Megan Basham - In the Valley of Cancer

Welcome to the Conversations That Matter podcast. I'm your host, John Harris, where we forge a bold Christian vision for America.

Today, it is my privilege to have, for the first time in person, a journalist that has meant a lot to me, who has done a lot of great work in the

Southern Baptist Convention and evangelicalism more broadly. And I've just appreciated so much of what she's done,

Megan Basham. Megan, thank you so much for being willing to talk to me today. Hey, John. Yeah, it's good to finally do this face -to -face.

This is great. Well, I appreciate your work. I felt like when you came on the scene, it was a breath of fresh air.

I know me and a few others were trying to sound the alarm on social justice in the Southern Baptist Convention and evangelicalism.

And your book, Shepherds for Sale, and your articles, especially on the Me Too issue, they really vindicated and exposed the problem.

And I think people see now more clearly because of what you've done, so thank you. Well, thank you, because I always felt a little guilty that you guys had been sounding the alarm so long.

And the alarm got to me and it woke me up, but then I went, now I'm gonna write about it too. And some things took off.

And I always want everyone to know, I'm like, listen, these guys were here doing this work a long time before I showed up.

I'm glad that you've done what you've done and you deserve credit for it. One of the things that I've been impressed with, and I think

I've even said at times, like, hey, Megan, I hope you're not doing too much. Take a break, because you have had, past tense, hopefully, and we're praying, past tense forever, cancer.

Yeah. While exposing these things. Like, literally, your book is sitting on the New York Times bestsellers list and you're going to chemotherapy.

Yeah. And I don't know what that's like. I feel like I would just sort of retreat from public life.

You felt like there was things that needed to be said. But today, I think we're gonna talk a little bit about that personal journey and what the

Lord did in your life, wondering whether you're gonna keep living or how long you have. So, what is that like, being successful and having a lot of people, note,

I mean, New York Times bestseller, that's pretty, that's the top for a book. Yeah. But then, you're wondering, hey, am

I gonna keep living? Yeah, I mean, it was a surreal year in 2024. So, you know, as we kind of discussed here in the opening,

I didn't expect to start writing about these things. I started writing about them because it kind of came into my own house.

I was at a church where we started to notice some things, my husband and I, and went, where's this influence coming from, this unbiblical progressive left -wing?

You know, at the time, I've talked with you about this before, about our children's ministry director sending out an email about talking to our kids about their white privilege.

And so, you know, this was back in like 2018, 2019, and I started to notice things going on. And that was part of why

I ended up at The Daily Wire, because there was a fairly intense battle at World Magazine, which was the

Christian magazine that I was at before. And thankfully, you know, World managed to right the ship.

I mean, they were abused in The New York Times and The Washington Post because they weren't willing to capitulate to sort of these disgruntled, young, woke reporters.

And instead, they ended up leaving and going to Christianity Today and The Dispatch. But in the meantime, that was how

I ended up at Daily Wire. And so it felt at the time like, okay, Lord, you put me providentially in exactly the right place to be able to write about these things without handcuffs.

And the book then did very well that came out of that reporting. And so it was a weird year to go through all of the legal fight and the kind of propaganda war to keep that book from coming out, because you and I have talked privately that a lot went on behind the scenes, a lot of efforts to try to keep the book from being published.

A lot of people worked pretty hard to ensure it would never see the light of day. And I think, you know, God was just so protective of me and the book through that process.

And so then it comes out and it hits The New York Times bestseller list in July, right at the beginning of August.

And a couple of months later, I got a stage three colon cancer diagnosis. What was hard, and it sounds very stupid at this point, but at the time, what was really difficult for me was that I had a lot of what felt like very coordinated attacks and I couldn't do anything.

You know, you're trying to answer them, but to a certain extent, you're like, at the same time that I'm trying to answer these attacks from people like J .D.

Greer, from people like Gavin Ortlin and Neil Shenvey, that was going on and I wanted to answer them.

And I tried to, to the best of my ability, but at the same time, I was doing chemo. I was doing surgery.

I was doing radiation. And so that was difficult because I think

God made me a little bit pugilistic by nature and I wanted to come out swinging and I wanted to fight and I wrote some replies, but it did feel like I couldn't give that the attention that I wanted to give it.

And maybe that was also, in fact, I know, that was also God's design to say, you might be a little hotter than you need to be.

You may be more preoccupied with your own reputation than I want you to be. And I'm gonna put this thing in your life so that you're actually going to depend on me in an entirely new way that you never saw coming.

And you know, not to say that it hasn't been really hard, it has been, but it did also bring some blessings because one of the things

I found when I couldn't be out there fighting back the way that I wanted to be was that some friends stepped up and they shared those arrows.

You, Rosaria, Elisa Childers, other people, Allie Vastucky, who were willing to stand up and support me and support the book.

And I think that, you know, maybe if I had been fighting as hard as I could have been, they might've said, you know, you might've said, and understandably, she's got this, she's handling it.

But instead it was kind of a blessing to be able to sit back and go, wow, Lord, you put a lot of people in my corner in ways that I didn't even realize they were in my corner.

What's it like to sort of stare at your own mortality, being as young as you are with teenage daughters, you wanna be around for them.

And things seem to be going so well, and now it's up in the air. Like, what did that do for you?

Is it, and just to also sort of add to this, I know Ben Sass has been going around talking about, he has terminal cancer.

And do you relate to the way that, like, he seems optimistic. I mean, did you feel the way that he feels or?

No, and in fact, I wanna interview him for that. And I've put in a couple of requests and maybe I'll get somewhere with it because I actually started thinking it feels like watching

Ben Sass, and we are in two somewhat different situations. I did end up, I'm stage four now.

Well, right now I'm nothing and hopefully that will last. Right now I'm no evidence of disease, but they did end up finding a metastatic legion on my lung and they had to take out the right middle lobe of my lung.

That was just in this past February. So, you know, that was a part of it, thinking, okay, we're out of the woods.

Stage three is not good, but I've gone through the treatment and I was declared no evidence of disease. And then on that first scan, they went, oops, we see something growing on your lung.

And so then I was upgraded to stage four. And then the news about Ben Sass came out and it was interesting to me to watch the way that he seems to be processing, granted a different diagnosis, he's terminal.

I still have a lot of hope. And, you know, God can work miracles in Ben Sass' case, but as far as we know, that's gonna be a terminal diagnosis.

Whereas, you know, I am still fighting. I'm still on a curative path, even though, you know, my odds have gotten worse.

But even watching him, I went, it feels like there's something different in how a husband and a father is processing this versus a wife and a mother.

Because he talked so much about, here's what I, the lessons I want my children to learn before I go.

And of course I want my children to learn lessons for me. But for me, it was so much like,

I want them to remember all of this loving and nurturing that they got from me. So I started planning one -on -one trips with each of my daughters.

You know, I took one daughter on a trip and we went out to the West Coast. And I just took my other daughter on a trip to DC because I wanted them to have those memories.

And I myself kept thinking about, I don't wanna miss their weddings. I don't wanna miss seeing grandbabies.

And for Ben Sass, it seemed more like he's thinking about how am I leaving a generational legacy that will live on with my children.

And I think that's just such a picture of how men and women do different things in the family. And I'm hoping

I get an opportunity to ask him about it sometime because I would like to know. And then the other thing is that I felt like he's put on such a brave face.

And I went, man, I didn't do that. From the outset, I've been tearful and afraid and sort of collapsing onto my husband.

And I've wondered too, if that's the difference between men and women, that I think it's been hard for my husband because he's going,

I can't protect you in this. This is something I can't save you from. And he's there for me, but he can't stop the cancer.

Whereas Ben Sass has expressed feeling guilt. If I'm leaving, I'm not here to protect you and to take care of you.

And so I think it's just been an interesting way that you see the creation order playing out through cancer.

And it sounds weird to say, but I have not felt brave at all. And I'm watching him and going,

I need a little more of that courage. But at the same time as a woman, I've been processing,

I only have the Lord to rely on. In any other situation in my life, if I had my dad or some man that I could rely on and say, help, help,

I'm weak, come help me with this problem. And to a certain degree, I still do that, but there's only the

Lord that I can rely on in this. And my husband and I are together going and pleading with him and bringing our case to him and asking for mercy in so many different ways.

But at the end of the day, you realize, Lord, this is up to you.

And there's nothing that we can do here temporarily that can change your decision.

And you know what's going to happen with me. And so we know that prayer works and we know that he will work through that prayer, but I don't know how to describe it other than just going, it's been an odd thing to go, wherever I go with this, no one goes with me but the

Lord. It sounds like you deepened your dependency and your relationship with the

Lord. I mean, did you see, have you seen differences in your life as your prayer life become more impactful for you and deep as your spiritual,

I don't know, people do different things fast or whatever, but when things are going well, oftentimes you don't look up as much, so.

Yeah, and I think my prayer life has become a lot more intense. And when we first found out,

I, as you might expect, had a lot of trouble sleeping and I would just put on sermons, a lot of MacArthur sermons, and I would just fall asleep to them because that was the only way that I knew how to get some sleep.

And I ended up, and I don't have it on me, I should read it to you, but I ended up texting

John MacArthur and that was just such a huge blessing in my life that one of the men who was probably more than any other well -known pastor, the father of my faith, that I ended up getting to know him in real life was just sort of this insane blessing.

And then when I was going through all this, I just, I texted him and I said, grace to you has always meant so much to me, but it's never meant more to me than it has in this season because suddenly those devotionals and my

Bible study and my prayer life, all of those were so much more important, but I was flipping to the grace to you app so often for all of it because it's just such a nice, neat, tidy package where you can get it all right there.

But he texted me back and said, this may be the most meaningful text I've ever received.

And that was just huge to me to go, wow, what a huge blessing that I had that. So, I mean, that is part of how

I processed it because you just feel like I got nothing but you Lord. And this is a means of grace through which

I'm getting the teaching and the prayer. And thank you for this technology that I'm able to rely on it.

Wow, what a blessing. I didn't even know he did text. This is breaking news right here. John MacArthur knew how to use his cell phone.

And so this was what, 2024 we're talking, I think? So 2024, at the end of 2024 was my diagnosis.

2025, that was pretty much the whole year was spent getting cancer treatment because I was diagnosed in November of 2024.

And so then you start doing all the scans and the meetings with the doctors and getting your first and second opinions.

And so then 2025 was cancer treatment. End of 2025 was the unfortunate upgrade to stage four.

And there was a lot of time that was not well spent that in fact,

Brian, my husband became a little alarmed and went, okay, what are you doing here? Like I became really obsessed with statistics.

Like I wanted to know all the cancer statistics. Someone had given me a book. This is terrible, but I'm just gonna admit it about that book from John Piper, Don't Waste Your Cancer.

And I'm gonna preface this by saying, I didn't read the book. So this is not a review of the book. But the reason

I didn't read it was so, like, I'm not proud of this. It was petty, but it was like, I became obsessed with cancer statistics.

And then I looked up what kind of cancer John Piper had and what the statistics were for that cancer.

And I went, I don't wanna read this book. He wasn't facing terrible odds. I'm not gonna read.

And that was awful. And my husband was going, babe, you are doing the thing. He taught, cause he did look, pick it up.

And he went, you are becoming obsessed with statistics. And I did things like in these online

Facebook cancer groups, I would look for somebody who a few years ago had my same diagnosis. And then

I would try to find out if they were still alive. And I spent, you know, a couple months with this very unhealthy habit.

And my husband was the one that went, you're not allowed to go in the cancer groups anymore. I'm sure they're helpful for some people, but the way you're using them,

I don't feel like is good for your emotional and spiritual health. And he was right.

So, you know, eventually I had to, through prayer and through Bible study, come to the realization that I was using that as a way to try to control my situation.

Like if I could come up with a configuration of statistics that made me feel good, then that was how

I was controlling it in a positive way. Or if I was seeking out these stories of people who had my cancer, who had died and who were not doing well, then like that was somehow going to be my story.

And, you know, Brian had to challenge me with that and go, what is it you think you're accomplishing with this time?

And is it fruitful? And that can make you, I mean, if you find out the people you're looking up didn't make it, then you're worse off than you were before.

It wasn't healthy. Yeah, you know, the Lord, obviously we're not supposed to trust in chariots and horses.

It's easier said than done sometimes. And if you're in a situation, whether it's cancer or a near death situation where you don't know if you're going to make it, and I haven't been there where you're sitting as far as cancer is, but I have been in situations where I wasn't sure what was going to happen to me.

And it was, I didn't know if I was going to get in a bad, I've been in a few car accidents. And in that moment, they say the life flashes before your eyes.

But does that happen with cancer too? Because where it's not, you're not in an emergency situation, but you get the diagnosis and then it's like, do you look back and do regrets flood you?

Do you start having, I don't know, second thoughts about life and what you should be doing?

And do doubts creep in about, okay, if I do die, am I really going to go to heaven? Do I really believe this?

Like, talk about that a little. I don't know that I have had any, and maybe it was my salvation story being as sort of extreme as it was.

And we've talked about that before, you know, serious prodigal story. And for that reason,

I don't think I've ever doubted what happens, you know, if this doesn't turn out well, and I have a long, slow road of saying goodbye to my loved ones, you know,

I've never doubted that I will go to heaven, but I, you know, I've been afraid of, will

I finish well? You know, will I show something to my children in that process that would make them doubt?

You know, you worry about that. I don't want to do that. And yeah, you absolutely have regrets. You're like, how much time have I spent on Twitter in the last few years that you're suddenly reevaluating whether that was well -invested time.

Yeah, absolutely, you do that. And you kind of give that to the Lord too. You go, you know, okay, Father, you saw that, you knew this was coming, and you're going to redeem this time that I have left, whether it's a lot of time or a little time, in the same way that you redeemed that wasted time.

Because, you know, there were a lot of years that I went, gosh, I squandered my youth in fast living, let's put it that way.

And yet you took that and you blessed me with a husband and two beautiful children.

And it wasn't like you said, okay, because you sinned before you came to me,

I'm now not going to bless your future. That wasn't what the Lord did. He's so gracious. And I don't think he's going to do that with cancer either.

So that, you know, you have trust that, I don't feel right now like I could handle that, if that comes.

But I also know I don't have to feel like I could handle it because I won't have to, because the grace is going to be sufficient when

I get to that point, if I get to that point and I hope that I don't. Yeah, well, your faith comes out in this, a very strong faith, very trusting the

Lord is going to bring you through it. I don't know if you know this, if I've told you this, my mom was diagnosed with stiff person syndrome a few years ago, which it's not cancer, but it's a degenerative disease that eventually will kill you.

And they don't know how long it takes to get to that point. And so for my family, that was kind of a hard thing to wonder, is mom going to be around in the next few years?

What's going to happen? And the Lord has been so gracious that the medication has been able to slow it down and she's able to know her granddaughters.

And, but it definitely recalibrates, even for those who don't have the cancer, your own vision on life.

Like it's not the, I don't know if it's the house of mourning that Ecclesiastes talks about. I feel like that's more of a funeral, but you do start to wonder, like if I only have a short amount of time with this person,

I want to make the most of it. And so I really think it's great that you not only got closer to the

Lord, but you got closer to your daughters by taking, it sounds like, so you went on trips with each one individually?

Correct. Oh, okay. So you didn't want to do them together. You wanted to do... Well, we did that too. We've done some family trips together and we're planning some others, but yeah,

I just felt like you, it sounds dumb, but like when there was a day of snow here this winter and we get like one day, cause it's

Charlotte and it's North Carolina. And when we got that one day of snow, normally I would be like,

I don't want to be out there in the barely two inches of snow that's kind of slush trying to slide down a hill.

And yet I'm watching my kids. I'm like, if I'm not here two years from now, I want them to remember this day and remember me with them.

And so in a weird way, it does bless you in the sense that you're like, I'm going to get up and I'm going to go out there and I'm going to not be lazy because I don't know if I'll have this opportunity again.

So I'm going to go sled in the two inches of snow with my kids. And so it sounds strange, but when you compare it to somebody who loses their life in a car accident, there is something kind about the fact that if this is going to take my life,

I've had time to think about those things and to go, here are the things that I want my kids to remember about me and here's the kind of memories that I want them to remember us having.

So in a weird way, you're kind of grateful for that sort of thing. Yes, it can be a blessing. Yes. Yeah. You've heard that Tim McGraw song, probably

Live Like You Were Dying. Yes. Yeah, it's one of my dad's favorites. I didn't really want to do that literally, but. Yeah, well, that's from a guy's perspective.

Like it's time to go parachuting and bull riding. Right. And I don't know, I've heard that song and wondered, like, would

I do that? I don't know. Like if you get the diagnosis, but I think the Lord gives a grace in each season.

He knows what you need in that moment. And it sounds like he gave you exactly what you needed. He gave you encouragement, friends.

He gave you his word, obviously. John MacArthur texting you. I mean, these are all things that now, now that you're, and we pray out of the woods for good, but.

Yeah, and a piece I didn't think I was capable of. Yeah, we'll talk about that. Like that was strange because I, I'm not like a hypochondriac, but I've always been like nervous of serious illness.

And I've always up to this point, I've been blessed with really good health. So I always imagined, and I had lost my aunt and my grandmother who

I never met, both of them died of a different, they both died of ovarian cancer. And so it's not like I had never thought about cancer before it happened to me.

In fact, I thought about it a lot. And I always assumed that if it happened to me, I would be a basket case.

I would be one of the people tempted to curse God. And I didn't think

I would handle it well. And in a lot of ways I didn't, but at the same time, God brought peace to me that I didn't think was possible.

Like I thought I would live in it every second. If I had a diagnosis like this, I thought

I will not be able to enjoy life. I won't be able to work or do anything. I'll just sit around thinking about cancer.

And amazingly that has not been the case. Did you have any optimism in this? I know there's obviously not wanting to, like Paul said, he doesn't want to leave behind those who he loves, but it's better to be with the

Lord. Did you have any of that where it's like, okay, Lord, if this is the way it's going to go, I'm at peace with it now that I get to see you and I'm looking forward to it.

I would not say that I am like that. I'm still very much like, I want to stay here,

Lord, and I want to see my grandbabies. And so it's more the peace that I have had has been more like just a gracious ability to not worry about it and not think about it.

And I don't know if I'd call it optimism because I'm still very aware that, look, I've had some tough test results.

I've had some tough phone calls with my doctors that I didn't want to have. So it's not like a

Pollyanna thing, or I just assumed that the worst couldn't happen because at this point I'm very aware that the worst could happen, but it's almost like I'm better able to live in the here and now than I was before.

I don't cast out into the future as much because I just,

I don't know, I've learned better how to rest and you've got the future, Lord, whatever that is, I don't need to worry about it.

And if it's a difficult road, you'll be there in that, but you are giving me the ability right now, which is very strange for me, not to dwell on it.

And I am a ruminator and I tend to, people might've noticed, I tend to get a little obsessed with topics and I did do that through cancer.

Yes, but I feel like at some point, God brought me to a place where, after I went through the obsessive period where Brian had to go, okay, put the computer down, we're not gonna do this anymore.

I felt a freedom that is unusual for my personality where I went, I'm just not worrying about it.

Yeah, that's such a blessing that you're able to go through it. And I know that in doing this, you've also wanted to be a witness to others, which you're so public about it, which to me,

I respect that a great deal because this is not just your story, it's God's story. It'd be natural to want to kind of crawl up into a shell, but you do want people to know what the

Lord has done in your life. So I know you have this piece coming out on Sunday in what magazine or publication?

Hopefully it comes out. It's supposed to be in the Washington Post. I think they're gonna run it this Sunday. Which is, that's amazing.

What do you want people to take away from that? What's the takeaway for those who are, maybe they don't know Christ, or I don't know if you have a different message for Christians, non -Christians?

Well, it was funny that you brought up Ben Sasse because in his 60 Minutes interview, he used the same

R .C. Sproul quote that I used in this piece, which I just want to say, I wrote the piece and I might actually tweak the ending.

So by the time people see this interview and read it, it may be a different ending. But originally I used the same

R .C. Sproul quote that he did about no stray molecules. There's not a molecule that is outside of God's control, which means there is not a single cancer cell that God's like, oops, that one got away from me.

And there is definitely a confidence that you rest in there that there is no part of my story that God's not in control of.

And that means that every single part of it is for my good. And that's hard to hear. Cause you're like, how is this cancer for my good

Lord? But you know, already you see it pruning character defects that I didn't know I had.

You know, I didn't know that I would spiral the way that I did until it happened. And God pruned some things through that.

And there's this, you hate to say it, but it is true that he disciplines those he loves and these difficult things in our lives can be a means of discipline.

And certainly I have seen some things like that in my life. And so it was funny when I saw

Ben Sass using, I'm like, ah, he is the same R .C. Sproul quote I did. But at the same time, it makes sense that both of us would be clinging to it.

So that wasn't coordinated. It wasn't coordinated. No, and I didn't plagiarize him. I wrote the article a long, long time ago.

But I think that probably the reason we both chose it is because there's so much comfort in that and knowing, you know, even these little cancer cells that for whatever reason,

Lord, they didn't get the message to, you know, to die. And that's the problem with cancer is that the cells continue to divide and they don't die like they should.

And God is allowing those cells to do that too. He's allowing those molecules to do that too.

And the comfort of providence is almost the only thing you can cling to in cancer because it feels like so much is out of your control.

And so you rest in the fact it's not out of your control, Lord. Amen. Yeah, I was talking to someone the other day who went through a great trial, was mad at God.

And then she said, but where else am I gonna run? There is nowhere else. And you're fortunate in God's providence to have a great husband who is pointing you back to truth.

And to be surrounded by people who are reinforcing the truth and, you know, he's been at work.

So thank you for sharing. I know it's kind of a vulnerable thing, but I think it will help people who are going through something similar.

I know they're out there. There's a lot of people that are going through this. More so, I don't know if it's, not to get on another vein, but when

I was a kid, I don't remember this many people having cancer. I feel like I hear it from younger people all the time. And they need hope though.

Yeah, and you're not imagining that. Rates of colorectal cancer for young people have skyrocketed.

I just saw a statistic recently that if you were born in 1990, you are like five times,

I think, more likely to get colon cancer than someone who was born in 1950. So something's happening and we do need to talk about that.

But in the meantime, yeah, I think this should be a thing that should, as you said, like going into the house of mourning caused people to reflect on the mortality because one of the other strange gifts of cancer is that if you are someone who finds yourself in that situation, you get the time to think about your eternal destiny.

And so, you know, I hope anyone out there who's watching this, who is in a similar situation or might later, or know someone or listen, it could happen to you any day now.

I mean, I never in a million years expected to be in this position, but that's the moment that you should go.

Today is the day that He's calling you. So don't ignore that call. Yeah, and for those who might've stumbled onto this video and you don't know

Christ, it's actually very simple. You need to turn from your sin and put your faith in His finished work.

He came to this earth, lived a perfect life, died on the cross for your sin to satisfy the punishment, the wrath of God that was in store for you.

He took that and He promises that those who trust in Him will be forgiven of their sin and will have the

Holy Spirit. And Christ is not someone who doesn't understand. He went through all the kinds of things and worse trials that we can't imagine yet without sin and chose to do it because He loves us.

So put your faith in Him today and thanks for watching. Thank you, Megan. Yeah, amen. Thanks for having me. God bless.