It is not an insignificant point that Gandalf had the Ring of Fire. I strongly suspect that without it he would have failed against the Balrog. Gandalf was the last of the Istari to arrive in ME and yet Cirdan, who did not apparently know before-hand that they were coming nor how many or even why they came, did not give the ring to any of the earlier arrivers, including the theoretical leader. That he gave the ring to Gandalf is, I think, another of those "hand of fate" moments; he was given the ring specifically because he would have failed without it.
On the physical level we know that a Balrog's body is hot. Certainly too hot for Gandalf's mortal body to withstand without any sort of armour. Surely Narya was what allowed him to physically approach the Balrog close enough to even try to fight it because, as we know, he was not its equal on the "magical" level: the first contact between them was on that level and left Gandalf visibly very shaken despite being only a momentary thing.
As to Gandalf the White; who knows? Certainly he was not Sauron's equal even without the One. Otherwise, why bother with the Quest and all? Why not simply grab a Palantir and directly overthrow Sauron? A lot of people would not have had to die.
So I think that Narya was another of those things that happen "by chance, as we say in Middle Earth".
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