Tempered by Fire (Story)

Of late, the sad news of the New Mexico/Colorado fires crosses all streams of media. There are literally hundreds of homes destroyed and thousands of people now homeless...

Yesterday, I found a website (Samaritan's Purse) with story and pictures of the recovery efforts already underway.

There was a photo in their story, though, of a woman holding up an intact ceramic figurine that survived the fire when there was nothing but ash and charred remains around her.

Yet on her face, there is this smile as she presents what she found.

This brought to mind another story, which I would like to share with my readers now. This was a story I heard on the radio back in 2009.

Tempered by Fire

A firefighter was going through a house that was completely destroyed by fire. Sifting through the warm ash, his fingers found these white ceramic figurines.

All it took was lightly dusting the ash from them, and they shown bright and beautiful, practically the same as the day they arrived at the house.

Everything else was gone. 

Moved by what was found, he asked the homeowner if he could keep one.

Surprised and still in shock over all she had lost... the homeowner mutely nodded her assent.

A few days later, that firefighter was speaking with some of his friends who were going through a very difficult period in their life. One had lost a job, the other ill, their roof leaked and the bills just kept piling up.....

The firefighter pulled the white ceramic figurine from his pocket and held it up for them to see. He explained how he came to find it. Then, he explained why it meant so much to him. 

"This was tempered in fire before it was ever brought into that house. While everything else in that house was destroyed by that terrible fire, these survived.

"If they hadn't gone through the fire first, they would have been destroyed."

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Sometimes we need to go through touch times to become strong enough for even greater challenges in life that would otherwise destroy us completely.

-ESA