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Danae Dobson and her famous dad

Photo courtesy of Focus on the Family

For more than a quarter century, Dr. James Dobson has dispensed advice on child rearing and Christian living to families across America. Through radio, magazines, best-selling books, and an array of multimedia resources, Dobson's Focus on the Family ministry has reached tens of millions of parents and children. But what evidence is there that his advice actually works?

Danae Dobson has a ready answer for that question: If the proof is in the pudding, then she and her younger brother, Ryan, are the pudding. And two of the main ingredients include their unwavering faith in God and their faithfulness to the scriptural principles that guided their parents in rearing them.

Now Danae Dobson is passing her family's legacy on to another generation. Since age 12, she has produced more than 20 children's book, and last year Tyndale published her first title aimed at teenage girls—Let's Talk! Good Stuff for Girlfriends About God, Guys, and Growing Up. The book has prompted several invitations to speak to teen girls, and Danae's 2004 calendar quickly filled up with engagements at churches and events sponsored by ministries like Virtuous Reality and Living Out Loud.

"If you try to build your self-confidence through boys, good looks, or hot bodies, you're never going to be satisfied," she tells her young audiences. "Long-term fulfillment is not something that you can buy at the mall or achieve through a thin body; it's about who you are as a child of God."

Through conversations with teens and her own research, Danae determined that the three main pressures girls face are boys and dating, eating disorders and body image, and conflicts with parents. It's a list that's nearly identical to what other Christian researchers have discovered.

	James and Shirley Dobson insisted on family devotions and prayer, something that Danae appreciates even more today.

As a result, Danae came to the conclusion that God wanted her to focus her speaking on issues of self-esteem and finding one's identity in Christ. "Everybody wants to be popular," she says, "so naturally kids want to buy the cool clothes, use the lingo other kids are using, go to the 'right' movies, listen to the 'right' music, and all those things relating to pop culture. All of this is okay, as long as it doesn't contradict their Christian faith and commitment. They need to have the courage to take a stand for what they believe."

Taking a stand is something both Danae and Ryan have learned to do well. Throughout Danae's and Ryan's childhood and adolescence, James and Shirley Dobson insisted on having family devotions on Saturday mornings, something Danae "wasn't always in favor of" as she got older and wanted to go out and do things with her friends.

Today she appreciates their commitment to that activity, one she credits with giving her the strength to continue to resist the myriad pressures of living in a postmodern culture. In the talks she gives to parents and grandparents—she also has a speaking ministry to adult women—she emphasizes the value of family devotions, of reading the Bible and other books, praying together, and talking things out.

Danae, who is thirtysomething and single, lives in southern California but travels extensively as part of her ministry. Last June, she journeyed to Kenya, where she worked on a video project for World Gospel Mission and spoke to the students at a Christian girls school. At the end of the presentation, Danae gave the students an opportunity to accept Christ, and out of the 250 girls in the room, 50 hands went up. "It was an amazing experience," she says. "When that happened, I knew that was the main reason why I was there."

Whatever else the Dobsons did as a family, it all worked together to bear healthy fruit in their offspring. For the daughter of such a well-known and at times controversial father, Danae lists few drawbacks to living in the limelight. Her Sunday school teachers may have scrutinized her a bit more, a few college classmates may have whispered her father's name as she walked by, and a couple of potential boyfriends may have acted somewhat guarded the first time they met her dad, but the advantages of "growing up Dobson"—which, coincidentally, is the title of a book she and Ryan are co-writing—have far outweighed the disadvantages.

"My father is the most down-to-earth person," she says. "Whenever I've introduced a guy to my dad, he always makes them feel comfortable. There's no interrogation, no 20 questions."

Lest anyone think her parents were perfect, though, Danae quickly points out that Jim and Shirley Dobson are the first to admit that they are not. "The important thing is that they prayed themselves through the task that God had given them and always tried to do what was in our best interest," she says. "I think they did a remarkable job."

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