We Are All Familiar Today With NEOs....Near-Earth Objects

               In February of 2013....in Chelyabinsk, Russia.... a meteor....15 to 18 meters in length....appeared unannounced....a surprise....and caused an explosion....the reports of which went all around the world. There is a good bit of video available on this if you are interested. It was the largest meteor strike since the famous 1908....Tunguska Event....also in Russia. Only the day before....NBC Nightly News reported on an asteroid that passed by the earth.....this asteroid was expected and announced beforehand.
              In the  book of Revelation....evangelicals have always talked about what are known as the....Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse....from chapter six....and the first four....seals....but the seventh seal....beginning in chapter eight....introduces the....seven trumpets. In the first three trumpets we see....hail and fire....hurled to earth....and then a great mountain....burning with fire....hurled into the sea....and then a great star....burning like a torch.
               Over the past five or so decades....as  biblical prophecy began to be studied in earnest....when evangelicals would come to the trumpets of Revelation....there wasn't much they....(we)....could do except to speculate with a fair amount of confidence that these things hurled on the earth were meteors and asteroids of some sort. It was obvious to us....and in retrospect....it appears that we were correct.
               Today.....NEOs.....Near-Earth Objects....are in the news fairly often. In September of 2022....NASA completed an experiment where they sent a spacecraft to slam into an asteroid....close enough to earth to do this....but not near enough to be a concern of a direct hit. To be more specific....this asteroid was given a name....Didymos....and it was a binary asteroid....in that it had a smaller moon with it. The NASA spacecraft hit the asteroid's moon as planned....and the effects were recorded as best as could be done. There is another spacecraft....this time from Europe....that is scheduled to meet the binary asteroid sometime in November....just to see exactly how much damage or change was done to the asteroid from the first collision. All this of course is part of the efforts to determine if an asteroid on the course of a direct hit....can be be deflected.
                We have a sixth armed forces group today that is called.....Space Force....and part of their responsibility will be to follow-up and implement these experiments....in possibly protecting the earth from asteroid and comet and meteor hits.
                This whole issue gets complicated a little more in that in 2004 a huge asteroid....(450 meters by 170 meters)....was discovered.....that will fly very close to earth on April 13 of 2029. The asteroid was eventually given the name of Apophis....the Greek god....the "uncreator....an evil serpent that dwelled in the eternal darkness."
                One particular scientist....(his theory has not been accepted)....made a lot of news by saying that the accepted calculations of....Pi....are slightly incorrect....and that with the real calculations applied to Apophis....there might very well be a direct hit on the earth in 2029.
                 Either way....whether Apophis is a threat to earth or not....we know that asteroids can appear out of nowhere....giving little warning if they would be headed to earth. Chelyabinsk was an example of that....and an asteroid like Apophis....as you can see from the above....is much bigger....and would cause much more damage....particularly depending on where it would hit on the earth.
                 So....what can learn from all of this? If I might segue a little here....sixty years ago evangelicals repeated and memorized Scripture about an end-times....mark on the hand....where you could not buy or sell without it....a chip if you will....and they were laughed at....but today that chip is more than a theory.....but a fact....being developed as you read this!
                 It's the same with asteroids. Sixty years ago we just theorized that Revelation was pointing to asteroids of some sort....but today....with all the research being done on NEOs....we all should be able to understand that a literal interpretation of Revelation chapter eight is entirely possible!