A fallen hero
Dear Friends,
Steve Jobs, the co-founder and former CEO of Apple, was a hero to millions. He’s the man who gave us the iPod and the iPhone, not to mention Apple computers. Some just loved the way his products looked and worked. Others admired his business acumen, taking Apple briefly to be the largest corporation in the world. For some he even had a quasi-messianic status. And now he is dead.
Reading obituaries is often a revealing exercise, and so it proved to be with him as several unpleasant truths emerged. There was a child whose paternity he had consistently denied until forced to do admit it. When he returned to Apple as CEO after some time away he cancelled the company’s corporate responsibility programmes. He was, by many accounts, something of a tyrant to work for. He was a genius, yet a flawed one; a hero, yet a fallen one.
As Christians, we should not be surprised to find such creative genius in sinful human beings. Our doctrine of creation and common grace teaches us that great good still persists, even in a fallen world – something for which we should praise and give thanks to God. And it reminds us never to put our trust totally in any human being. There is only one hero who will never disappoint us – whose character, words and actions are beyond reproach – and that is the God-Man Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh.
Chris Hobbs,
Vicar.