By: Gen. Jim – 9/9/25
This is the question we have before us. Let’s define these two words:
Stagnate: (adj.) (Latin, stagnans), “without motion or current, not flowing or moving, not active, alert, alive.”
This word is the opposite of moving forward in God, being alert, active, & alive. God’s people are meant to be a FORWARD MOVING people… “pressing toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” – Phil 3:14, NKJV. I think this one Scripture spells out what God wants for His people. The Apostle was not writing about initial salvation, he already had this. The literal translation is, “In line with the goal, I follow toward the prize.” The word picture is that of a foot race.
It was customary to set the “prize” in a conspicuous place at the very point where the race was to end. The sight of it aroused the competitors to strain every nerve, & to forget everything but their one object: to WIN! Paul makes this clear by what he wrote in vs. 13: “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, & reaching forth unto those things which are before.” Does this sound like a man that has stagnated in his Christianity? …PREACHING FORTH… PRESS FORWARD!!
There is no doubt that the Apostle was writing about Christian perfection, i.e., maturity in Christ (as described in Eph. 4:13-15 by Paul). The “perfect man” is the “fully developed Christian man” … that has defied stagnation & procrastination.
Single Aim
What about us? Do we have a single eye/aim to obtain the prize? In Paul’s day Judaism was the religion. It could not bring the seekers into perfection: Jesus’ way could & can. Self-righteousness is the opposite of godly-righteousness.
Procrastinate: (Latin, procrastinatus), “to put off, postpose (such actions habitually).” How many of us have procrastinated on God, putting off things that needed – MUST! – to be done? Far too many believers live in “slump land”, even “swamp land” called Churchianity… “having a form of godliness but DENYING its power,” -2 Tim. 3:5. “Form of godliness”? Paul equates “godliness with “power”. No godliness, no power.
Do we not see this evident in today’s Church? Powerless to resist sin! Paul uses the word “form” (Gk., morphōsis), meaning “appearance or formula” – looking like a believer, having the correct church doctrines etc. Well, neither one can describe today’s Church-goers, especially the liberal /woke /LGBTQ churches. The “Christians” look like the world – tattoos, piercings, all manner of dress & language.
Don’t Set up Camp!
When we started ACMTC (1981, kicked into high gear in 1983), the Spirit of God told my wife and me “don’t set up camp!”. this was confusing for God had plainly instructed us to start a missions training corps. To do this we had to establish a stationary base (Sacto. CA). What He meant, we learned later, was that once we learned certain (spiritual) things, to move on to other realms in knowledge/practice. In short, the Spirit was telling us “Don’t Stagnate! … keep moving spiritually. Some churches that once were “on fire” for God, grew old & cold because they did not PRESS ON!” You can smell the mildew/mold, the oldness, the coldness of certain church organizations and denominations.
Their FIRE has GONE OUT! … only cold coals, hence, DEAD religion. When God wanted them to pull up stakes of their tents, they procrastinated: “We’re comfortable in our stagnation.”
(At the end of this article, I have added a Prophetic Word. Read it carefully!)
There have been times in our walk that the Spirit wanted us to move on (in a certain way/teaching etc.) When we procrastinated, we paid for it. God turned things against us, so we had to move on. We forget that true Biblical Christianity is a fluid/flowing/forward moving religion. True Christianity is not just a set of doctrines /practices, but a Spirit-controlled/Spirit-propelled movement whereby individuals are RADICALLY transformed – from the mundane to the miraculous… endless potentialities of spirit growth – will we endure the pain?
Human nature prefers stagnation/procrastination, not moving forward and upward.
The Spirit’s Purpose
Paul lays it out for us in his epistle to the Galatians (5). He contrasts the “Spirit” with the “flesh”: one brings forth the good fruit; the other rotten fruit. He says, and it is SO TRUE!, “the flesh lusts against the Spirit, & the Spirit against the flesh.” (vs. 17)
The Spirit cannot be born in us merely thru “improvement” of the old self (i.e., the flesh), but only thru DEATH to the “self life”. Paul says, “I die daily”. What? Yep! He put “self” under foot and kept Christ on the throne of his heart.
Grow Up in Him
“… speaking the truth in love, may GROW UP in all things into Him who is the head – Christ,” -Eph. 4:15.
We’re to keep going and growing. Just us humans grow by stages, new stages of development emerge out of the passing of former stages. Somehow the Church (with exceptions) has adopted the idea that once they get their doctrines/practices learned, all they have to do is acknowledge them and this is all that is needed.
The other extreme is that the modern Church says, “we must move on with the times.” In other words, adopt the ways & means of the sinful world. Now we have leaders using the “F” word in sermons! Sex-sins are permitted in the name of “love” & “experience”. We have now a moral-less/standardless/godless Church.
The NEED!
We need a moral consistency today. The lack of such has caused the Church to become shipwrecked. She has allowed moral degeneracy to continue over the decades. Reprobate leaderships has convinced what we need is to be conformed to the world, not more conformity to Christ. And, so, “improvers” have destroyed what once was built upon the Rock. To appraise, judge, criticize the CURSE, is to bring upon yourself/ourself the WRATH of the Church itself.
When I speak of “moralism”, I mean godly, not human. Human moralism, with all its advice & exhortation & inevitable presumption, is the very antithesis of Biblical Christianity. The modern Church had adopted the “right” psychological attitude that flows along with Satan’s agenda – DAMNATION!
WOE TO US!
Is this too strong for you? Did Jesus use such language? Yep! Sure did! (Mt. 23 = 8 times, all connected with hypocrites! “Jesus, that was not nice of you!”. Well, Jesus was not, and we are not, under the “nice” bondage.
When false virtue/righteousness rules, rules are broken (God’s rules). Vice becomes virtue. To be efficacious, false virtue must come down from aloft! Jesus did so (not that He had false virtue), He came down, humbled Himself so He could relate to humanity.
Lost Faith
When one loses his/her faith in God & His Word, it ends in degradation, destruction, & damnation… dignity & divinity are left to DIE!
Some rule by legalistic moralism, that is putting rules upon man/woman that bind them rather than free them. Today’s Church (with exceptions) mocks Puritanism (in it’s original meaning). The original Puritans were strong believers in original sin (i.e., inbred sin), & felt that the Christian could not be made trustworthy by mere self-improvement (without the workings of the Holy Spirit). It may be respectable but lacks the “Sword that cuts & the Fire that burns.”
Back in the day, John Cotton (early Christian leader in the colonies of what was to become America) wrote: “Now if it be a divine truth, that none are to be trusted with public permanent authority but godly men, who are fit materials for Church membership, then from the same grounds it will appear, that none are so fit to be trusted with the liberties of the commonwealth as Church members. For, the liberties of this commonwealth are such, as required men of faithful integrity to God & the state, to preserve the same.” (Quoted in Parrington, Main Currents in American Thought, 1, 34.).
Thus, Church members presumed to declare who should be citizens with voting power etc. (see my articles on “Christian America”).
McGuffey’s Eclectic Reader
M.E.R., America’s most popular school book in the 1800s testified to America’s early form of theocratic gov.:
“Their form of government was strictly theocratical insomuch that it would be difficult to say where there was any civil government authority among them distinct from ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Whenever a few of them settled a town, they immediately gathered themselves into a Church; & their elders were magistrates, & their code of laws was the Pentateuch… God was their King, & they reguarded Him as truly & literally so…” (William Holmes McGuffey, McGuffey’s 6th Eclectic Reader, 1879, p. 225).
Enter J. Cotton
McGuffey was very much influenced by J. Cotton’s writings. He wrote: “The famous John Cotton, the first minister of Boston (now a WOKE cesspool!!!)… earnestly pleaded ‘that the gov. might be considered as a theocracy, wherein the Lord was judge, lawgiver & king; that the laws which He gave Israel might be adopted…’ At the desire of the court, he compiled a system of laws founded chiefly on the laws of Moses…” (Jeremy Belknap, John Farmer, The History of New-Hampshire, 1862, pp. 42, 43). As I have shown in other articles, the 13 colonies had godly constitutions where the names God /LORD, Lord /Jesus /Christ /Holy Spirit were mentioned. Compare the U.S. Constitution, no names appear except using the phrase “in the year of our Lord.” The U.S.C. is a humanist doc., not a Christian doc.
J.W. Welch
J.W.W. wrote: “Indeed, it has rightly been concluded that ‘the ideal polity of early Puritan New England was thought to comprehend divine intentions as revealed in Mosaic law.’ The rule of law began, not with the rules of man but with the rules of God. One Puritan document directly states, ‘[T]he more any law smells of man, the more unprofitable,’ & thus, it asserts, the only proper laws were in fact ‘divine ordinances, revealed in the pages of Holy Writ & administered according to deductions & rules gathered from the Word of God.’” (J.W. Welch, “Biblical Law in America: Historical Perspectives & Potentials for Reform”, Sept. 30, 2002).
My God!, if we were to be under the “rule of God” today, well. ALL HELL would BREAK OUT!!! This nation is Hell-Bound if it does not change course. The same goes for the Church.
The differences between Christendom of the 1600s & today is between night & day. It will take a BLOOD/REVOLUTION (the Blood of Jesus) to eradicate the Sin, the demons out of today’s Church.
I could write dozens & dozens of quotes from early Christian writers who believed in the Bible… its laws /rules /instructions /correction. Now the Modern Church has the attitude of “we don’t care what the Bible says! “But even in Early American Christianity in the pre-revolution days, there were cold, informal churches. The fight to keep Biblical Christianity ALIVE/ACTIVE was noted by many in & out of Church. Daniel J. Boorstin, who wrote, “The Americas: The Colonial Experience”, stated “… [by] the mid-18th century… Puritanism was all but DEAD!”, p. 6. Even the framers of the U.S. Const., although mostly Churchgoers, were not the same as those of the 17th century. The Pentecostal church we were recruited into (1972) is not the same today. The dress codes especially are worthy of note.
Why Do “Christians” Do It?
I mean, with all the Biblical doctrine, its reproofs, its instructions in righteousness, why do so many Christians not believe in what the Bible says? Well, Paul considered all this when the Church was in its infant stage. He was really concerned with doctrine. He was aware/alert to the workings of demon spirits: “Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the (Christian) faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits & doctrines of demons,” 1 Tim. 4:1. In short, believers in Christian doctrine will procrastinate, hence, giving themselves over to believe in demon doctrines.
In Paul second epistle to Timothy he again brings up the subject of doctrine: “For the time will come when they (believers) will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires… they will heap up for themselves teachers… they will turn their ears away from the truth, & be turned aside to fables… be watchful in all things…” -2 Tim. 4:3-5.
I believe one of the BIGGEST false doctrines being taught & accepted by multitiudes is that God loves you no matter how in the HELL you live!!! And the LGBTQ plus church is one of those who teach doctrine contrary to Biblical doctrine. Paul, in his first letter to Timothy, writes in reference to the law (moral), it is made for “the lawless & insubordinate, for the ungodly (the believers who have turned away from Biblical doctrine) & for sinners, for the unholy & profane… for murderers… fornicators… sodomites (male/female homosexuals)… liars… perjurers, & if there is any other thing that is contrary (opposed) to sound doctrine,” -Tim.1:9, 10.
The Law
The “law” Paul refers to was not the O.T. Law for Jews only, but he uses it in a much wider sense: the outward authority which restrains men/women from wrongdoing. The purpose of moral training is to BUILD UP within an individual the inner motives & restraints which will make legal restraints unnecessary.
Let’s be real: the flesh / carnal man / carnal woman, without some restraints, will become tyranny in one way or the other (generally speaking) Like the training of children involves discipline & restraint. But even this will not make the inner person a good person that will by loyal to Christ. It must be voluntary.
Doctrine?
διδασκαλία (Gk.), occurs 15 times in the Pastorals as against 6 times in the rest of the N.T. The use of the word “sound” in connection with Christian teaching occurs only in the Pastorals in the N.T. we find words like “sound doctrine” (2 Tim. 4:3; Titus 1:4; 2:1), “sound words” or “wholesome words” (1 Tim. 6:3; 2 Tim. 1:13; Titus 2:8), “sound in the faith” (Tit. 1:13; 2:2), further indicates the emphasis which these epistles put on correct or orthodox doctrine.
So, “sound” here does not mean “healthful” or “health-giving”; it means “correct” & “right”, “normative” & reasonable”. Doctrine is a settled established body of Christian teaching.
The attitude of too many church leaders today is, “I don’t care what the Bible says…” Yep! They don’t care. They make their own rules that overrule God’s desire & intent for His people’s well-being & growth. I think we all need more discipline in our lives in order to combat stagnation & procrastination.
We are not meant to be VICTIMS of accepting/possessing false doctine; we are meant to be VICTORS… moving onward & upward in the things of God.
Will you say yes or will you say why?
Can a believer resist the Holy Spirit? Sure can! (let us remember, the Holy Ghost (or Holy Spirit) dwells in US (2 Tim. 1:14; see also Rom. 8:9, 11). Some, who have never repented of their sins but have joined a Church/fellowship, believe they have the Holy Spirit. Note Paul’s words in Rom. 8:9 (NKJV) where he uses the if word twice: “… if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is NOT HIS.” Then in verse 10, Paul again uses the “if” word: “And if Christ is in you…” He goes further, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you…” (note: vss. 13 has the “if” word twice; vs. 17 twice; vs. 25 once; vs. 31 once).
So, with all this said, let us examine ourselves to see if we are in the faith (see 1 Cor. 11:28; Gal. 6:4; 2 Cor. 13:5) Paul, in 2 Cor. 13:5 (NKJV) uses the words, examine/test. He says, “Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?…”
If we KNOW Jesus & the Holy Spirit is in us, we KNOW we should not yield to stagnation & procrastination.
WOS – Don’t Stagnate nor Procrastinate
I speak unto you this day and I say, I do not want those who are Mine to stagnate and procrastinate. I want those who are Mine to keep moving with Me and doing what I have called them to do. When any people will keep their vision single and be in obedience to the commands given to them by My Holy Spirit they will want to keep moving on.
Those who have grown stagnant and are procrastinating doing what I want them to do, will find all manner of justifications and excuses for their laziness and failure to obey and come forth in My Way. I see the ones who are choosing to dull out, acting as though they are still on target. I know why they do such when they were once on fire for My Kingdom and ready to obey any directive or order which came to them by My Spirit. They would rather remain comfortable in their own stagnation than to listen to My Spirit telling them what to do. They sat too long in one spot and by refusing to “pull up stakes” and move on, they are no longer serving Me as they should. Instead they prefer to remain in where I put them long ago and claim such is their final abode. In this, they are foolish for they have not gained anything when I want them to move on and they are too much in the past to follow the commands given them by My Spirit. Why would I want My people to be as the dull, the dumb, the foolish who make no efforts to follow in the steps of the same JESUS they once loved? Quite truthfully, I am very disappointed with such ones because of the fact they are not in obedience, they are in disobedience and by such they are being rebellious and quenching My Spirit. When people grow more attached to the works of their hands, to the places they live in or own, to the transportation, etc they have chosen what they can do above Me. They will brag about how much they have done and can do and no one else is doing anything in their eyes, except them.
However what they are failing to realize is they have grown proud and turned aside to the works of their own hands and have loved the same, above Me. The god they now worship is ‘SELF’ and they want others to worship them also. They are disturbed and angry when My Spirit overshadows them to get them to move on and they don’t want to. Then they will continually strike out at anyone who indicates they should move onward, not remain in the filthy waters of stagnation.
When people turn aside from Me for any reason and refuse to move on with what I want My Spirit People to be doing they think their excuses and justifications are fine, they are deceiving themselves. Because they are being stubborn about following My Spirit’s commands if they were to die, they would not be counted acceptable unto Me. Of course they will be weeping and gnashing their teeth in anguish as they are sentenced to Hell. They will attempt to offer their stagnated and procrastinating reasons for not moving in unity, however I do not listen to them, I leave them to their own imaginations for they would rather believe lies than move in the Truth with Me, My Son, and My Spirit. Their “bad behavior” affects others for they will want others to join in their rebellion against My Desires and by the same draw others into their circle of rebels.
Over and over they are made absolute fools because they will no longer bend the knee and while in their eyes they are “so perfect” before Me they are nothing more than Hell-bound fools headed down the road to Hell. While they want everyone to know how the others cannot live without them quite obviously they are determined for damnation while refusing My desires and commands.
What the ones who have stagnated and procrastinated have failed to consider is if they want to be worshiped, they have ceased to obey and by the same are no longer accepted as they have become REJECTED. Reality is, people by their own choices and the motives of their hearts decide if they want Heaven or Hell. Those who want to be with Me in Heaven will obey and remain steadfast, enduring every trial until their earthly journey is finished and they are received as Faithful. Those who want to be worshiped have departed from My Way and demand to have their way and by the same have become fools in My sight.
People are meant to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling because they do not want to grieve Me, they are not meant to be full of impudence and imagine they can “be their own boss”. No, those who remain sincere will see Me as their boss and they will not follow after rebellious fools full of themselves.
Be serving each day in the attitude of gratitude to be pushed by My Spirit to keep moving onward. They’ll be in the Way which I want them to live in and know in My Way, they are enabled to know how good it is to be serving Me and not themselves. Truly the Faithful will see how they do not need to fear men nor what they say they can do to them. Because it is Me the Living God who gives to My people the strategies of victory. They are not meant to be “victims” they are meant to be Victors and to keep moving on from Glory to Glory giving honor and praise unto Me. They will not want to steal the Glory which belongs to Me, instead they will give Me thanks.