Moving My Asteroid

This a picture of the small asteroid that collided with the Earth's atmosphere last February over Russia.  It was a pretty small one, about 55 feet, but the explosion delivered 500 kilotons of energy, shattered glass in buildings, and injured over 1000 people.  There have been much larger asteroids that have collided with our planet and have done much more damage - leveling mountains, changing climates, and wiping out the dinosaurs.  I don't think we would ever want a large asteroid to collide with our planet.  That would be bad.

Fortunately, we live in time when very smart people are able to locate objects and estimate whether or not they could collide with the Earth. These scientists are devising ways to avoid the cataclysm the impact of a large, Near-Earth Object would create.

Having earned my degree in space geology and astrophysics from Hollywood,  I had always assumed that the best way to stop an asteroid from destroying our planet was to simply wait until it got close by and then launch Bruce Willis on a rocket to blow it up with a nuclear bomb.  But many scientists at NASA's Near Earth Object Program say that's probably not the best idea.  Blowing up a big asteroid would create many small asteroids to deal with (and we've just experienced the damage even a tiny, off-course asteroid can do.)

It turns out that one of the best ways to deal with a large, near-earth object heading for catastrophe is to simply nudge it over time from its current trajectory.

Because of their enormous mass, size and velocity, large objects can be unstable and quite often, they are fragile.  They must be gingerly, slowly, steadily nudged into a safe trajectory to avoid the damage that breaking them would do.  It can take years to do this.

There are many large asteroids and comets in my life and they are all on various trajectories - some good, some not so good.  These are my Near-Heart Objects.  Some of those objects are outside of me but within my sphere of influence are my family, my workplace, my neighborhood, my church, my government.  Some asteroids are within me and when they are off course, they send me onto destructive paths of behaviors and thoughts.

Out of His goodness and love for me, when I am off course, sometimes God breaks me into pieces.  He blows me out of the sky.  That big, off-track asteroid inside of me gets shattered and I crash to Earth.  Sometimes that's what required to get my soul back on the right trajectory.

I've found that much more often than not, God's Spirit chooses to simply nudge me slowly and gently over time.  He whispers to me softly and subtly and it moves me.  And before I know or even realize it, I am in a better place - solid, whole, and at full velocity.

There are many Near-Heart Objects in our lives, all moving through time and space on different trajectories.  I pray God's Spirit gives us the discernment to know which ones are off course and how to lovingly move them onto the path back toward Him.