavenly home. So I hope the book will both encourage people because I think we all need that but also equip them. There's some really practical things that you learn from each of these stories. I hope people are left with both.

Roger Marsh: You mentioned early on that your mom had a penchant for Dr. Dobson's writing, especially with you in mind. Now that you are in your adult season of life, remembering his legacy of course and continuing it on here at the James Dobson Family Institute, do you have a fond memory of Dr. Dobson, a time where you said wow mom was right, that Dr. Dobson knew what he was talking about?

Shannon Bream: Yes, like every time we listened to him on the radio because my mom wanted to make sure I was listening to him, it wasn't just for her. But just the times that he and Shirley shared together and talked about marriage and parenting and how they were really a team in that and that God gives us roles and we complement each other and we work together. They modeled marriage in such a beautiful biblical way. That just had a lasting impact on me.

Roger Marsh: Well it's obvious and evident because you and Sheldon have a great marriage. How many years now?

Shannon Bream: We just celebrated our 30th anniversary. We always like to say we're not perfect but we're perfect for each other. That's how we view it. We're humans, we're flawed humans who come together in marriage and you're so super selfish and you have to learn to be each other's biggest cheerleader and biggest supporter. I thank God that hopefully we've matured enough to figure that out.

Roger Marsh: And you survived COVID together.

Shannon Bream: We did. In fact, we were among those who really enjoyed it because it just gave us so much more time together than we normally have. I know it was isolating for a lot of people. It put stress on families and marriages for a lot of people. For us, because we're apart so much with our work, it was in a weird way a blessing to be thrown together with all that extra time together.

So while I recognize it was really difficult for a lot of people, for us it was a season where we found some silver linings. The fact that you were able to take such a positive outlook on a situation that for a lot of people I think was fearful, not necessarily negative, but as the stories are coming out about what was really behind the scenes, it can be a little demoralizing. But I think for people of true faith, you seem very energized by that we lived through something like that.

Roger Marsh: Right. And we look at the future now and say amen, glory, hallelujah. The White House in this administration has gotten a lot more active when it comes to religious liberty. Our own Gary Bauer is a part of that group that meets regularly and is really impacting. First year the 150 promises delivered. As a reporter of faith who wants to stay objective but inside is saying yay, what encourages you the most about what you're seeing from the White House right now?

Shannon Bream: I do think the President has so many people around him that are strong people of faith that are speaking into these things. You've got Speaker Mike Johnson who I've known for ages long before he was the Speaker, back when he was a young attorney that was doing work for religious freedom and then as a congressman. He's unabashed in his faith and I know that he shares that with the President and that has a big impact in these policies.

Somebody like Secretary Rubio, who is very well versed in his faith. If you heard him listen, I saw this of him years ago on the campaign trail when he was running for president and I would say he's not quoting these verses as somebody who's memorized a cue card, this is a genuine faith from him. If you heard him speak at the Charlie Kirk Memorial, I thought this is a guy who in these brief moments he had gave one of the most clear, succinct explanations of the gospel that I've ever heard.

Looking around and knowing that the President is going to get wise counsel from people who are truly walking with the Lord I think is a big blessing. Yeah well it's certainly helpful to have a trusted voice on Capitol Hill reporting the news from Washington DC and giving us at least one honest and objective opinion coming from a biblical worldview.

For our money it's Shannon Bream with Fox News Channel. Nothing Is Impossible with God: 11 Heroes, One God, Endless Lessons in Overcoming. There's a link for the book up at JDFI.net. Shannon Bream, it's always a pleasure to spend time with you especially because it means Easter is coming.

Shannon Bream: It does mean Easter is coming. This is a good time it seems to be the time of year when your writing is most prolific. Thanks for keeping on writing and thanks for being with us today here on Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk.

Shannon Bream: Thank you for having me. God bless you guys.

Roger Marsh: Well I have to admit Shannon Bream is the real deal and her reminder that we are always going to be in a season of overcoming until we reach our heavenly home, that's something I think we all needed to hear today. You've been listening to a special edition of Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk recorded live at the 2026 National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, Tennessee.

Now if you missed any portion of the broadcast or if you want to share it with a friend, visit JDFI.net and while you're there you can also check out information about Shannon Bream's brand new book that just released yesterday. It's called Nothing Is Impossible with God. You'll find all that information and more when you go to JDFI.net.

Well I'm Roger Marsh and from all of us here at Family Talk and the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute, thanks so much for listening today. Be sure to join us again next time right here for another edition of Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk. The voice you can still trust for the family you love.