Is Your Marriage FIREPROOF?

I am a latecomer to the FIREPROOF movie hype. I have been burned too many times by other movies and gimmicks that claim to represent Christian this or that. So I was suspicious that FIREPROOF wouldn’t be all that. I was wrong.

My wife Lynn and I saw the movie earlier this week and we both liked it a lot. I would highly recommend it for anyone looking for a good date night. It has good action for the guys, good relationship stuff for the ladies, with some goofy fun mixed in as well.

All the while, the film weaves excellent truths about life, marriage, and even God into the story. The messages are natural and appropriate as opposed to some “Christian movies” where it feels forced and the story seems strained.

The folks that made FIREPROOF are the same group from Albany, Georgia that put out Facing the Giants. For Facing the Giants, they spent around $100,000 and the movie brought in about $10 million!

In FIREPROOF they spent more and have continued to grow as movie makers. They also secured Kirk Cameron to play the lead role of Caleb Holt, a Captain in Albany’s Fire Department. While it doesn’t compare to a multimillion dollar production, it is very well done—you feel like you are at a real movie.

Since the setting is south Georgia, everyone talks right too! The characters greet one another with a big “Hey, how are you doin’?” The main lady gets sweet tea with lemon to drink. And when she was sick, her husband brought her Chick-fil-A Chicken noodle soup. All that felt right in a movie!

As a pastor, I appreciated the way they handled the severity of problems in a marriage heading to divorce. Typical movies don’t spend too much time on angry husbands because they don’t feel respected or wives that feel rejected because the guy indulges in internet porn. The film didn’t sugar coat the advances of another man at her workplace either. These are major problems I see a lot and FIREPROOF handles them appropriately.

The right solutions to these real problems were also included within the story. One big point that was made is that love is not primarily a feeling. Try getting that one through a typical Hollywood film!

Don’t misunderstand; love does indeed involve feelings, but lasting love is not based on feelings. Feelings come and go. If your marriage is based on floods of romance, you’ve got a good two years before your foundations begins to crack up underneath of you.

The Bible emphasizes that real love chooses to put the needs of someone else above your own. Love is a verb—it is doing things more than it is feeling things.

Think about the love chapter in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13. Almost every verse in that short Bible chapter adds to the description of love. The kinds of things mentioned, however, are not candles and soft music, long walks at sunset, or kissing by the fireplace. In fact, there is nothing said about feelings at all.

Now most people I have ever heard talk about that chapter get the point or the passage wrong. It is not written to be a sweet description the bliss of godly love. Paul’s first letter to the church at Corinth addresses more problems than virtually any church in the Bible. Chapter

13 is a giant rebuke to this church of self-focused rascals who would rather showboat their spiritual gifts than serve others in the church family.

With that major qualification, 1 Corinthians 13 still has much to teach us about the meaning and importance of real love. Consider some of the actions words given to describe love.

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).

Where are the emotions in that description? Let me assure you that if you do those sorts of things the right kinds of feelings will follow. If you just follow your feelings, however, there is no guarantee that you’ll be doing those sorts of things! Which will prove to be lasting love?

The opposite of God’s kind of love is not hate. Look at the section of 1 Corinthians 13 again; do you see what love’s opposite really is? It is selfishness. Marriage can’t be all about you and work long term.

The greatest example of love in history is the work of Jesus on behalf of sinners on the cross. “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you” (John 15:13,14). “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

While, I’m sure Jesus’ heart was warm with compassion for sinners like you and me while he was suffocating on the cross, there was nothing about what he did that felt good. In addition to the excruciating physical pain, Jesus was enduring the wrath of God that sinners rightly deserve. It was like Jesus went to hell while he was ON THE CROSS.

He was making possible the meeting of your ultimate need—forgiveness for your sins. When you are most honest you will admit that you have not always worshiped God like you should have. Other things or relationships have captured your heart as higher priorities. Whenever anything (physical things, like a new house, or even concepts like controlling things or getting the approval of others) takes the place of God in our lives, it is idolatry and sinful.

God doesn’t tolerate rival gods set up in the corners of your heart. He made you. He has the right to have your heart’s real love and worship.

He will judge his creatures that fail to prioritize him throughout their lives. But he loves you and made a way to forgive you.

God’s love wasn’t about sentimental or romantic feelings. He sent Jesus to live perfectly and then suffer and die as a substitute for sinners.

That is real love! He calls on you to lay down your idols and receive him who loves you the best.

Entrusting your life to Jesus will reorient you from being self-focused to being God-centered. That will change your life, including your marriage. Learning to look away from ourselves towards God will help us look to the needs of others around us as well, namely our spouses. Jesus now calls Christians to treat others out of the overflow of how we have been treated by him.

“By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers” (1 John 3:16). And Christian husbands know the standard of love which we are called to. “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25).

Obviously, FIREPROOF isn’t designed to address these issues to that kind of depth, but it does a very nice job showing some of these principles in action. If you are not experiencing this kind of love in your marriage, I would highly recommend the movie to show you what it could look like. There is no magic pill—this kind of love is hard work.

Start with the Lord. Ask for his help. Ask him to show you if there are idols that have captured your priorities. Ask him for forgiveness based on the loving cross of Christ. Then ask him to start to make you the husband or wife you should be.

One more thing, don’t be afraid to ask for help from other mature Christians, like your pastor. A good marriage is hard work. God gave us wonderful resources to help us through it. Don’t be too selfish to take advantage of these gifts.