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I think we all know that family can be one of the most complicated things that we deal with in our lives. But I think we also know that things that take hard work and commitment and difficult conversations are often the most beautiful things in our lives. And we have two really special guests with us today, Chris and Julie Bennett, who have a brand new book called Fighting for Family, The Relentless Pursuit of Building Belonging.
They have served in church ministry together. Chris is pastoring a church in Malibu. Julie is a cancer survivor, a writer, a speaker. They are authors. And they are joining us to talk about their brand new book. Great to have you guys.
Thank you, Shannon. So happy to be with you. Such an honor. So fun. Listen, your story is amazing and you're very gracious to share it, warts and all, because I think the transparency is what always really helps people because we look around and see families that look perfect and maybe you're in a season of being single and you want a family or a spouse and
And you talk about all those things in the book about the purpose and where we are now and finding family. I love the idea of chosen family and the people who come into our lives. And all of us, I hope, can count friends who feel like family to us. But you really start out by sharing your story.
and an amazing adventurous but frightening season. You uproot everything you knew, left, moved to a new city and in short order find out not only Julie that you've got cancer but then we're into COVID and you didn't have that infrastructure that you had back at home. So tell us about walking those steps.
Yeah, it was quite an adventure. We found ourselves being this really adventurous family of six. And then very quickly, we had to choose to be a really brave one. So, you know, we write about in the book, but...
Leaving Oklahoma where we pastored a church for almost a decade to move to Los Angeles and all the stories that led us there. We found out the house that we had sold that we were going to live off the cell and rest for six months. We found very quickly that about two weeks in that they decided not to buy our house. But now we're with four kids in Los Angeles and with now no place to live and no money and a stage three breast cancer situation.
And I needed to start chemo immediately. And we just had to make a decision. And we chose to stay. We knew I found out I had cancer in L.A. instead of Oklahoma for a reason, which is another story. And that journey of perseverance and really learning the things that even as pastors we
And leaders like we get to practice everything we ever preached, you know, do we really throw heard, you know, and even sometimes when people think you're crazy, like making choices out of obedience is really difficult, but it was really,
Um, it was one of those, the paradox of it was the greatest gift, what we walked through and the very hardest thing we've ever done. Um, but it shaped us as a family and yeah. So, and then that quickly led to after 20 moves and six and a half, seven months while I did chemo, we finally got a home and then I was in remission for about a year. And then as soon as the world was shutting down with COVID, my cancer came back with a vengeance and then we were on another journey.
And you've got four precious kids with the two of you in the middle of this. And, you know, you mentioned not getting that diagnosis in Oklahoma as one of the first things that you kind of
We're thinking through in this tough conversation that you guys are having saying, you know, maybe we wouldn't have moved if we knew that I was going to have cancer and need treatment and all of these things. And there were a lot of people who wanted you to come home and let them take care of you. And you talk about how your family had to have tough conversations. You had to make commitments and believe that God had led you there for a reason and to fight through really difficult things. I mean, every family is going to face this kind of stuff at some point.
but to face the level of serious challenges that you had all at one time, for a lot of people, Chris, would feel like we would buckle under the weight of that. Well, I think faith is an interesting thing because the essence of faith is that we're putting our trust in something and someone that we usually can't see. And God will speak things to us. He'll invite us into things. I used to always tell our church in Oklahoma,
you know, if God invites you into something, say yes before you know how. And that sounds great in a sermon soundbite, but when you're trying to walk out a life of faith, you know, what we found was God would give us just enough to keep going. And Shannon, I remember a month into our move before cancer, before the 20 moves, we were so excited, new city. We're going to, you know, use media as this platform to be a champion for family. And this guy texted me from Oklahoma that I barely knew. And he tracked my number down and,
And he said, hey, I felt that I was supposed to reach out to you. And God woke me up at 4 a.m. this morning to pray for your family. And he said, what I felt God say was that it's your faith that led you to L.A., but it's your trust that's going to keep you there. And he said, God's going to give you incremental clarity along the way so that you learn to trust him. And I remember that thinking, well, that's great. And then when everything started coming against us in the natural, all we could go back and say, OK, God,
we feel a little bit crazy, but we believe as best we know how we are stepping out to do the thing you asked us to do. And every time we'd come to an impasse, some encouragement, some level of provision, something would be like God saying, I'm with you. I'm going to take care of you. And, you know, on the cover of our book, it's this mountain and kind of the intro of our book, we describe family being like this mountain and I've never climbed a mountain. We've
you know, hike and do things like that. But, you know, if you are climbing Everest, that summit is so overwhelming, but there's base camps along the way and the base camps exist so that you can go to that place to rest, to acclimate so that you can go to the next place. And I think that's what our faith journey is about is we don't compare our journeys. We just say, this was the journey we were on. Yeah. People thought we were crazy. And there were times we thought we were crazy, to be honest. And I think that's how people have related to the story is that,
We all, it may not be as extreme, you know, it may be a decision of should I put my kids in homeschool or should I take them out? I mean, all these decisions that feel risky, but we have to ask that question again.
in our own stories, in our own heart, no matter what it is, because there's not a formula of, is God who he says he is? And that was the defining moment for us. There's a lot of voices and there's wisdom. We've got to seek counsel and all of those things. I'm not saying that, but it was...
God, those Joshua four moments where the memorial stones were put down of the remembering who God was for us along the way. And we might not know what the outcome is, but we're going to make a decision based on how God's directing us and leading us through lots of different signs and remembering that he promises that he'll stay with us. We don't know what it's going to look like, but he promises he'll never leave us. And that was an anchor for us.
Yeah, it's so true. I have shared in my book and in, you know, different things speaking as well that the darkest moment of my life where I really, really thought I cannot go another day.
What I heard from God, not audibly, but in my spirit was, I will be with you. Not, I'm taking all of this away from you and everything's going to be fine. It was just that I will be with you. And that was enough to just put another foot in front of the other and just keep going. And what better promise could we have? Because we have no idea what our circumstances are going to be. But if we can have the certainty that he's with us, what a beautiful gift and a promise. So powerful. Yeah.
There's this passage in the book of Galatians where Paul is talking and he said, when I came to you, I showed you the very marks of Jesus. He was basically saying, there's suffering I went through and his scars were the things that gave him his authority. And I think sometimes even as Christians, we're
trying to hide these parts of our story because of shame or pain. And that's part of why we wrote this book is to help people work through. We've all been hurt by someone or something that was meant to be family to us. But, you know, when we embrace the process of healing, whatever that journey looks like, the scars become the place that we actually have a voice. And what we found is because our story is
marked by lots of ups and downs, lots of pain, betrayal and sickness and financial challenges. And you don't get perseverance through prayer or the laying on of hands. You get perseverance through suffering and pain, even things that maybe weren't even from God. He will use those in our life. And so we've had families and couples and people that have reached out to us that know our story. And the
because what God has done in our marriage, you know, we found it to be true that when God heals something, it's not cliche to say that it's stronger than it was before. It's the same way a bone when it heals is, you know, supposedly like 20% stronger when it's healed. And we found that in every relationship. And we said fighting for family because we live in a culture war where people are fighting with their families. You know, there's so much division, so much isolation, so
And people forming tribes and camps and we're saying, all right, there's got to be a way that we can learn to fight for relationship, for community, for belonging, because I think it's the thing that God hardwired us for.
Yeah, and you guys have very practical information. You talk about betrayal, about forgiveness, tips on working through those things, but I love that the chapters also have kind of an assignment, many of them, about writing down ideas, responses, working through things. And one of the things that you advise people to do is create a family mission statement. How does one tackle that and what should it include?
Yeah, so good. I mean, and I think the mission statement is to keep you as a reminder when it is hard of like, who are we? What are we after? You know, our mission statement that we I mean, when our kids were teeny now our kids are 2018, 15 and 12, which is hard to believe. But we have the same mission statement. It's on a chalkboard. I'm looking at it right now. It was in our old house, you know, right above our kitchen table.
But we would just say, what are the things we care about? What are the values to us? And it was a shared conversation where our kids, we would literally have a piece of paper. I would say, all right, what are some values we care about and this and this and this? And then we just formed it into a statement. I mean, businesses do it all the time to keep people in alignment. Well, why wouldn't we do that in the place that matters the most with which is at home? And so I think it's a fun activity, whether it's your roommates or
you know, people that you're doing life with to say, hey, like, who do we want to be? What's kind of like our purpose of why are we, what's our why every day? And so our statement is we are a joyful family. We love Jesus. We serve each other and we honor everyone. And we do it perfectly. It's truly amazing. Yeah.
Which is what you're here to tell us. Right, exactly. We have mastered this thing. Everyone's like, I'm bored. Don't read it. No, yeah, there's no perfect family. No, but it's that those journeys along the way with the kids. I mean, we used to like do it in a wrap or sometimes the kids are rolling their eyes and now we get older and they don't, they won't do it in a wrap anymore. But it's those moments where like, we're actually doing the opposite of these things, but this is who we want to be. So instead of feeling like,
We suck. We're shameful. You know, all the things that can come in, you know, fighting for family, whether again, that's as a single or in your workplace or on, you know, you're trying to coach your kids, school team, whatever that is, is we're going, wait, what is the mission statement for me in life?
life or in this moment. And I'm, I'm reminded not out of condemnation. Um, but this is who I want to be. And it's just been something we've come back to every time. It's like, we also have a tool. We have these quirks. Every time we open a bottle of wine or do something we're celebrating. Um, of course you can do that with lots of other things, but, um, coffee tea, like we take something and we put it in a jar and it's what are the things we're celebrating, like what we're doing. And we will revisit those things when it's really hard.
That's a great idea. This reminder is almost a faithfulness and provision in the past.
I think about how, you know, I've been reading a lot in the Psalms lately where David, you know, is lamenting, but remembering what God did for him in the past. It's easy when you are in a cancer diagnosis or a house sale that's fallen apart or COVID or any number of things that people are going to face. It's hard in that moment. And what a strengthening to be able to go back and remember those positive things that have happened in those good memories. Yeah.
You talk about all these different places where we can have sort of family or community, whether it's workplace or, you know, girlfriends, guy friends, chosen family, all of those things. And I think it's great that you validate and talk about how important those are. We know that people are in a crisis of loneliness.
And certainly COVID just poured gasoline on that fire. A lot of people feel very disconnected and lonely. And you talk about finding connection. It doesn't have to be your blood relative to be family. Talk us through that about how important those relationships are. Yeah, for sure. I remember as we were kind of
doing prep for the book and research and finding it was a book. I think it's called only America, but it talks about how 40% Americans say they have zero to one confidant. And I think the illusion of this generation is that we are so connected. We can do things like this, which are amazing. We can connect on FaceTime. We can connect through Instagram, but it's for many people, a false sense of connection. And, you know, the U S surgeon general released this 85 page document last May that said there, you know, this is titled our epidemic prevention.
of loneliness and isolation and to your point covet accentuated what was already there and i remember the first few weeks of lockdown and that video going viral i think it was in italy in these high-rise apartments and the windows were flung open and people are singing across the way you know this song in solidarity and you're just going okay nobody thrives alone and so then you go well
How do you help people overcome that? Because especially, you know, one sociologist said, you know, family is the place you get hurt the most. But the interesting part is family and community is the place you get healed from the pain that you experienced in that context. So when we get wounded in family life,
Our flesh wants to isolate and isolation perpetuates our pain. So then we say, well, how do you actually build belonging? And so in the book, we try and really help people remove the barriers. I mean, forgiveness is a big one. But this idea of belonging is a really key one.
And, you know, Shannon, we have a mutual friend that it was her that we sat down with three years ago during COVID. She was single at the time and we had three of our other single friends over and we just said, OK, we've been together since 19. We've been married since 21. What does family look like for you as a single? Because sometimes we can elevate marriage and kind of that context of family is like, well, that's the highest level. And then you go, well, that's not a lot of people's story. Well, what do you do if that's not yours?
And something that our friend said was belonging is not just something that you find. Belonging is something that you bring. And so we kind of talk about if you believe you belong, you can bring that wherever you are. That could look like inviting a neighbor over for dinner, texting a friend and say, hey, can we grab coffee? And you know what? It takes a lot of courage to do, especially if you're afraid of rejection or you've experienced that in the past. But we think it's possible. We'll have more Live in the Bream in a moment.
This is Jimmy Fallon inviting you to join me for Fox Across America, where we'll discuss every single one of the Democrats' dumb ideas. Just kidding. It's only a three-hour show. Listen live at noon Eastern or get the podcast at foxacrossamerica.com.
Again, we're talking to Chris and Julie Bennett. Their new book is Fighting for Family: The Relentless Pursuit of Building Belonging. Okay, so on the other side of this, there's the conversation too that you guys address about boundaries. And I think all of us at some point in our life realize we need some of those with certain relationships or situations. How do we make good judgments about that? And how do we go about actually instituting boundaries?
I'm going to let Jules tag on in the back end, but I'll say if we, you know, for me as a follower of Jesus and for Julie, we look at him as God.
What's his lifestyle? What's the model? And Jesus was no doubt busy. No doubt there were demands on him. But there was such a high value that he found in one in solitude. But Jesus actually had boundaries. He had boundaries in his life because he knew boundaries were important, where it's like he would escape to lonely places when the crowd was gathering and trying to find him to go get with his father, to get strengthened, to get filled up, I think, to even get envisioned.
And so that he could go and do the work he was called to do. And so I think the idea sometimes is that, you know, out of humility, out of servitude, we're going to lay our lives down for people. And there's a right part of that. But it cannot be at the expense of our own health or I would say even our own families.
And so I think for us, boundaries has been, okay, we have to establish clear priorities. Having been in pastoral ministry for a long time, I've seen so many families that have been broken up because they've seen parents that were more committed to the ministry or the church than they were their own kids. And I think we're
we learned some of this the hard way because we've always tried to have a open door policy. We've had, you know, singles live with us over the years and we kind of look back and go, you know, the heart was good. There was good fruit that came from it, but we didn't have good boundaries that guarded our time in our marriage. We didn't fight for our time in the way we needed to. And I think there was a season where our kids didn't get our best because we didn't have the proper boundaries. So I think,
determining priorities and then really whether it's with your spouse, your roommate or a trusted person having kind of an agreement of, OK, what are we going to give ourselves to in this season? What are the things we're going to say yes to? And then that helps us know what to say no to. I mean, you know, family is has become like the costliest and most overused word in relationships, you know, and it comes chock full of meaning. And we think about building family
I don't have much more to say without a really long story from what Chris said, but I realized so many of my boundaries just in relationships, even in my own marriage, was I was excited.
expecting me from other people. And I actually had a lack of speaking of boundaries, I had a lack of boundaries of knowing how to relate to people at times, because I was so caught up in my own way that I functioned, and I dealt with conflict, a conflict and how I wanted to. And so there was a lot of pain. And sometimes a trail of hurt, whether that was towards myself or towards others, because I didn't understand that
I can't expect everyone to act and be like me. I mean, can you imagine? I think Jesus was the perfect model of that walking with 12 disciples. Can you imagine how different and you got the extrovert, you got the one that's a little bit annoying and his jokes were, you know, went way too far. And this disciple did this. And I thought it really is this picture of there's the ability to like separate ourselves and regroup, but also come to people in relationships and the boundaries of how we relate to one another by seeking to understand before being understood. We have, um,
Things as a family that we practice imperfectly. Anyway, we write about it in the book. But yeah, sometimes it's understanding ourselves so that we can create those boundaries. Sometimes it's like I share in the book, sexual abuse. How do I have boundaries in forgiveness but not being in relationship with people? That's a big one too.
Absolutely. And it's all in the book. It's like tons of practical information that's really helpful. Not just talking through the issues, but really some meat on the bones ways to
To tackle some of these things, so quickly before we go, I want to give folks, if you will humor me, at least one good tip for elevating family dinner nights so we can actually connect. This is something that everybody who eats dinner and has kids and has a million projects or whatever your home scenario is, if you got folks around the table, you want to make sure they actually connect in some way. Can you give us a tip?
Yeah, let's say, Jules, you get the tip. The one thing we found was that, you know, up until the 1950s, the dining table was the centerpiece of the American home. It was the place of vulnerability. TVs came out, TV dinners came out, and then families started gathering around the TV instead of the table. And so we're actually starting something called FAMDA table dinners where we're trying to bring families back together one table at a time.
But there's some very practical things that we encourage people to do when they are around the table. And again, this could be in your home with your actual children, spouse. It could be roommates or it could be neighbors. Yeah, well, I'm not going to read all of the goals that we have in the book. But one thing is believing the best about each other, even when we're at our worst. So even at the end of the day, we're coming around the table or you may be your community group or it may be even a table of strangers. We're like, we have different political views and these things.
So believing, seeing the best. We talk about honor without stumbling over who people are not, even those closest celebrating, excuse me, who they are without stumbling over who they're not. That's really important, even as we're intentionally asking questions at the table. So sure, we can ask someone like, what was the best part about your day? But we like to take it a step further and ask questions, play games around the table with our family. Without your phone. Without your phone. Exactly. Ah.
And it's like, no, don't tuck it under your leg, son. Go put it in the box. We all have to do this so that we can really be present. And we ask questions how we get to know each other better. So we have games that we use that have been – we didn't reinvent the wheel on that. Questions about how well do you know mom? And so how well do you know dad? So fun things like that. One thing I know we're probably running out, but we do something called the honor, the guest of honor. And so we have a guest over. We'll go around.
And just say, let's go around and share one thing of gold we see in this person. And I'm telling you, every time it is tears because everybody needs to be reminded of who they are.
They do. That's so powerful. And some of us, you feel awkward sometimes if you're not used to being sort of the center of attention, but everybody really needs that cheerleading and encouraging that they're seen and they're valued. So I love that you do that. And there's so much other practical information in this book, Fighting for Family by Chris and Julie Bennett. Folks can find out more about you, your ministry, get help, fightingforfamily.org. You guys want to give us some social media or other places to check out what you're doing too? Yeah.
Yeah, if you want to follow us on social media, Instagram's our main thing. We're also on Facebook, but Julie Bennett underscore and then at Chris Bennett 143. And we love when people send us DMs. There's also an email where you can connect with us specifically. We love to hear your stories. We love to respond and just remind you that there is hope for you where you're at with your family more than ever. God is on your side and we believe in you.
Well, God bless you guys, your ministry, your willingness to share your story and connect and help other people find these connections, overcoming loneliness and building stronger, healthier families. Chris and Julie Bennett, thank you for joining us on Live in the Brain. Thank you, Sienna. Thank you, Sienna. Appreciate you. Listen ad-free with the Fox News Podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. And Amazon Prime members can listen to this show ad-free on the Amazon Music app.
Hi, everybody. It's Brian Kilmeade. I want you to join me weekdays at 9 a.m. East as we break down the biggest stories of the day with some of the biggest newsmakers and, of course, what you think. Listen live or get the podcast now at BrianKilmeadeShow.com.