Welcome back to Pomoja Podcast, a ministry of
Life of Christ International Ministries. Pomoja
means together, and that's exactly what this
space is about. The place where stronger lives
are built, faith is strengthened, hearts are
encouraged, and Christ -centered homes are shaped
through ordinary conversations. that become extraordinary
encounters with God's truth. One conversation,
one story, one revelation at a time. Thank you
for joining me for another powerful conversation.
In our last conversation, we walked together
through the lives of some of the greatest marriages
recorded in scripture. We looked at Adam and
Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob
and Rachel, Elkanah and Hannah, Hosea and Gomer,
and finally Joseph and Mary. Their stories were
all different. They lived in different generations.
They faced different struggles. They carried
different assignments from God. Yet they all
had one thing in common. Every one of those marriages
passed through the fire. And somehow, every one
of those homes became warm. By the end of our
conversation, we arrived at a simple but profound
conclusion. Warmth is not the absence of fire.
Warmth is the testimony of a fire that has been
surrendered to God. But that conclusion leaves
us with another question. In fact, I believe
it may be the most important question of this
entire series. Why? Why would a loving father
allow the fire in the first place? If God is
all -powerful, couldn't He prevent every misunderstanding?
Couldn't He remove every disappointment? Couldn't
He spare us the financial pressures, the waiting
seasons, the painful conversations, and the difficult
moments that every marriage eventually faces?
Of course He could. So why doesn't He, if marriage
was His idea? Why did he design it in such a
way that every couple must eventually walk through
the fire? That question stayed with me for a
long time. And over the years, I believe the
Lord has slowly been teaching me something that
completely changed the way I understand not only
marriage, but his work in our lives. I came to
realize that God never wastes the fire. One of
the greatest misconceptions many of us have is
believing that God's highest priority is to make
our lives comfortable. It isn't. God certainly
cares about us. He delights in blessing his children,
but comfort has never been his highest goal.
Transformation is. When you begin reading scripture
with that understanding, something remarkable
happens. You start seeing the same pattern over
and over again. When God called Abraham, his
ultimate purpose wasn't simply to give him a
son. God was forming the father of faith. When
he called Moses, he wasn't only delivering Israel
from Egypt. He was transforming a shepherd into
a leader who would carry the presence of God.
When he chose David, He wasn't merely preparing
a king for Israel, he was shaping a man after
his own heart. Throughout the Bible, God consistently
shows that he is more concerned with who we are
becoming. than with what we are receiving. The
same principle applies to marriage. Marriage
was never designed simply to make us happy. It
was designed to make us holy. It is one of God's
greatest instruments for shaping our character,
maturing our hearts, and teaching us to love
as Christ loves His Church. Perhaps that is why
the fire becomes necessary. There are some things
God simply cannot produce through comfort alone.
Patience, humility, self -control, forgiveness,
faithfulness, kindness, long -suffering, grace.
Those qualities are not developed when everything
is easy. They are formed when we choose to surrender
ourselves to God in the middle of difficult seasons.
Think about Jesus himself. The writer of Hebrews
tells us that although he was a son, he learned
obedience through what he suffered. Pause and
think about that for a moment. If the perfect
son of God entered the school of suffering, why
would we expect his followers to graduate without
ever entering the classroom? The fire is not
God's way of punishing his children. It is his
way of preparing them. The fire is not evidence
that God has abandoned us. Very often it is evidence
that he is actively working within us. And perhaps
that is why my father never described the flames
in his story. He never talked about the smoke.
He never talked about the struggle of keeping
the fire alive. He simply said the house was
warm. Because once the fire has accomplished
its purpose, What remains is no longer pain.
What remains is warmth, peace, security, maturity,
rest. A home where two people have learned not
merely to live together, but to grow together.
But this raises another important question. If
God uses fire to transform us, does that mean
every fire comes from Him? Or is there a difference
between the fires the enemy ignites and the fires
God allows? That distinction is essential because
the Bible never treats every trial the same way.
Learning to recognize the difference will change
the way you understand suffering, conflict, and
even the difficult seasons in your own marriage.
And that's exactly where we're going next. There
is something I've come to appreciate about God.
Long before he ever spoke about marriage, he
had already established one of his greatest principles
in creation itself. If you pay attention to the
world around you, you'll begin to notice it everywhere.
Everything that carries great value passes through
fire. That isn't just true spiritually, it's
true throughout creation. Think about gold. Gold
doesn't become valuable because of the fire.
It was already valuable. The fire simply removes
everything that doesn't belong. Every impurity
rises to the surface until only the pure gold
remains. The greater the purity, the clearer
the reflection. The fire doesn't create the gold,
it reveals it. The same is true of clay. A potter
may carefully shape a beautiful vessel with his
own hands, but before it enters the furnace,
It remains fragile. It can easily collapse. It
can easily be broken. It cannot yet fulfill the
purpose for which it was created. Only after
passing through the fire does it become strong
enough to carry what the potter intended it to
carry. Even bread follows the same pattern. Before
it enters the oven, everything is already there.
The flour, the water, the yeast, the oil, every
ingredient is present. But no one can be nourished
until the dough passes through the heat. The
oven doesn't ruin the bread, it completes it.
And then there is steel. Steel is heated, folded,
hammered, and refined over and over again. Not
because the blacksmith despises the metal, but
because he sees something the raw steel cannot
yet become on its own. He sees a bridge, a foundation,
a tool, something strong enough to carry tremendous
weight. The strength was always possible. The
fire made it visible. Now let me ask you a question.
If God has woven this principle into everything
He created, why would marriage be any different?
Why would we expect the most sacred covenant
between two people to become strong without passing
through the very process that strengthens everything
else God has made? I think that's where many
of our disappointments begin. We expect commitment
without being tested, unity without sacrifice,
intimacy without vulnerability, patience without
waiting, strength without resistance. Yet throughout
the Bible, God has never worked that way. When
I began reading the scripture with that perspective,
I realized this pattern was there all along.
Abraham's faith passed through the fire of waiting.
Joseph's character passed through the fire of
betrayal. Moses' leadership passed through the
fire of the wilderness. David's calling passed
through the fire of rejection. Peter's courage
passed through the fire of failure. Even our
Lord Jesus Christ entered the fire of suffering
before the glory of the resurrection. That is
not a coincidence. It is God's pattern. He is
not only interested in where He is taking us,
He is deeply interested in who we become on the
journey. And perhaps that's why my father's story
never focused on the flames. He never described
how difficult it was to keep the fire burning.
He never spoke about the smoke or the exhaustion.
He simply said, the house was warm. Now I understand
why. The warmth was never accidental. It was
the evidence that someone had endured the process.
Someone had refused to walk away when things
became difficult. Someone had chosen covenant
over convenience. The warmth wasn't the miracle.
The transformed husband was. The transformed
wife was. The transformed marriage was. That
was the miracle. But before we go any further,
There is another truth we must understand. Not
every fire serves the same purpose. Some fires
consume, others purify. Some are ignited by the
enemy, others are allowed by God. From the outside
they can look remarkably similar, but their purpose
could not be more different. And learning to
discern the difference may completely change
the way you understand every trial that enters
your home. There is something else we must understand.
Not every fire has the same source. Not every
trial has the same purpose. And not every difficult
season should be interpreted the same way. From
the outside, two fires may look identical. Both
produce heat. Both bring pressure. Both can leave
us exhausted. Both can bring us to our knees.
Yet one fire is designed to destroy. The other
is designed to transform. If we fail to recognize
the difference, we may spend our lives resisting
the very work God is trying to accomplish, or
worse, embracing the very thing the enemy is
using to destroy us. That is why discernment
matters. Jesus leaves no confusion about the
enemy's purpose. In John chapter 10, he says,
The thief comes only to steal, to kill, and to
destroy. Notice those three words, steal, kill,
destroy. There is nothing redemptive about Satan's
intentions. He never sends a trial to make you
more like Christ. He never attacks your marriage
to strengthen it. His purpose is always destruction.
He looks for cracks in the foundation. A conversation
that ends unresolved. A disappointment that is
never processed. An offense that quietly becomes
bitterness. A prayer that slowly disappears.
He rarely begins with dramatic destruction. He
begins with small compromises, small wounds,
small lies, small distances. Then he patiently
waits for them to grow. That is how he works.
His fire feeds pride instead of humility. It
feeds resentment instead of forgiveness. It feeds
suspicion instead of trust. It feeds isolation
instead of unity. His goal is always the same,
to separate what God has joined together. God's
fire is completely different. When God allows
fire, He is never trying to destroy His children.
He is revealing, refining, and restoring them.
Peter writes that our faith is more precious
than gold which perishes though refined by fire.
James tells us to consider it pure joy whenever
you face trials of many kinds because the testing
of your faith produces perseverance. Notice the
language. Peter doesn't say the fire destroys
faith. He says it proves it. James doesn't say
the trial weakens faith. He says it develops
endurance. God's fire always produces something
the enemy's fire never can. Greater faith. Deeper
humility. Stronger character. A heart that trusts
Him more than before. Then Malachi gives us one
of the most beautiful pictures in all of scripture.
He describes God as a refiner of silver. A refiner
doesn't light the fire and walk away. He sits
beside it. He watches it carefully. He controls
the temperature. He knows exactly how much heat
the silver can endure. And he removes it at precisely
the right moment. Our Heavenly Father does the
same. He never abandons his children in the fire.
He watches, he guides, he strengthens, he comforts,
he refines. The enemy's fire is reckless. God's
fire is purposeful. The enemy burns to erase
the image of God. God burns until the image of
Christ begins to appear. The same heat, completely
different purpose. When I look back over my own
marriage, I realized there were seasons I asked
God to extinguish the fire. Now I thank Him for
what He accomplished through it. Not because
the pain was enjoyable, but because the God who
met us in the fire refused to let the fire have
the final word. That is the difference. The enemy
hopes the fire will end your story. God uses
the fire to write a better chapter. Once I understood
that, Another truth became impossible to ignore.
God wasn't using marriage primarily to change
my circumstances. He was using marriage to change
me. And perhaps that is one of the greatest purposes
of covenant. Not simply to find the right person,
but to become the person God is calling you to
be. As we come to the end of today's conversation,
I hope you're beginning to see the fire differently.
Perhaps you've spent years asking God to remove
the fire. Maybe today he's inviting you to understand
it instead. We've discovered that God never wastes
the fire. We've seen that throughout creation,
everything of great value passes through a process
of refinement. Gold, clay, bread, steel. They
all remind us that God often uses pressure to
prepare what he intends to use. And finally,
we've learned something every believer must understand.
Not every fire comes from the same source. The
enemy burns to destroy. God refines to transform.
One seeks to separate. The other seeks to sanctify.
The same heat, completely different purpose.
So if you find yourself walking through a difficult
season today, don't ask only, Lord, when will
this end? Ask another question as well. Lord,
what are you producing in me that could never
be produced any other way? You may discover that
the fire you wanted God to extinguish is becoming
the very place where He is shaping your faith,
your character, and your marriage. Remember,
God never wastes the fire. But our journey through
the house in the middle of the forest is not
over. In our next conversation, we're going to
make this deeply personal. We'll move beyond
understanding the fire and begin looking at what
the fire actually reveals inside us. We'll discover
that marriage is far more than two people learning
to live together. It is one of God's greatest
classrooms, a place where pride is confronted,
where forgiveness is learned, where character
is refined, and where two imperfect people are
gradually transformed into the image of Christ.
We'll also confront one of the greatest misconceptions
many couples carry, that every difficult season
means their marriage is failing. What if the
opposite is true? What if the pressure is evidence
that God is still working? And what if the greatest
miracle isn't that your marriage avoids the fire,
but that you don't come out of it the same person
who went in? We'll answer those questions next
time. Until then, remember this, the warmth in
the house is never the absence of fire. It is
the testimony of a fire that has been surrendered
to God. God bless you, and I'll see you in our
next conversation.