I’m sure I’m not the only one whose Facebook timeline has turned into a series of heartbreaking deaths over the last months. I keep wondering if it has always been this way while we just weren’t exposed as much to the news, or if the numbers are particularly increasing these days. But either way, death in the era of social media feels very different.

You get to visit the profile of a person who no longer walks this Earth, stare at the profile picture they’ve only updated a few days before they left, without it even occurring to them that this is how they’ll continue being remembered. Because when they took that picture, they probably didn’t even pause for a second to think that this would be the same one their family and friends will shortly start circulating, as they ask people to pray for them.

The last words. The last comments they responded to. Followed by a prayer for mercy and forgiveness only a few days after. The last smiles they were complimented on. The last memes they shared. The dreams and hopes they still had. The time stamps show it was all only a week ago. One week ago they logged onto the same platform we’re all on right now; we existed in the very same realm, and now one of us is no longer here. But they didn’t know, and neither did we. Only He does. He knows a lot more than what will permanently stay behind.

Death is one if the scariest, most painful realities I still can’t make peace with, yet it’s the one thing that truly reminds me of how temporary everything about this world is. Knowing we’ll eventually return back to the One who knows it all, makes so many things more bearable...sometimes.