Starstruck

Have you ever seen a shooting star? I don't know about you, but it is really exciting for me to get this rare treat. I was thinking about shooting stars this morning and what a gift from God they really are. First of all, I went to www.nasa.gov and here is what they say about shooting stars:

Despite what their name suggests, "shooting stars" are not stars at all; they are meteors. Meteors are produced when bits of cometary or asteroidal debris in space, usually between the size of a sand grain and a pebble, enter the Earth's atmosphere and burn up, creating a brief — usually white — streak of light.

To me this is God's way of showing us He loves us. These spectacular light shows are created from a space rock the size of a grain of sand, or at most a pebble! I was wondering how a particle the size of a grain of sand produce such a beautiful sight, so I looked to NASA for my answer. NASA says that the reason the particle lights up the way it does is due to the speed at which the meteoroid enters the earth's atmosphere -- 60-70 kilometers per second. Just to give you some perspective, the space shuttle moves around the earth at about 8 kilometers per second. NASA also states:

Air friction heats the meteoroid so that it glows and creates a shining trail of gases and melted meteoroid particles. The gases include vaporized meteoroid material and atmospheric gases that heat up when the meteoroid passes through the atmosphere. Most meteors glow for about a second.

To me that is a miracle designed to keep us mindful of the Creator of the Universe. I took my thought process one step further. Shooting stars are really meteors right? Well, meteors come in different sizes. Here is what NASA says again:

The size of meteorites varies greatly. Most of them are relatively small. The largest meteorite ever found weighs about 66 short tons (60 metric tons). It fell at Hoba West, a farm near Grootfontein, Namibia. However, much larger bodies, such as asteroids and comets, can also strike the earth and become meteorites.

Meteorites reach the earth's surface because they are the right size to travel through the atmosphere. If they are too small, they will disintegrate in the atmosphere. If they are too large, they may explode before reaching the earth's surface. One such object exploded about 6 miles (10 kilometers) above the Tunguska River in Siberia in 1908, leaving a 20-mile (32-kilometer) area of felled and scorched trees.

I think that we can see God's protection and intentional design by studying Meteorites. Hollywood has capitalized on people's fear by making movies that suggest that a meteorite could destroy the earth. But God has protected us. He protects us from comets and asteroids. He designed the earth's atmosphere to also protect us. God is such a loving God. I t is so hard to understand how people can choose not to believe in Him when it is easy to see the Creator in His Creation.