Investors weighing where to put new money this year have two unusually different but similarly buzzy options on the table: South Korean memory chipmaker SK Hynix, whose U.S.-listed shares debuted with the largest foreign IPO in American history earlier this month, and SpaceX, which completed the largest initial public offering ever recorded just weeks earlier. Both stocks have generated intense investor interest, but their businesses, valuations and risk profiles differ substantially. Here’s what the numbers show.

Note: This article provides factual information to help readers understand each stock; it is not financial advice, and individual investment decisions should account for personal risk tolerance and, where appropriate, guidance from a licensed financial advisor.

How each company reached the public markets

SK Hynix’s American depositary receipts began trading on Nasdaq on July 10, raising $26.5 billion in the largest first-time share sale by a foreign company in U.S. history, surpassing Alibaba’s 2014 offering. Shares priced at $149 and jumped 13% on their debut, and the offering was more than seven times oversubscribed.

SpaceX went public just weeks earlier, on June 12, in an offering that dwarfed even SK Hynix’s. The company sold 555.55 million shares at $135 each, raising more than $75 billion and valuing the company at $1.75 trillion, the largest IPO in history. Shares opened at $150 and surged more than 30% before closing the first day at $160.95, a rally that briefly made Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire.

Where the stocks trade now

As of Friday, July 24, SpaceX shares, trading under the ticker SPCX, stood at $114.25, down from a previous close of $118.24, and well below the stock’s all-time high of $225.64 reached June 16. That represents a decline of roughly 50% from the stock’s post-IPO peak, according to Yahoo Finance, which also noted the stock is down about 25% over the past month and roughly 9.7% over the past week alone, amid rising short interest and volatility ahead of the company’s upcoming earnings report.

SK Hynix’s ADR, by comparison, has held up considerably better. Shares traded around $172.70 on Friday, up 4.5% on the day, and the stock’s premium over its Seoul-listed common shares has remained elevated, reflecting sustained U.S. investor demand for direct exposure to the company’s memory chip business.

The bull case for each

SK Hynix’s investment case centers on its position as the world’s leading producer of high-bandwidth memory, the specialized chip technology essential for powering the AI accelerators made by companies like Nvidia. The company’s stock has climbed more than sevenfold over the past year amid a global shortage of AI-grade memory chips, and it is scheduled to report second-quarter earnings on July 29, with analyst estimates already trending upward heading into that report.

SpaceX’s bull case rests on a broader, more diversified set of businesses: its dominant position in commercial rocket launches, its rapidly growing Starlink satellite internet service, and long-term optionality tied to Starship, the company’s next-generation reusable rocket system. HSBC, in a note initiating coverage of the stock, modeled a “blue sky” scenario valuing SpaceX as high as $293 per share if Starship becomes commercially viable starting in 2027 and Starlink captures a larger share of the broadband market. Alphabet’s own second-quarter filing disclosed a $94 billion stake in SpaceX, underscoring how deeply other major technology companies have bought into the company’s long-term prospects.

The bear case and valuation concerns

Despite that bullish long-term framing, HSBC set a base-case price target of just $115, below both SpaceX’s $135 IPO price and its recent trading level, and initiated coverage with a hold rating, arguing that shares already reflect much of the company’s long-term growth potential even after applying a premium for Musk’s track record of building disruptive businesses. According to StockAnalysis.com, SpaceX’s roughly $2.77 trillion peak valuation implied a price-to-sales ratio of nearly 150 times its $18.7 billion in 2025 revenue, a figure the site contrasted with defense contractor Raytheon, which trades at roughly 2.8 times its larger revenue base.

SK Hynix, by contrast, has drawn more measured valuation concerns, though its ADR has traded at a substantial premium, at times exceeding 30% to 50%, over its Seoul-listed shares, reflecting strong but potentially overheated U.S. investor demand relative to the underlying Korean stock.

Analyst sentiment

Wall Street’s overall stance on SpaceX remains cautiously optimistic despite the stock’s post-IPO slide. According to Investing.com, 27 of 34 covering analysts rate the stock a buy, versus just one sell rating, with an average 12-month price target of roughly $231 to $237, implying substantial upside from current levels, though estimates range widely from a low of $62 to a high of $800, reflecting deep disagreement about the company’s ultimate trajectory.

Volatility and risk profile

The two stocks differ sharply in recent volatility. SpaceX carries a reported beta coefficient of nearly 6, according to TradingView, reflecting extreme price swings relative to the broader market, and the stock has become the subject of a large short-selling position, with bearish bets reportedly gaining more than $15 billion in value as shares fell from their post-IPO highs. SK Hynix, while itself a historically volatile stock, has shown comparatively steadier post-IPO trading, buoyed by continued strong demand signals in the AI memory chip market heading into its earnings report.

What to weigh before deciding

Investors comparing the two are weighing fundamentally different bets: SK Hynix offers more direct, immediate exposure to current AI infrastructure spending through an established, profitable chip business with a clearer near-term earnings catalyst in its upcoming report. SpaceX offers exposure to a broader, more speculative set of long-duration technologies, rocket launch dominance, satellite internet and future Mars ambitions, with a valuation that several analysts, including HSBC, have described as already pricing in significant future success.

SK Hynix’s July 29 earnings report will offer the next concrete data point for investors assessing that stock’s near-term trajectory, while SpaceX’s own upcoming quarterly results, along with the outcome of its next Starship test flight, are likely to serve as key catalysts determining whether the stock stabilizes after its steep post-IPO decline or continues to face pressure from rising short interest and lockup-related share supply. Both companies remain central to the broader AI and space infrastructure buildout shaping markets this year, but their risk, valuation and volatility profiles differ enough that the right choice is likely to depend heavily on an individual investor’s time horizon and tolerance for the kind of dramatic swings SpaceX shares have already shown since going public.

ChatGPT and its companion services went down worldwide early Saturday morning, leaving users unable to load conversations, send prompts or access saved chat history in what OpenAI later confirmed was its fourth service disruption in as many days.

Outage-tracking service Downdetector said user reports indicating problems with OpenAI began climbing at 5:11 a.m. Eastern time, with the hashtag #OpenaiDown circulating on social media shortly after. More than 3,000 users had flagged the outage on Downdetector by Saturday morning, and “Is ChatGPT down?” began trending on Google search as reports spread.

What went wrong

The outage affected all three of OpenAI’s core services simultaneously: the ChatGPT chatbot itself, the company’s developer-facing API, and Codex, its AI-powered coding assistant. Users encountered a range of symptoms, including sidebar loading animations that never resolved, an inability to send new messages, and error messages citing “too many concurrent requests.” According to reporting from TheNextWeb, users encountered 503 errors carrying the internal label “biscuit_baker_service_me_circuit_open,” a technical signal indicating requests were being blocked before they could reach OpenAI’s servers.

The disruption was global in scope, with reports coming in from users across the United States, Europe, India and Australia, according to Unite.AI, affecting not just the consumer-facing ChatGPT app but also the many outside applications and services that rely quietly on OpenAI’s API infrastructure to function.

OpenAI’s response

OpenAI acknowledged the outage on its official status page shortly after reports began surfacing, stating it was “investigating the issue for the listed services,” naming APIs, ChatGPT and Codex as affected. The company later updated its language, stating it was “experiencing issues” with “elevated error rates” before eventually reporting a mitigation had been applied. “We have applied the mitigation and are monitoring the recovery,” OpenAI said, as the company moved from an “investigating” to a “monitoring” status within roughly an hour of the outage’s onset.

By late Saturday morning, the outage appeared to be resolved. Outage-tracking service StatusGator reported that OpenAI’s status returned to “operational” as of just after noon UTC, noting 554 total user-submitted reports of problems over the preceding 24 hours, with the disruption marked as resolved.

The fourth disruption in four days

Saturday’s outage was notable not just for its scope but for its place in a broader pattern. According to TheNextWeb, the incident marked the fourth service disruption OpenAI had experienced in four consecutive days, a stretch of instability that has drawn increasing attention given how deeply ChatGPT and OpenAI’s underlying infrastructure have become embedded in both consumer routines and third-party business applications.

A history of recurring outages

Saturday’s disruption continues a pattern that has affected OpenAI’s services periodically since ChatGPT’s public launch. The company experienced a roughly four-hour outage on June 4, 2025, followed less than two weeks later by a separate incident on June 17, 2025, that knocked ChatGPT offline for about two and a half hours, with OpenAI attributing that disruption to “an elevated error rate” between 11:20 a.m. and 1:55 p.m. Pacific time. An earlier outage on Jan. 23, 2025, affected users across the U.S., U.K. and beyond for several hours before OpenAI issued a fix. A more severe incident on June 10, 2025, lasted more than 10 hours and also affected OpenAI’s video generation tool, Sora, alongside ChatGPT itself.

Why these outages matter beyond individual users

Because ChatGPT and OpenAI’s API have become foundational infrastructure for a wide range of third-party products, ranging from customer service tools to coding assistants built on top of Codex, disruptions to OpenAI’s core services can ripple outward well beyond individuals simply trying to chat with the AI model directly. Businesses that have built products on top of OpenAI’s API face their own downstream outages whenever the underlying service experiences elevated error rates, a dynamic that has become an increasingly significant point of scrutiny as more companies embed OpenAI’s technology directly into their own offerings.

What affected users experienced

During Saturday’s outage, users described being stuck in persistent loading loops when attempting to open the ChatGPT sidebar or access prior conversation history, according to BleepingComputer. Attempts to send new messages returned errors citing an excessive volume of concurrent requests, effectively locking users out of active conversations even when the interface itself appeared to load normally.

How OpenAI communicates during outages

OpenAI maintains a public status page that the company updates during service disruptions, though as with several past incidents, the company’s public acknowledgment lagged behind the volume of user reports appearing on independent tracking platforms like Downdetector. That pattern, users noticing and reporting problems before OpenAI’s own status page reflects an issue, has remained consistent across the company’s outage history, from January 2025 through Saturday’s incident.

With OpenAI reporting the outage as resolved by late Saturday morning, the company has not disclosed a specific root cause for the disruption or detailed what changes, if any, it plans to make following its fourth outage in four consecutive days. Given the frequency of the recent disruptions, users and businesses relying on OpenAI’s services may reasonably expect continued scrutiny of the company’s infrastructure reliability in the days ahead, particularly as ChatGPT, Codex and OpenAI’s API continue to see growing adoption across both individual and enterprise use cases. For now, service has been restored, but the string of back-to-back incidents this week leaves open the question of whether Saturday’s fix will hold or whether additional disruptions may follow.

The Mega Millions jackpot climbed to $743 million ahead of Friday night’s drawing, with a cash value of $323.4 million, making it the 10th-largest prize in the game’s history as players across the country checked their tickets against Friday’s winning numbers.

The winning numbers drawn Friday, July 24, were 2, 5, 42, 44, 60 and a gold Mega Ball of 1. Drawings are held twice a week, every Tuesday and Friday at approximately 11 p.m. Eastern time.

A long stretch without a jackpot winner

The last time a player won the Mega Millions jackpot outright was more than three months earlier, when a ticket purchased in Ohio claimed a $60 million prize on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17. Since then, the jackpot has climbed steadily through repeated rollovers as no ticket has matched all six numbers in the twice-weekly drawings.

That stretch has not been entirely without winners, however. In Tuesday’s drawing preceding Friday’s jackpot, no ticket matched all six numbers for the grand prize, but two players came close to the top prize: one ticket holder in California won $2 million, and another in Arizona won $3 million, both by matching enough numbers to claim a lower-tier prize under the game’s payout structure.

How the numbers compare historically

Friday’s $743 million prize now ranks 10th on the all-time list of largest Mega Millions jackpots, a list still topped by the record $1.602 billion jackpot won in Florida on Aug. 8, 2023. The full top 10 includes $1.537 billion won in South Carolina on Oct. 23, 2018; $1.348 billion won in Maine on Jan. 1, 2023; $1.337 billion won in Illinois on July 29, 2022; $1.269 billion won in California on Dec. 27, 2024; $1.128 billion won in New Jersey on March 26, 2024; $1.05 billion won in Michigan on Jan. 22, 2021; $983 million won in Georgia on Nov. 14, 2025; $810 million won in Texas on Sept. 10, 2024; and Friday’s $743 million prize, with a winner still to be determined.

What winners can choose

Should a single ticket match all six numbers, the winner would face a choice between two payout options: a one-time lump-sum cash payment or an annuitized prize paid out through an initial payment followed by 29 annual installments, each 5% larger than the one before it. Most jackpot winners historically opt for the lump-sum cash payment rather than the long-term annuity structure.

How the game works

Mega Millions is played across 45 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Each ticket costs $5, and players select six numbers across two separate pools: five different numbers from 1 to 70, known as the white balls, and one number from 1 to 24, known as the gold Mega Ball. Players uncertain of their preferred numbers can opt for a “Quick Pick” or “Easy Pick” selection, which lets a terminal generate a random set of numbers on their behalf.

To win the jackpot, a ticket must match all six numbers drawn. In the rare event that more than one ticket matches all six numbers in a single drawing, the jackpot prize is split evenly among the winning tickets.

Mega Millions tickets now come with a built-in multiplier that automatically boosts non-jackpot prize winnings by two, three, four, five or 10 times. That feature replaced the previous system, under which players had to pay an additional dollar to add the optional “Megaplier” to their ticket.

How long winners have to claim a prize

According to Mega Millions, the window for collecting winnings varies by state, typically ranging from 90 days up to a full year from the date of the drawing. Lottery officials encourage players to check with their specific state lottery for the exact claim period that applies to their ticket, since deadlines and procedures are not uniform nationwide.

Where to buy tickets

Mega Millions tickets can be purchased at a range of locations, including convenience stores, gas stations and grocery stores. In some states, tickets are also available for purchase online, offering an additional option for players who prefer not to buy in person.

A broader trend in jackpot growth

Friday’s near-record prize continues a broader pattern of increasingly large Mega Millions jackpots in recent years, driven in part by a 2017 overhaul of the game’s number pool that lengthened the odds of winning the jackpot from roughly 1 in 259 million to about 1 in 302.6 million. Longer odds have generally meant more frequent rollovers and, correspondingly, larger jackpots by the time a winning ticket is eventually sold. Rising ticket prices, which moved from $1 to $2 following the 2017 changes and then to the current $5 price point more recently, have also factored into the size of jackpots the game has produced.

Separately, Powerball, Mega Millions’ chief rival among major U.S. lottery games, recently announced a structural change of its own that officials say could allow its jackpots to grow at a faster pace going forward, a shift that could intensify competition between the two games for players chasing the next big prize.

The next Mega Millions drawing is scheduled for Tuesday, July 28, at 11 p.m. Eastern time. Should no ticket match all six numbers in Friday’s drawing, the jackpot will continue to grow heading into that next drawing, potentially climbing further up the list of the game’s largest-ever prizes. Players hoping to check their Friday tickets against the winning numbers, 2, 5, 42, 44, 60 and Mega Ball 1, are encouraged to verify results directly through their state lottery or the official Mega Millions website.

Saturday’s edition of the New York Times’ Strands puzzle sent players on a tour of clothing history, blending everyday garments with more obscure regional and cultural dress terms, offering a fitting challenge for word puzzle fans who enjoy a bit of fashion trivia mixed into their daily word search.

Strands, the Times’ newer entry in its daily puzzle lineup alongside Wordle and Connections, presents players with a six-by-eight grid of letters and challenges them to find a group of hidden words connected by a shared theme, along with a special “spangram” that touches two opposite sides of the board and summarizes the puzzle’s overall concept. Words can run in any direction, including diagonally, and none of the theme words overlap with one another on the grid.

Saturday’s theme

The official theme for Strands puzzle number 874 was “Frocks and smocks,” a nod to the puzzle’s focus on dresses, robes and tunic-style garments drawn from a range of cultures and traditions. According to Tom’s Guide, the puzzle’s difficulty started off relatively approachable before growing more challenging as solvers worked through less familiar clothing terms tied to specific regional dress.

The spangram and full answer list

Saturday’s spangram was YOUWEARITWELL, a phrase that ties together the puzzle’s clothing theme by celebrating personal style and connecting each of the featured garments back to the central concept of wearing something well.

The remaining theme words for Strands #874 were GOWN, KIMONO, MUUMUU, TUNIC, DIRNDL and PINAFORE. A gown refers to a long, often formal dress typically worn for special occasions. A kimono is a traditional Japanese robe characterized by wide sleeves and a wrapped design secured with a sash. A muumuu is a loose-fitting dress of Hawaiian origin, traditionally designed for comfort in warm climates. A tunic describes a simple, often sleeveless garment that extends to the knees or lower, worn across many cultures throughout history. A dirndl is a traditional regional dress from the Alps, featuring a fitted bodice, a low-cut blouse, a full skirt and an apron, closely associated with Austrian and German folk costume. A pinafore is a sleeveless, apron-like garment typically worn over another piece of clothing.

How solvers experienced the puzzle

Reaction to Saturday’s puzzle varied depending on how familiar individual players were with historical and regional clothing terminology. One Tom’s Guide writer described finding GOWN on the right-hand side of the board with KIMONO positioned below it, then spotting MUUMUU in the bottom-left corner, which helped isolate the remaining letters needed to trace the spangram YOUWEARITWELL. That same solver noted the puzzle then cornered off TUNIC in the top-right section, before DIRNDL appeared spelled vertically down the left-hand side, leaving PINAFORE as the final word to complete the board.

A separate TechRadar review described a more uneven solving experience, noting that the puzzle “started off easy and ended baffling.” That writer found GOWN, TUNIC and PINAFORE relatively quickly as more familiar clothing terms, along with KIMONO after piecing together the spangram, but needed an additional hint to identify DIRNDL, and discovered only after finishing the puzzle that MUUMUU refers specifically to a loose Hawaiian dress rather than a more general term.

Hints for those still working through it

For players seeking help without fully spoiling the puzzle, Tom’s Guide offered a set of supplementary clue words tied to the letters involved in Saturday’s solution: TELL, PAIN, PIANO, WINK, PLUM, PUMA, NOTE and FROWN. The outlet also noted that Saturday’s spangram specifically begins with the letter “Y” and ends with the letter “L,” a structural hint that can help narrow down its placement on the board before attempting to trace the full word.

How Strands works more broadly

Strands operates differently from Wordle or Connections, requiring players to identify theme-related words hidden throughout a grid of letters rather than guessing a single word or sorting items into categories. Players form words by dragging or tapping connected letters, and can double-tap the final letter of a word to submit it. According to the Times, Strands themes can take a variety of forms, including fill-in-the-blank phrases, sequential steps in a process, items belonging to a shared category, or even synonyms and homophones, giving the puzzle’s editorial team flexibility in how each day’s challenge is constructed.

Wordle and Strands editor Tracy Bennett has said she aims to vary puzzle difficulty throughout the week in a similar fashion to how Wordle’s own difficulty shifts from day to day, occasionally introducing unexpected twists to keep regular Strands solvers on their toes.

A newer addition to the Times’ puzzle lineup

Strands remains one of the more recently introduced games within the Times’ broader puzzle offerings, joining established titles including Wordle, Connections, the Connections Sports Edition, the Mini Crossword, Pips and Sudoku. Since its debut roughly a year ago, the game has steadily built a dedicated following among daily puzzle players looking for a format that blends the visual search mechanics of a traditional word search with the thematic cleverness associated with the Times’ broader games portfolio.

A new puzzle every day

A fresh Strands puzzle publishes at midnight local time in each player’s time zone, meaning solvers around the world are frequently working through different daily puzzles depending on when they log in. That structure mirrors the release pattern used across the Times’ other daily word games, allowing players in different regions to compare notes on a given day’s puzzle even as they may technically be solving different numbered editions depending on timing.

A new Strands puzzle will publish at midnight Sunday, continuing the game’s daily run as it works to solidify its place among the Times’ most popular offerings. Players who found Saturday’s clothing-themed puzzle more challenging than expected, particularly around the less familiar DIRNDL and MUUMUU entries, can look forward to a fresh theme and a new opportunity to extend their solving streak with Sunday’s reset.

This article was written by

Follow

Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of SOFI either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

Seeking Alpha’s Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.

Brian Doerksen, the Canadian worship leader and songwriter whose music became a fixture of church services around the world for more than three decades, died July 21 at his family home in Abbotsford, British Columbia, following a brief and swift battle with stage 4 cancer. He was 60.

Doerksen passed away peacefully in his sleep at 6:45 a.m., surrounded by loved ones, according to a statement shared by his family on his official Instagram account. The announcement came just days after his family revealed he had been diagnosed with cancer following months of undiagnosed medical issues.

A rapid decline

Doerksen’s illness progressed with unusual speed. His family said he had been dealing with unexplained health problems for months before being hospitalized earlier in the month after experiencing severe pain. Doctors diagnosed him with stage 4 cancer by that Saturday, though they were still working to identify the specific type. By Monday, a family update revealed his kidneys had failed, and he died the following morning.

“On July 21st, at 6:45AM, our beloved Brian passed away peacefully in his sleep at his family home, surrounded by those who loved him most,” the family’s statement said, thanking the “entire community around the world that prayed, gave, and sent incredible messages of love” throughout his illness.

Remembered for his character as much as his music

Doerksen’s family described a man who remained focused on others even as his health rapidly declined. “Till the very end, Brian continued to love those around him, encouraging them in who they are, and shared incredible gratitude to those in the medical field who tried their best to help him,” the statement said. “He was a beacon of light even in his final moments to his close family and friends, and loved well right to the end.” The family added a broader wish for others following his example: “May we all be like him, to love freely, be kind, and grateful even in the midst of the hardest of times.”

A pioneering figure in modern worship music

Doerksen was among the most widely sung songwriters in contemporary Christian worship music, best known for songs including “Come, Now Is the Time to Worship,” “Refiner’s Fire” and “Faithful One,” compositions that have been performed in churches across the globe for decades. Raised in a Mennonite Brethren family in British Columbia, Doerksen joined the staff of Langley Vineyard Christian Fellowship in his early 20s, serving as worship pastor into the early 1990s. That role placed him at the forefront of an emerging worship style, plainspoken and guitar-driven, focused on intimacy with God rather than performance, that helped reshape congregational singing worldwide.

Vineyard Worship, the organization closely tied to Doerksen’s decades-long career, honored him in a statement following his death. “It is with deep sadness, and with profound gratitude to God, that we honor the life of Brian Doerksen. Brian was one of the fathers of Vineyard Worship,” the group said. “Through his songs, leadership and friendship, he helped shape worship in the Vineyard and, far beyond that, the worship of the global Church.” The organization added that “generations of us have encountered God through songs like ‘Come, Now Is the Time to Worship,’ ‘Refiner’s Fire.’”

Vineyard Worship also emphasized Doerksen’s character beyond his musical output. “Those who knew him speak of a man marked by humility, kindness, generosity and deep faith. He was a worshipper before he was a songwriter, and his life reflected the One he so faithfully sang about,” the group said, adding that “even in the midst of suffering, he continued to encourage others, overflowing with gratitude and hope.”

Tributes from fellow musicians

News of Doerksen’s death drew an outpouring of tributes from worship leaders and musicians around the world. British worship artist Tim Hughes wrote, “So deeply gutted by this. I always” admired Doerksen’s contribution to the genre, according to Premier Christian News. Singer-songwriter Matt Redman, who has described “Faithful One” as his all-time favorite worship song, said he was deeply saddened by the loss and remembered Doerksen as a constant source of personal encouragement throughout his own ministry.

Veteran Christian radio promoter Chris Hauser reflected on the broad reach of Doerksen’s catalog. “Brian Doerksen consistently wrote and performed songs I needed to hear in many important stops in my faith journey,” Hauser said. “‘Come Now Is the Time to Worship,’ ‘Refiner’s Fire,’ ‘Purify My Heart’ and many others have been the soundtrack for tens of millions over decades.”

A career marked by awards and lasting influence

Over the course of his career, Doerksen received numerous awards recognizing his contributions to Christian music, and his songs remain among the most frequently performed in contemporary worship settings globally. His body of work has been credited with helping shape a generation’s experience of congregational singing, moving the genre toward a more direct, personal style of musical worship that continues to influence songwriters today.

Survived by his family

Doerksen is survived by his wife, Joyce, described by his family as his high school sweetheart and partner of 38 years, along with their six children. His family has expressed gratitude for the global outpouring of support during his illness, and a GoFundMe page has been established to assist the family during this time.

A legacy that endures

For many who have attended a church service over the past three decades, Doerksen’s musical fingerprints are likely present in some form, whether through his own compositions or the broader style of worship music his work helped popularize. As tributes continue to arrive from musicians, worship leaders and congregations around the world, Doerksen’s family and the broader Vineyard Worship community have framed his death not only as the loss of an influential songwriter, but as the passing of a man whose character, by the accounts of those closest to him, matched the faith he spent his career singing about.