Who Guards the Planet?

A recent article in Time magazine (June 9, 2014) was entitled “The Man Who Guards the Planet.” It was about an astronomer, Don Yeomans, who tracks asteroids, calculating how close they’ll come to earth and trying to devise methods to deflect those that are big enough and close enough to cause damage.  They have very sophisticated equipment, constantly monitoring deep space. In 2013, they were all very proud of their knowledge of a huge asteroid, “about the size of a small office building,” that was coming close to earth, “below the altitude of some of our highest-flying satellites.” But because of their equipment, they knew it would miss, and they were bragging about their superiority over their universe.

As they were watching, and congratulating one another on their cleverness, a totally different meteorite, completely undetected, entered earth’s atmosphere at around 40,000 miles per hour (almost 60 times the speed of sound) and exploded in the air over Chelyabinsk, Russia. There was a blinding flash, a hot cloud of dust and gas, and a powerful shock wave. Thousands of buildings in six cities were damaged by the shock wave and about 1500 people were injured, mostly from

debris from the damaged buildings.
The shock wave wasn’t just felt in Russia. It reverberated through the scientific community. Here was all this modern equipment designed for only one purpose—to detect and possibly deflect any large piece of space debris that might damage earth. And yet this large asteroid snuck in behind the sun and blew up in their faces. “That was humbling,” Yeomans says, “and instructive.”

[22:65] Do you not see that GOD has committed in your service everything on earth? The ships run in the ocean by His command. He prevents the heavenly bodies from crashing onto the earth, except in accordance with His command. GOD is Most Kind towards the people, Most Merciful.

[57:4] He is the One who created the heavens and the earth in six days, then assumed all authority. He knows everything that enters into the earth, and everything that comes out of it, and everything that comes down from the sky, and everything that climbs into it. He is with you wherever you may be. GOD is Seer of everything you do.

[4:132] To GOD belongs everything in the heavens and the earth, and GOD is the only Protector.

God is the only Protector. Yeomans and all of NASA may devote their lives to watching for asteroids. Millions of dollars may be spent on plans to deflect or destroy those that seem to be a threat. But God is the only Protector. In 1912 men built a huge ship that they boasted was unsinkable, yet on its maiden voyage Titanic went to the bottom of the sea. When we challenge God, He lets us know who’s in charge.

[10:66] Absolutely, to GOD belongs everyone in the heavens and everyone on earth. Those who set up idols beside GOD are really following nothing. They only think that they are following something. They only guess.

Beginning in 1961, the Russians and the Americans sent up hundreds of men in space, orbiting the earth, landing on the moon. And then beginning twenty years later, we sent up over 20 space shuttle missions, to run experiments in space, deploy satellites, make space walks, and then to return to earth, land safely and fly again. We felt invincible. We couldn’t be stopped. So in the most publicized of all the shuttle missions, with teacher Christa McAuliffe aboard, a small O-ring problem caused the space shuttle Challenger to explode one minute into flight.

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