March 15th is the anniversary of my uncle Hector Millán. He was a Methodist pastor for more than thirty years. He served more than 20 of those years serving in our Conference. Without hesitation I can say he was the embodiment of what it means to be a faithful disciple. He was kind. He was gracious. He was a very loving man. He had the ability to see the potential for ministry in all people. In fact, he was the one who challenged me 19 years ago to be faithful in discerning the call God was placing upon my life.
One way he portrayed faithfulness was by loving people without judgement, without conditions, and in doing so, he reflected God’s love in him. He knew God loved him. He strived to follow Jesus’ example in all he did. He often would talk about how thankful he was with God. Even in his 19 years long journey fighting cancer, he never complaint to God, instead, he always found refuge and strength in God. Even more, he always found relief in serving others. He never stopped serving and loving others. Especially, he never stopped helping people find ways to be faithful to what God was calling them to do. During his fight, amid his pain, he remained faithful to the source of his strength.
Lent is an opportunity to be faithful. We can be faithful by showing kindness to one another. We can be faithful by extending grace to others, even those we don’t agree with. We can be faithful to extend our love to others, no strings attached, and without judgement. We can be faithful by helping others to be faithful. Our world needs faithful people. People committed to offer something different to what the world is offering.
I am thankful for people like my uncle who embodied faithfulness. How can we embody faithfulness today? How can we more faithful during Lent? How can we more faithful to one another? I invite you to learn more today about #BeUMC, which gives us a glimpse of how as United Methodists we seek to we seek to be faithful people of God.
Almighty God, help us to be faithful people, so we can become exemplars of faithfulness to others. Amen.
If you would like to view past editions of Time with Ismael,
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