00:00:43.000He's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created.
00:00:48.000Turning point, we will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.
00:01:02.000Hey everybody, welcome to this episode of the Charlie Kirk show.
00:01:04.000I am super excited because I get to finally do the interviewing uh, with a friend of mine and someone who I have a lot of respect for, Shannon Bream.
00:01:11.000You see her every night on FOX NEWS and she has a phenomenal new book out, the Women Of The Bible.
00:01:16.000Uh speak uh, the wisdom of uh 16 women and their stories.
00:01:21.000Uh Shannon, welcome to the Charlie Kirk show.
00:01:35.000Uh, I said what a great idea for a book.
00:01:38.000So uh, tell us why you wrote this book and a little about it, and then we'll get into some of the specifics.
00:01:43.000You know, FOX came to me because they were starting this book label and said, we're thinking about doing something in this space about women and the Bible.
00:01:53.000This is such a wonderful opportunity to tell the stories of these women, people who may not be people of faith or pick up the bible.
00:02:00.000Um, I still think they'll be fascinated by these stories and if you know them, as I thought I did, I learned so much in researching and writing the book.
00:02:08.000Uh, so I thought, just thought for people who think that women are sort of secondary in the Bible, they don't have a starring role, they don't know these stories, and so to me, just super exciting to be able to share them with a new audience.
00:02:20.000I, I love that, and one of the uh talking points that more secular culture uses is that the Bible is just for reinforcing a patriarchy.
00:02:30.000So i'm super thrilled to be able to discuss this with you about how the women of the Bible played not just an important role but a decisive role.
00:02:40.000So let's get into some of the specifics.
00:02:42.000Uh, queen Esther uh, the Book Of Esther, one of my favorite books of the Bible.
00:02:46.000It's the only book in the Bible uh, where Adane or Hashem or God is not specifically said but his hand is present, all throughout, present throughout that story.
00:02:55.000Uh, tell us about uh Esther and why you chose her in the Bible, in the book About From The Bible.
00:03:07.000It's an amazing story of how she was an orphan, she started out with just an uncle raising her Very modest means, and she rises through the ranks.
00:03:15.000And this is one of those stories that when I went back to study it for this book, I learned so much.
00:03:19.000I was reminded of so many incredible facts and divine intervention along the way, where she ends up being the most unlikely thing, which is a Jewish woman essentially displaced.
00:03:28.000The Jews were all over the place at this point, not with their own homeland.
00:03:32.000And she ends up being the queen of Persia.
00:03:34.000And there's this evil guy, Haman, who is part of the administration, who's plotting against the Jewish people to completely wipe them out.
00:03:41.000And she's in this place now where Mordecai, her uncle, who raised her, who has told her not to divulge her Jewish background, now says, It's up to you.
00:03:49.000God has placed you for such a time as this in this kingdom.
00:03:52.000You're going to have to go to the king.
00:03:54.000Well, in those days, to go to the king without him asking for you, you could be killed on the spot.
00:03:59.000And she said to Mordecai, have all of the people fast for three days.
00:04:02.000And at the end of those three days, if I perish, I perish.
00:04:49.000I think I'm going to say this: Jael or Jael, Jael, and prophets like Miriam.
00:04:54.000Tell us about some of these lesser-known women of the Bible.
00:04:57.000Yeah, Deborah's story I love so much because she was a judge.
00:05:00.000She was leading the people, and Israel was in this cycle that they often get in, that we sometimes do too, where we forget God's faithfulness.
00:05:07.000They've wandered away from him, and now they're begging for help.
00:05:10.000Well, Deborah was the woman leading this entire nation.
00:05:13.000They came to her to settle disputes, those kinds of things.
00:05:16.000And she was revered and very well respected.
00:05:18.000So God tells her, Hey, I want you to get the people together and go into battle against the Canaanites who've been oppressing them, who had, you know, just way more everything that you would need in the way of manpower and chariots and all the things the Israelites didn't have.
00:05:32.000And she went and called her top general, Barack was his name, and said, All right, God is telling us we need to go into battle against the Canaanites.
00:05:39.000He's probably looking at this on paper as most people would, like, this doesn't seem like a great idea, at least by earthly standards.
00:05:46.000And he says, I'll go and do it if you come with me.
00:05:50.000Because he knows she's anointed and she's like, okay, I'll do it.
00:05:53.000But because of your hesitance, God is going to deliver the opposing general into the hands of a woman.
00:05:58.000And as a younger person, I remember hearing this story and thinking it was Deborah, but it's not.
00:06:01.000It's a second character, Yale or Jael, some pronounce it.
00:06:06.000And she ends up being the one who captures and murders the opposing general.
00:06:10.000The Israelites completely rout the Canaanites.
00:06:14.000And it's just an amazing story of these women who are warriors and fighters and don't question God, even though it seems like the task he's giving seems impossible.
00:06:23.000Deborah just trusted him blindly and said, I believe if God has sent us, there is purpose, and I'm going.
00:06:32.000She's known as the sister of Moses, and she is critical in leading the Israelites on the Exodus and eventually their journey towards the promised land.
00:06:40.000And with all these women, we see that they are flawed.
00:06:44.000I love the Bible doesn't sanitize them because I think it makes it more relatable for the rest of us to say where they mess up, they make their own decisions, and they get off track.
00:06:52.000God can still work through all of those messes, and he does in all of these stories.
00:06:57.000And so, in writing this book and reflecting on the 16 stories and the 16 women of the Bible, Where were you able to kind of see what's happening today with young women in America and derive some wisdom from that?
00:07:15.000Because we have our Young Women's Leadership Summit at Turning Point USA and young women right now, some of which they feel confused, especially young Christian women.
00:07:24.000Can you connect some of the things that you learned or discovered in the process of this book that might be applicable to young women in America today?
00:07:32.000Yeah, what I found is these stories are timeless.
00:07:34.000They're universal issues that women had back then.
00:07:37.000We still very much have today, feeling sometimes like an outsider, feeling forgotten or like God's not hearing your prayers or you're searching for your purpose.
00:07:46.000And some of the more weighty problems of infertility and widowhood, family squabbles, we all have, you know, complicated family relationships from time to time.
00:07:54.000But seeing these women, some of them very humble and that you may not hear a lot about Hannah, she didn't come from a big prominent family, but the desire of her heart was to be a mother.
00:08:04.000And we see for years her longing and her praying and going to God, like, see me, see my sorrow, and please hear me.
00:08:10.000We see outsiders like Ruth and like Tamar, who Tamar is the one who really, really got off track and made a mess of her situation.
00:08:18.000But she ends up in the lineage of Christ and God is redeeming every decision, good and bad, for his purposes.
00:08:24.000And so I think as a young woman, I remember feeling like, what is going to be my place in the world?
00:08:39.000There's learning patience and watching for God's hand.
00:08:43.000I think in all of these stories and so many things that translate to today that I hope will be encouraging to women of all ages, but certainly young women, because I remember that coming out of Liberty, my undergrad, and thinking, gosh, there's so much I want to do in the world, but how do I get started?
00:08:57.000And, you know, having roadblocks along the way in your career and in your personal life, things not always going according to your plans.
00:09:04.000But now I have the hindsight and the blessing of looking back to see God's hand in all of it.
00:09:09.000And I think you'll see that these stories from the Bible too.
00:09:14.000We all know that conservatives are getting kicked off of social media.
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00:10:17.000So can you talk, just expand upon your personal journey and story?
00:10:22.000Because so many young women, you know, that we that we talk to and that we have at Turning Point USA and also listen to our podcast, they're inundated with this kind of new feminism.
00:10:33.000And it's not, I don't think it's healthy for our country, which is almost more about attacking men than lifting up women.
00:10:40.000Can you talk about that just from your experience and also use some of the kind of biblical wisdom that you've been able to do such a great job of articulating in this book?
00:10:49.000Well, I feel like God has created men and women in his image.
00:10:53.000We are all equal in his sight and we all have roles to play.
00:10:58.000And I think something that's so encouraging to me is to stop and have that reset sometimes when the Lord tells or the world tells us about what's important or how to be popular or how to get more likes on social media.
00:11:24.000For me, it's a different one than he has for my husband.
00:11:26.000And thank God that we're two different people and that we fit together and he's able to be strong where I am weak in some certain things.
00:11:34.000And we bust up a lot of stereotypes in our marriage.
00:11:36.000I mean, I am very much a career-driven person and we've navigated things a little bit differently, but we feel like God calls each of us to our own specific roles and our paths.
00:11:46.000And don't feel like you have to have a cookie cutter path to anything that you do.
00:11:50.000I've talked in my first book about the fact that we don't have children and that was a choice.
00:11:54.000And a lot of people don't understand that.
00:11:56.000It was hard for me as a Christian woman to have conversations about that, to articulate that.
00:12:00.000But I feel like God calls us to all kinds of different things and different plans and purposes.
00:12:06.000And don't let the world tell you that you're unimportant or that what you believe is wrong or that you need to be silent about things that are your deep faith convictions.
00:12:19.000I think that there should be room for all of that.
00:12:21.000But again, Christ told us you're going to have trouble in the world.
00:12:25.000Our lives aren't guaranteed to be easy, but what we are guaranteed is that he is walking through it with us.
00:12:31.000And I've seen that in my darkest moments, professionally, from getting fired from my first TV job or the guy who told me I was the worst person he'd ever seen on TV and I'd never make it, to going through my husband having a brain tumor, to finding out that I've got a chronic, incurable genetic disease that I've got to manage.
00:12:45.000I mean, life will throw you all kinds of curveballs.
00:12:49.000But again, God has been faithful in every bit of it.
00:12:52.000And he has found to show us a way through it with his strength and his grace, which I lean on every single day.
00:13:03.000People love to hear about stories of individuals that have had a lot of success.
00:13:07.000And I've always been struck at how you are unapologetic about your faith and that you're able to lead with grace and have such, you know, really live out the spirit.
00:13:17.000You could see that the spirit lives in you and in your work.
00:13:20.000There's a lot of people that listen to our podcast that are not believers.
00:13:24.000Talk even more about your experience with Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.
00:13:29.000We do talk about that a lot on our program, but we also have people that, you know, tune in for the politics and they're still searching for that.
00:13:37.000Help help us through your journey and continue to expand on that.
00:13:42.000My parents divorced when I was really young, but they both already had the seeds of faith and in their own lives grew much stronger through the years and both came to faith.
00:13:51.000And my mom had me in church every time the doors were open.
00:13:54.000She was a teacher at a Christian school.
00:13:58.000And that just put fuel on the fire of both of us of our faith.
00:14:01.000Our church was our community and our home.
00:14:04.000It was the support for us when it was just a single mom and a young daughter.
00:14:08.000And so it really is family to me in a much broader sense.
00:14:12.000I came to realize after being exposed to faith my whole life in my middle school years, like, wait a minute, this has to be actually a personal relationship.
00:14:20.000I have to say, Christ, I accept what you did for me.
00:14:22.000In this Easter week, we commemorate him going to the cross as a sinless sacrifice for the rest of us.
00:14:28.000So I made that personal commitment and acceptance then, and I've been a work in progress ever since.
00:14:34.000To me, my faith gives me the greatest strength in the worst times, like this pandemic year, which has been a season of loss for so many people, professionally, personally, losing people that you love.
00:14:44.000Maybe your own health has been at stake financially.
00:14:47.000Your kids out of school worrying about how they're going to catch up.
00:14:50.000There's just so much anxiety and pressure.
00:14:52.000But for me, this year has been one of really rerooting again into my faith.
00:14:57.000It reminded me that I got to start every day before I turn on the phone and start looking at my emails or social media or anything else.
00:15:04.000I spend time in the word and in prayer and journaling because I know I need it.
00:16:03.000And we try to list them out so people will understand which Mary we're talking about at which time.
00:16:09.000We do include Mary, the mother of Jesus.
00:16:11.000And I've always been most familiar with the beginning of her story where we see the angel come to her and she's like, wow, you've got this divine assignment here on earth to give birth to the savior in human form.
00:16:21.000And just her faithfulness in that and what a blessing she was and being chosen to be this woman.
00:16:28.000But in the book, we go a little bit further.
00:16:30.000We show her as a mother to Jesus, his earthly mother, his part, her part in his ministry, and how she's there through the end in the crucifixion, which I cannot imagine any mother having to go through witnessing their child be falsely accused and beaten and killed.
00:16:47.000She is there at the foot of the cross.
00:16:48.000But not only that, she's there in the upper room praying with the disciples.
00:16:53.000She is the earliest part of the church coming together as we know it.
00:16:57.000So I have always thought about 15-year-old Mary as I guess, you know, somewhere her age would be.
00:17:02.000But to see her life through as a mature woman and the fact that she was there faithfully to the end, I think was just a very meaningful journey to me to watch her all the way through.
00:17:12.000And we have Mary Magdalene also, who was a woman who was part of Jesus' ministry.
00:17:16.000We see in the New Testament, these women were equals.
00:17:19.000It wasn't normal that women would be studying at the foot of an exalted rabbi or teacher, but they were part of Jesus' inner circle.
00:17:45.000And immediately the joy and the discovery that he is resurrected, that he's alive, she runs off with the news.
00:17:52.000And essentially, she's the first evangelist, Charlie.
00:17:55.000And what's so amazing about that story, and I'm not sure if you touch on this in the book, is that if they were making it up, who would on earth want to have women witnesses?
00:18:06.000Can you talk about that, the context that actually reinforces the veracity of the resurrection?
00:18:12.000Yeah, in those days, women wouldn't have been considered great witnesses or exalted witnesses in legal disputes and that kind of thing.
00:18:19.000You would not favor to put a woman on the stand.
00:18:23.000The men would be the one who would be trusted and valued as legal witnesses.
00:18:27.000So for the men who wrote the Bible inspired by God and putting this together, if they wanted to make their airtight case, I don't think they would have used women as the ones to be the witness to the resurrection.
00:18:38.000They would have wanted to pin that on one of the disciples or one of the man somewhere in the story.
00:18:42.000So the fact that they actually include women as the first witness and the first one to run and tell about Christ and to have that discovery to me is really powerful.
00:18:51.000And the fact that Jesus upended so many norms about how women were valued or treated in those days is a beautiful thing.
00:18:57.000We actually, I decided to do a closing chapter of Jesus and the women because there were so many other women we wanted to include just to see how Christ interacted with them.
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00:19:57.000Even as she says, all the things other on the right wing are afraid to say.
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00:20:54.000So Shannon, can you help for some people that are not yet believers?
00:20:58.000We touched on this a little bit, but there are stereotypes about the Christian faith.
00:21:01.000And I'm sure you get asked about all of this.
00:21:03.000In the New Testament, there are some scriptures that say that they're misinterpreted that women should not speak at church or things of that nature.
00:21:12.000Without taking any theological positions, you can, if you'd like.
00:21:16.000Can you talk about how these are general misrepresentations of Christianity?
00:21:20.000Because there's a stereotype that certain people have or a belief wrongly that women are looked down upon and not taken seriously in the Christian faith.
00:21:30.000Yeah, and I think that that last chapter in the book busts that myth wide open by the way that Jesus related to women, included them, revealed himself to them.
00:21:38.000We think about Mary Magdalene the day of the resurrection in the Garden 2 area.
00:21:44.000But I think too about the Samaritan woman.
00:21:46.000At this time, the Jews and the Samaritans were not friendly at all.
00:21:50.000Jewish people would travel way out of the way, so they wouldn't have to go through Samaria and interact with them.
00:21:55.000And yet, Christ went there knowing he would interact with this Samaritan woman at the well who was living a life of shame.
00:22:02.000She was there in the heat of the day because she wouldn't travel with the other women.
00:22:05.000I mean, she had been married five times, was living with a man who wasn't her husband.
00:22:09.000Jesus doesn't, you know, hit her over the head with that.
00:22:42.000And people can debate about leadership, about whether women should be pastors and leading church or not.
00:22:46.000And that's an ongoing debate and conversation.
00:22:49.000I think that God gifts women to do very specific things.
00:22:52.000And I've been blessed and I've been grown spiritually by the women who are great Bible teachers and study leaders and people that I've heard speak over the ages.
00:23:00.000And I think there's this misconception too about the idea of submission of a Christian wife.
00:23:05.000And my husband and I have worked through all of those things.
00:23:08.000We both are believers and believe that our marriage is consecrated to God and is guided through his leadership and through his guidance.
00:23:19.000We don't say, you know, it should be 50-50.
00:23:21.000It should be 100%, 100, both sides giving 100%.
00:23:24.000And we respect each other's decision-making skills.
00:23:26.000There's only one time in 25 years of marriage that we got to a complete impasse on a decision.
00:23:32.000It was about a job and about somewhere that we were going to move.
00:23:34.000And it was the one time in 25 years that I've said, I don't agree and I'm frustrated with this decision, but I think you as the leader of our family and the head of our household will have to make the final call.
00:23:46.000And it wasn't easy, but I knew it was the right thing.
00:23:49.000And it turned out to be the best thing for us because in that, there's also responsibility with men and having to make those difficult decisions and being answerable to God.
00:23:57.000It's not like men are just going around barking orders and women are subservient wives.
00:24:02.000I mean, that's never been my experience personally.
00:24:05.000And it's certainly not what I believe the Bible represents or models to us about marriage.
00:24:10.000That is a really important point because that is a false impression that many people in the secular world think that that's what the Bible articulates or what it argues for.
00:24:20.000So I think that's a really important thing.
00:24:22.000I was going to ask you about the submit to your husbands because that is frequently used by some of the secular feminist groups as a reason not to become a Christian.
00:24:36.000And so, Shannon, I want to kind of close on a couple ideas.
00:24:40.000You have an amazingly successful career.
00:24:42.000You're able to bring your faith into your career, into companies that are not churches, but still are obviously willing to publish books like this.
00:24:51.000Can you talk about the need for people in their work to talk about their faith?
00:24:55.000And what's your experience about that been?
00:24:57.000Were you a little bit more shy with your faith early on in your career?
00:25:02.000Have you become more bold or has it just been, you know, outspoken all throughout your career?
00:25:07.000I think people who work with me and have known me everywhere I've worked, they clearly know that whether they don't know what to call it, a person of faith or religious or churchgoing person, that's always been front and center for me.
00:25:18.000I also think it's really important to build a relationship with people.
00:25:22.000I think if I talked about Jesus with the Samaritan woman, I don't think you show up and start spouting Bible verses and telling people what they're doing wrong and beating them over the head with that.
00:25:53.000And, you know, what Christ said to that woman was, they don't condemn you, neither do I condemn you, but go and sin no more.
00:25:59.000So I think it's about saying to people that I see you as a human being.
00:26:02.000I'm going to take the time to build a relationship and care about you.
00:26:06.000And if you have questions of faith, I have people come to me and say, I'm having this crisis or someone's sick and I don't know how it works, but I know you pray.
00:26:13.000Will you pray for me or pray for this person?
00:26:16.000And I feel blessed that I'm able to do that.
00:26:19.000And, you know, over the last year, probably have been even more outspoken about my faith because people seemed very much like they were searching.
00:26:27.000I love to post Bible verses or things from a devotional I'm reading.
00:26:30.000And just the feedback from people the last year is I think they're very much hurting and they're searching.
00:26:35.000And they are very much comforted by scripture and drawn to it.
00:26:42.000And I hope that I will be genuine in sharing with people and seeing them as Christ does as people in his image.
00:26:50.000So I asked this question out of Christians, and you can answer it however you want, but every Christian has moments where doubt might not be the right word, but you're less enthusiastic than others.
00:27:02.000I don't know if you've had this experience or not.
00:27:04.000And if you have, how are you able to stop the backslide and get back into gear?
00:27:10.000I think for sure everybody has that at some point in their Christian journey.
00:27:27.000So I was saturated in it all the time.
00:27:29.000And even going off to Liberty University, which as you well know, is a fantastic Christian place to get your education and with wonderful professors.
00:27:40.000But there were times even there that I said, okay, I've heard this and believed this and been involved with this my whole life, but what does it really mean?
00:28:15.000And to me, whether you're going to have a faith in something secular to save you or be the basis of your life, that's a leap of faith as well.
00:28:21.000For me, God has shown up in my darkest, toughest circumstances.
00:28:45.000I want to make sure I get the title exactly right.
00:28:48.000But Shannon, is there anything in particular that we didn't cover that you wanted to touch on in regards to your book or what your any upcoming events you might be doing or things that, you know, promotional around it?
00:29:02.000Yeah, you can get it at foxnews.com slash books or Amazon, any place that you like.
00:29:07.000One little nugget is that we did include study questions.
00:29:12.000And I hope that it takes the reader from these wonderful, amazing stories that need nothing added to them because they are page turners from the pages of the Bible.
00:29:20.000But it gives you a little bit more personalization or maybe how these things can apply to your own life.
00:29:25.000You can do them alone, or I've had people say to me, oh, we've ordered several copies so we can do it as a Bible study over Zoom or however.
00:29:31.000And I love to hear that because I always learn from here from other people as they study too.
00:29:36.000But I hope it'll take things the next step from just like a super interesting, exciting, encouraging story to how it can actually benefit you in your own life through those questions.