Philippians 1: 1-11

“Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” Vs.6

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When one comes to faith in Jesus Christ, God goes to work to conform his child into the image of His Son. And we as believers can be assured the work He begins, He also completes through the partaking of His Word and His Holy Spirit.

I had an object lesson in this when I was plagued with basal cell carcinoma. I had two open sores on my leg that refused to heal. They remained a constant pain to me and so I sought how to treat them through the Lord’s guidance. I am not one who rushes immediately to a doctor. The reason is I’ve experienced negative results, so if there is a natural remedy for my condition or the Lord chooses to heal in His own way, I seek to find it because it has worked well for me to do so.

I did go to the dermatologist for the biopsy. But the treatment was to remove the cancer growth surgically. This alarmed me since I had discovered that even with this the cancer can return and the skin is permanently scarred. I also did not trust the treatment because they gave no adequate advice on how to prevent infection from the biopsy procedure. In fact, I told them what I would do instead of their suggestion to apply Vaseline to the wounds. I had a relative who did this and it ended up infected. So with my suggestion they looked up the best antibiotic ointment to apply.

In the meantime, the Lord was teaching me about how to nourish my body by avoiding foods that are overly processed and manufactured. My grand-daughter was researching a college paper on the Vegan diet when she discovered how a person gave testimony of being cured of skin cancer by changing her diet. When I looked into the research I stumbled onto a natural remedy for basal and squamous cell skin cancer. The treatment was to apply an eggplant extract until the cancer cells were destroyed. I wanted to go this route instead of surgery so I ordered the cream and when I was contacted by the dermatologist to schedule the Moh procedure I asked if she was willing to monitor the treatment using this cream. I consulted my Lord about all of this by saying to Him if the biopsy report was not melanoma and only basal cell cancer I would feel confident to go this route. All of the biopsies reported “Basal Cell carcinoma. Well, as I predicted the dermatologist was not interested in monitoring this treatment and I was on my own. But not really, I had the great Physician guiding me on this scary unknown path.

I ordered the cream and began a ritual of applying it two times daily. The cream contained an acid base to permeate the tissue and allow the extract to attack the cells. Needless to say, it was painful and I at times wanted to give up, but the instructions said to continue until the tissue was healed. The skin would be inflamed all around the sore as the extract began to hunt and destroy. Finally, after approximately nine weeks, the burning subsided and I discontinued the treatments and the skin began to heal.

In all of this the Lord was also going after deep rooted habits and wrong thinking in my life. As He exposed them it was painful emotionally to discover my faults, but the knife of the Word was applied and He told me to be patient as He completed the work to get rid of the root of what was holding me back from experiencing His complete freedom in Him and healing. (Hebrews 4:12). As I prayed concerning His cleansing, He spoke to my heart He was removing everything that was not of Him.

The Lord has promised to complete the work of redemption in our life until the day we come face to face with our God. In that day we will stand righteous before a Holy God in Christ, presented to the Father as His faithful bride. (Jude 1:24-25)

Let the Lord do His work in your life through all adversity, knowing He is transforming you into His likeness and removing all that is not of Him. What remains Is His awesome transformation of your nature to reflect His own without scar or blemish. (James 1:2-4)