Thoughts on the Life and Death of Steve Jobs

Computer and hand-held technology genius Steve Jobs has died a comparatively young man at 56. Few entrepreneurs leave such a massive legacy.

Jobs was born to an unwed mother and adopted by working class parents. They saw that he went to college only for him to drop out. In a Stanford University commencement address in 2005, he explained it this way. “After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK.”

The rest is tangled, sometimes tortured, but electrifying personal history. By age 20, Jobs had teamed up with a friend to design computers. By 30, they had made Macintosh and Mac household words and were employing 4,000 people. When Apple fired him from his own company, Jobs became involved with Pixar and Next. He sold Pixar to Disney, and Next was so successful that it was eventually bought by Apple, and his work came full circle. Jobs became the guru of computer and personal electronic technology with the iPod and iTunes, the iPhone and the iPad. For a time, his company was at the top of global profitability.

But his life took another sudden down turn when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. His Stanford speech revealed new discoveries. “When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: ‘If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.’ It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.”

Jobs went on to remind the graduates that death is the fate of all of us and that they should live life to its fullest potential. “Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything—all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure—these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Without particularly knowing it, Jobs was expressing the highest truths of Christian lives lived for God.

He was a visionary who shepherded the world to greener pastures of communications. Spiritual vision provides even more. In the old King James Version, Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.” Without a unique word from God, the people are running wild.

He had the nakedness of death right. “… naked I came from my mother’s womb, And naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; Blessed be the name of the Lord.” (Job 1:21)

Steve Jobs leaves a legacy of triumph from tragedy. He said getting fired from Apple was the best thing that happened to him since he was free to explore and innovate. His attitude reflects a biblical principle of the Christian life, one that the Apostle Paul saw from a prison cell. “But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel, so that it has become evident to the whole palace guard and to all the rest, that my chains are in Christ; and most of the brethren in the Lord, having become confident in my chains are much more bold to speak the word without fear.” (Philippians 1:12-14)

And one more thing, as Jobs would say. Jobs’ unwed mother gave him up for adoption rather than aborting him. His adoptive parents received a call in the middle of the night that a newborn needed a home. They encouraged his interest in computers and saved money to send him to college, the final wish of his young mother just before she signed the final papers. Can we even imagine the world’s loss if she had aborted that tiny life within her?

Steve Jobs’ amazing story of only 56 genius-packed years and the legacy he left behind affirms the wisdom of Moses, tutoring his nation on a wilderness journey. “I call heaven and earth as witnesses this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and you descendants may live.” (Deuteronomy 30:19)

Dave Virkler