The Reality of Mortality
What Steve Jobs and Jesus Teach Us About Death
“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.”
Steve Jobs
In the days since the sudden passing of Senator Lindsey Graham, I have continued thinking about the sobering clarity death provides as it interrupts our routines and reminds us that the time we assume we have is never guaranteed.
During his 2005 commencement address at Stanford University, Steve Jobs described the awareness of his mortality as one of the most important tools he used when making significant decisions. Remembering that he would eventually die, he explained, caused external expectations, pride, embarrassment, and fear of failure to lose their power. Death helped him distinguish what truly mattered from everything merely pretending to matter.
Many of the fears controlling our lives depend on the illusion that we have something permanent to protect. We protect our image because we assume there will always be another audience. We protect our comfort because we imagine the conditions of our lives will remain stable. We protect ourselves from failure by acting as though avoiding embarrassment is more important than becoming who we were created to be.
But death exposes the fragility of all of it.
The approval we worked so hard to earn will eventually fade. The image we carefully maintained will belong to someone’s memory. The opportunities we postponed will expire. The life we kept on promising ourselves we would begin someday will reach its final day.
Unlike Jobs, Jesus does not tell us to follow our hearts. He tells us to follow Him. But perhaps the gap between those ideas isn’t as wide as it first appears. The longer we walk with Jesus, the more He reshapes what we want. He doesn’t simply give us new instructions; He gives us new affections. Over time, following Him transforms our hearts until what He desires increasingly becomes what we desire.
In one of the great paradoxes of the Christian life, Jesus says,
“Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
Here Jesus, like Steve Jobs, is warning us against making self-preservation the organizing principle of our lives.
We can become so committed to protecting ourselves that we never fully obey God.
We believe God is calling us to create, lead, serve, reconcile, confront, or change, but we delay because obedience threatens something we have worked hard to preserve.
Our reputation.
Our routine.
Our relationships.
None of those fears are imaginary. Obedience can be costly. Following Jesus does not guarantee that everything will work out according to our preferences. The cross itself reminds us that faithfulness and comfort are not the same thing.
But Jesus invites us to consider another possibility.
What if the life we are so desperately trying to protect is the very life we are losing?
What if avoiding failure has also prevented fruitfulness?
What if the greater risk is not attempting what God has placed before us, but reaching the end of our lives having never attempted it at all?
This is where the awareness of death can become a spiritual gift. It does not have to drive us into despair, but it can deliver us from distraction.
Remembering that we will die does not mean that nothing matters.
It means we can finally recognize what matters most.
What I’m Reading:
Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump by Maggie Haberman & Jonathan Swan
This book captures the first year of Trump’s second presidency. I’m only a third of the way, and it’s already made my list of top books for 2026.
What I’m Listening To:
I’ve been watching a few author interviews on Oprah’s podcast as part of the research process for something I’m working on. More on that later.
What KS Is Up To:
This past Sunday, we continued our summer series, KS at the Movies, which is our attempt to copy Jesus’ illustrative genius by using movies as modern-day parables.
The Week 3 message was based on the movie Creed II. I’ll post a link to our church’s podcast, which is now on Substack as well, so you can check out the recap.
The Week 4 message will be based on the movie Inside Out 2, which explores how aging introduces new emotions.