After the Sermon: Philippians 4:6-7
12/1/2025 | Thad Yessa | The Antidote: God’s Cures for the World’s Contagions
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Welcome to the After the Sermon podcast where Pastor Thad answers follow-up questions and we share Igor personal applications from the sermon for the benefit of the church. My name is Brian and I'm here with Pastor Thad is Monday morning. Hello everyone. Everyone. And we want to remind you with this podcast that sermons are not just a Sunday thing. So we got a handful of questions. Our first one this morning is from Darcy. She wrote in, can you say more about a present active command in scripture? Are there other types of imperatives? How do we know the difference and should we apply them differently?
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Thank you, Darcy. I appreciate this question for a couple of reasons. I had a seminary professor, my Greek professor, who just really had a firm stance on how to use Greek and sermons, and he said that it should be underwear supportive but not seen. And so just getting to flush this out a little bit more. And so can I say more about the present active command in scripture and to be precise with the word I used? And so in Philippians four, six, you have do not be anxious about anything and that word specifically be anxious about if we were to be very technical for just a moment, it's a verb. It is a present active imperative, second person plural. Now for the Aboriginal Center, I am assuming that doesn't mean much and that is okay. I don't think to read our Bibles, we have to be Greek scholars.
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Like I said, Greek is supportive. It's helpful in knowing you might see some things that you might not in an English translation, but when we're talking specifically about Greek verbs, there are questions that someone who knows the Greek language could ask or we in using our English translations could ask is who is doing the actions? That's the person. How many are doing it? That's the number. How is the action being portrayed? That's the tense. Is this a fact, a command, a possibility or a wish? And that's the mood. And then the voice is the subject, acting, receiving, or participating. So in the Greek language, when you're looking and translating verbs, that's what you're looking for, that there's different ways the words are put together that help indicate what it is, what the different person, number tense mood and voice are. So kind of to back up and just to be a little technical, and I had to pull out my Greek workbooks from seminary that I've not touched in a really long time, but just to walk a little bit more through that.
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So the person, is it first person, second person, third person? Is it the speaker, the one who spoke about or the one spoken about? So speaker, the one spoken to, the one spoken about. So we could say, I release. So if I'm using the word I release, that is a first person singular. The first person is doing in. Its only involving one person. And then when you get to the number, it's either singular or plural, one person, multiple people. Now when you get to the tenses, you kind of start getting into a little bit more, okay, English class, getting really in depth. You have the present tense. It's an ongoing action in the moment, an imperfect tense. It's ongoing or customary past action. You have an Aris tense, which is a complete action. You have a future tense, meaning this is an action that's going to happen in the future.
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You have a perfect tense. It's completed action with a present result, and you have a plu perfect tense, a completed action with results in the past. That's a lot. It's a lot. The biblical languages take a lot of work. And it's actually, it's like any skillset that if you don't use it frequently, you have to kind of relearn or reteach yourself. Now, where I want to get us to is the mood, the indicative mood. It's the mood of reality. It states what is actual factual or assumed. The imperative, which is the word we're talking about, is a mood of command. It gives orders, instructions, or urgent requests, which is what our word is that we're going to be looking at. Subjunctive is the mood of probability or purpose. It expresses what may might or should happen. And the optive mood is a mood of wish, expressing desire, blessings, ideal possibilities.
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And so as we think about this word, and in Greek it appears just as one word, but it actually has three words that we would translate in English language to make it the present. So it's a happening now imperative, it's an action, it's a command that we're supposed to follow and then it's active. So this is what we're supposed to do. We're going for us, do not be anxious. Stop being anxious. It's a command from Paul or it's the same translation. If you were to look at Matthew six's Jesus, sermon on the Mount, do not be anxious. And so the reason I highlighted that this is a present active command in the sermon is just to indicate for us that this is a command with ongoing action that we're meant to be following after. We can tend to look at commands in scripture and not necessarily view them as command.
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Just say, oh, that's a nice or that's a good thought. And it gets to this point of, am I disobeying a command of Jesus? Am I sinning or is this just a suggestion on this is an ideal way for me to live? And so my kind of premise in addressing that was to say that Jesus does say in Matthew six, and Paul says in the Philippians four that it is a command to be followed after, and therefore to disobey that command, it leads towards sin. Now, I didn't go into a whole differentiating between, well between the good worry, anxious alarm and the negative and parse out every single example of it. To just highlight though, I think we need to take Jesus' command seriously and Paul's command to us that we should not be anxious if we find ourselves being anxious. We should ask the question of, am I sinning?
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Am I disobeying? Is there something in my heart that is causing me to be anxious? Is there something that's causing me to not draw near to God? Is there something causing me to not draw near to others and invite them into the conversation? So that's a long kind of explanation of a little bit of the Greek in that what I really want to get to though is how do we know the difference and should we apply them differently? What I would just really encourage all Christians, but specifically those here at West Hills, is to have a really good Bible study and know of really good Bible resources that, as I said, I don't think you have to know Hebrew or Greek or Aramaic to be able to read and understand and apply to the Bible. I don't even think you need a study Bible or all these Bible resources.
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I do think they are really helpful tools for us though. So I would just encourage very great starting point, get a really good study Bible. We are extremely blessed with a plethora of wonderful study Bibles. I find myself most drawn to a couple of different ones. The Reformation Study Bible done by the ESV, the general ESV study Bible. There is a NIV Zondervan Study Bible super helpful. That's just a couple that come to the top of my mind of ones that I regularly use and find helpful. And again, we've got so many different ones of a church history study, Bible, an archeological study bible, a biblical theology study Bible, lots of options, lots of options out there. And so I would just encourage someone to avail themselves of using these great resources because in study Bibles not all, they're not going to give you all the parsings of the different verbs in that, but they're going to give you guides and helps and notes that'll help you perhaps understand a little differently.
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I would also say there's a lot of really good digital resources that bible hub.com, you can look at every single word that's translated and it'll give you its own parsing. It'll help some of the Greek language. That's what I had pulled up to look at what the actual parsing of the Greek words were. And Philipps four through six, you can pay for different Bible softwares, like logs, Bible software is kind of like the premier one, and they have different packages that are available, but you can either download it onto your phone or computer or you can use their web browser. Also really helpful. And I'd also say just a really good commentary that not all commentaries are so technical that the lay person couldn't use, but instead, they're just really helpful tools that I often just encourage people when they're leading a life group and they're walking through a book like, Hey, here's a couple really helpful commentaries that go deep enough that if there's going to be a real technical question, it'll point you in the right direction, but also just devotional enough that it's going to be really helpful in that.
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And so to just avail yourself of some of those resources that will help you understand more of what's going on with these particular phrasings or these words. And I would argue that most Bible translations that we're going to find ourselves using really smart Bible scholars have helped translate those so that the words being used are indicating the correct meaning of the word, the ESV, the CSB, the NIV, the NASB, the LSB, the lots of them out there. So I would just say look at a couple different translations as well as another way to how does this translation differ from this one and use them together. And so I would say all of that together is a little bit of, here's more about present active command. It means it's a, this is what you should be doing,
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And then to avail yourself for some of the resources to help if someone doesn't know Greek to be able to do that. Or just encourage, I think if anyone in our church, and we've thrown this around before of doing a biblical languages class of you can teach yourself Greek. There's a lot of really great resources out there that it's not so hard that you couldn't just dedicate an hour or two a week and learning vocab and learning the alphabet and reading a little bit and doing a workbook that you wouldn't be able to understand a little bit more in depth what's going on in the Greek language.
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That's good. Thanks. Callie also wrote in, she writes, how would you assess the health of West Hills in terms of praying for one another and bearing each other's burdens? What are some practical ways we can keep growing in this?
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How would I assess? I don't have a barometer or even a skill that I could think would be the most helpful. I would describe it as growing. How would I access the health of West Hills in terms of praying for one another and bearing each other's burdens? Both aspects of we're encouraged by Paul for those who are anxious to not be anxious. And then with prayer and Thanksgiving and supplication, make your requests be made known to God. And one of the aspects I drew out is as recipients of God's peace through the work of Jesus, we are to extend that peace towards one another. And so as I think about West Hill's, tangible ways in which I've seen this to be an ongoing work in the church would be the prayer requests that we're getting from the connection cards just on the back, that there was a time where there were four or five or the same, four or five, either individuals or requests that were seeing more people jump on board to be sharing those requests.
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I see people praying for one another in the lobby of, or people coming up to me and sharing a burden. And I'll, instead of just saying, yeah, I'll pray for that and make an active effort to pray right then for that individual, we've seen some people forward for prayer after the service that as we close all of our services, everyone's reminded, Hey, you can come forward and share your prayer request with a member of the prayer team or an elder and receive prayer. I think of all of those three, the coming forward is probably the least taken advantage of. And again, there could be a variety of reasons for that. But again, I've seen people in the lobby throughout the building, in the parking lot, praying with one another. And so I can assume that it is ongoing, continuing growing. So that's probably my assessment of one another's burdens.
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I guess if I had add, another one that I don't have tons of data on would just be in our life groups and in our discipleship groups. I know in my life group that we keep an ongoing list of all the requests that are being shared for the group, and we can always reference back to those, some of the other life groups and discipleship groups that are specifically in my shepherding group. They have either a Google doc or a notes app, or they send me screenshots of their prayer requests. So I know that those groups are sharing prayer requests, they're sharing burdens. They know that those requests are being shared with me as well so that I can be praying for them. And that's happening not just in the groups that I'm involved with, but in the other ones. And so I think there's an ongoing growth towards bearing one another's burdens towards praying for one another.
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What are some practical ways we can keep growing in this? If I could give one big one is to start with just being vulnerable. I think this is modeled for us so well in our lead pastor will just even sharing openly struggles, hardships, difficulties from the pulpit. And I think it starts there. It starts with leadership, not just with him, but the other elders and staff and ministry leaders and deacons, life group leaders, de group leaders, but just a vulnerableness that if we really believe that the gospel was enough to save us and bring us into everlasting life and relationship with the God of the universe, then we also believe that the gospel is real enough to deal with our real problems of the everyday moments of our lives. If I had to guess, there's probably two reasons I could probably think of more why we don't see more.
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That's not to say we don't see any at all, but see more prayer requests submitted on the connection cards or through the app or on our website or the coming forward at the end of a service is either the lack of vulnerability. And so it could be a pride issue of I don't want other people to know this. And again, coming to God in prayer is an admission that we are weak, we are not in control, we need someone else. And then to invite someone else in is to let someone else see our own weakness. And so I think there's a temptation of pride that we want people to see us in a certain light that perhaps we still put on our mask when we walk into the church doors that we don't want people to see or know the hardships, the difficulties, the things that we're worried about, the things that we're fearful about, the things that we're anxious about.
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And so I think that's one aspect of it, and I continue to pray that that culture will continue to shift. It has started shifting, but that will become more of a reality. And then I think the other aspect is probably just an uncomfortableness. I can picture moments where people have probably shared and they weren't met with the response they thought they were going to get, meaning someone shares something hard, difficult, trying to another individual, and that individual doesn't know how to respond and so it just feels awkward and makes them feel insignificant or not seen or not valued. And so I think those are probably two of the ways to do it. And so I would say how can practical ways of, I would just encourage everyone to build it into a habit and rhythm when you get to service that at some point throughout, you'll take some time to share a prayer request.
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Again, we all have something that we can pray about, something that the Lord has put on our heart, some burden, some stress that perhaps we might think it's insignificant. So why would I burden someone else with this? And so I would just encourage, build it into a habit. For me, if I'm going to submit a prayer request, it's going to be I sat down and at the very beginning of the service or as the sermon's wrapping up, those are the kind of two moments where if I'm going to submit a prayer request, I know I need to write it down, otherwise I'm going to forget. It's going to feel rushed for me at the end, and then I'm just not going to do it. So just build it into a habit. And again, our prayer requests on those cards, you can mark whether it's public or whether it's confidential, meaning if it's public, it's probably going to be, there's the potential for it to be prayed for in a service, which I think is a really good thing.
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I think that's been an improvement that we've seen in the pastoral prayers led by the elders of prayer requests of the church being shared with the church being prayed for by the church and then confidential that that's going to a very select number of individuals that everyone who on that list who sees them, they understand that it is a confidential prayer request, but you have the ability to mark whether it is public or whether it's confidential, and those are respected. And again, just build that into your habit, build it into your rhythm that at some point throughout the Sunday morning you write down on that connection card or you use the church center app or you submit it online. Lots of different ways that we've tried to make it accessible to people. So I think that's one, I think two for the individual to also make it a habit of when someone shares a prayer request to do two possible things.
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The first would be just pray for in the moment of someone shares something, Hey, can I pray for you right now? You don't have to make it awkward, you don't have to make it weird, but just try to build that into your own habit that when someone shares a prayer request, instead of saying, I'll be praying about that, to just take a moment, take 30 seconds a minute and just pray with that individual right now. And then second to find a way to keep track of that. If someone sends me a or tells me a specific prayer request about a specific date or time or something coming up, I try in that moment to either text it to myself, send myself an email, put it in my prayer notes app, or add it immediately to my calendar so that I'll get a prayer prompt about it so that whether I've prayed for it in the moment, when that prayer request for a specific time and place, I'm getting a reminder.
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And then I can text that individual or call them or email them and say like, Hey, I just want you to know I remembered your prayer request and that I'm praying about it. I think we are all can fall into the temptation to someone share something. I'll be praying about that and then immediately forget to pray about it that we just because of the busyness of life, we just move fast and don't think tons about it. And so then to just build it into your habit to continue to do that. And then other than that, I would say in after services, just remember that there's no prayer request too big or too small that you can't come forward and share. I know the prayer team and the elders would be so encouraged to be praying for individuals after the service that they would make it.
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They would take that step to come forward in faith, to know that they'll be received and prayed for that. They would be blessed by that opportunity to pray for them. I would say in your group community, whether that's a life group or a D group, to just be vulnerable with one another, to share about the real things of life and make it really personal, general, just kind of prayer request guide that I would commend all groups of asking the question, how can we pray for you personally, it's great to pray for aunts and uncles and cousins and those distance removed or those extended, but I would also just say, when sharing prayer requests, there should be at least one personal applicable prayer request to you, the individual. And if you're a group leader who's listening and you've got someone in your group who's never shared a personal prayer request, like something for them to just strongly encourage and exhort them that we want to care the best for you possible.
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And so one of the ways we can do that is for you to share how is it that we can pray for you or a way that we wrap up our group after our discussion of the particular text we've been studying and discussing. I say, how can we pray for each other in light of this passage, meaning a direct application from this passage? How does that direct our prayers for one another? And again, we can pray outside of that, but that's just one kind of rhythm that I've tried to build into the life group that I lead. I'm sure there's lots of other ways, practical ways that we can continue to grow. There are a lot of really great resources out there, good books, good bible studies, good apps that you can use to help grow in your prayer life. But I think just being vulnerable, being active in our prayer, sharing those prayer requests, praying for one another right away, filling out those cards. I think all of those lead towards steps where we can continue to see a growing pattern of praying and bearing one another's burdens in our church.
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That's practical. Thanks. Lastly is an application from Emily. She wrote that I would replace my worries with prayer, meditating on God's truths. That's good.
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That's a great way
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To end in a great prayer for all of us. Thank you, Emily. We pray that this has been beneficial and edifying for you as you seek to be changed and to love God more as you apply God's word after the sermon. So now go continue to apply the sermon and make disciples, and Lord willing, we'll catch you right back here next week.