Life's Change Agent

Ed Stetzer post: Remarkable Thoughts on Death from Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs died a few hours ago.

His impact is hard to overstate-- his genius and inventions are ubiquitous. Earlier today, I blogged on tech tools I use-- and Steve Jobs impacts my life every day. Steve Jobs literally changed the world.
Yet, he was more than an inventor. He was also a public figure-- and few people have lived in the public eye like Steve. For that matter, few people have, well, slowly declined in public view.

Watching his health over the last few years reminds us of our own mortality-- and Steve thought that death was a good thing for all of us to consider.

Steve Jobs faced death and, unlike some public figures, he spoke of it. Here is what Steve said in 2005 at the Stanford commencement address:

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.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Worthwhile words.

It is a biblical thing to see life a fleeting (Psalm 89:47).

I do not know Steve's spiritual condition, but I do know that each of us must live in the light of eternity. Steve died today. I could be tomorrow. May I live my life in light of that reality-- that life is fleeting AND that eternal life is a gift to all that have been made new in Christ.

"You don't even know what tomorrow will bring--what your life will be! For you are a bit of smoke that appears for a little while, then vanishes" (James 4:14, HCSB).

Indeed.