The After Sermon /// What's supposed to make the church different?

Welcome to The After Sermon by Plum Creek Church.

This bite-sized discussion is where we get to sit down with our communicators and ask a few follow up questions connected to the weekend message, unpack it on a deeper level, and explore how it all relates to our journey of following Jesus more fully.

What happens when faith stops being just about “me” and starts becoming “we”?

In this episode of The After Sermon, Daniel sits down with Doug Miller to unpack Ephesians 2 and explore one of Paul’s biggest themes: God didn’t just save us from something—he saved us into something.

Together they discuss the power of the phrase “but God,” why gratitude fuels transformation, and how the church becomes a compelling witness when people from different stories, backgrounds, and experiences learn to live as one family.

If you’ve ever wondered where you belong, or why community matters so much in following Jesus, this conversation is for you.

This conversation is also available on our YouTube channel along with the full sermon that this discussion is based on.

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@plumcreekchurch

You can learn more about Plum Creek Church by visiting our website as well.

Website: https://plumcreek.church/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome back to the after sermon where we get to sit down with the communicator from the weekend and talk about the sermon. Doug Miller, thank you for joining us. You bet. Awesome. All right. So give us a little synopsis.

SPEAKER_00 0:12

Yeah, we're uh slowly working our way through the book of Ephesians. Uh-huh. We're in chapter two this week. Okay. And a letter that Paul wrote to a church that he started in a thriving metropolis of um what we know Turkey today, uh a port city where it was a strategic place to plant a church because it would be out of this place that the message of the gospel would go to other regions as well.

SPEAKER_01 0:38

So you said that Ephesians 2 leads us from who we are to how we got here. Uh unpack that for us a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

I think there's this this kind of uh moment of change that Paul is talking about. He describes who we were before we knew God, and then kind of the but God moment, he provided opportunity for us to be made right with him through the work of Christ on the cross, and then there are all of these things that kind of start happening as a result of what he did in our lives, but also in our community.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Right, right. Okay. So you said those two words, and I felt like a lot of your sermon kind of hovered around this but God moment. What do those two words kind of stir in you personally?

SPEAKER_00 1:27

I think in the context of Ephesians, the apostle Paul wants us to not forget where we've come from. And this was important in the in the context of this book or letter that uh Paul wrote, there were a group of folks, Gentiles, that's me, because I didn't come from Jewish descent, that felt as though they were on the outside. And there's times when I felt like I'm on the outside, wondering how it is that it all works for me to be in the family of God. And so when he says this but God moment, it's like remember where you were, don't spend too much time looking back because things are different now, and that's that but God moment.

SPEAKER_01 2:02

Got it, got it. Okay, so you also made the point that grace does not just forgive us, it transforms us. How do we hold the tension between striving? Like we don't want to, we're not trying to strive, right? But we also don't want to just drift. How do where do we find ourselves in that tension?

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Yeah, I think we can get caught up on the extremes easily. What matters most is the motive of our heart, and that's why we said we don't behave to get into right relationship with God. Right. God puts us in relate right relationship with him because of what he did on the cross. That's not our doing, but our response for um the gratitude we have for all that he's done for us is that we choose to leave live the Jesus way, and so we're not striving to uh become um in God's favor because of what Jesus has done. My heart then is touched in a different way, and then that becomes the thing that precipitates my behavior changing in significant ways.

SPEAKER_01 3:05

I felt like it was really interesting how Ephesians 2 kind of falls into these two categories. Like, first it's like, you know, uh what Christ did, kind of like the wow god moments. And then it shifts to like, well, who we are. So it's like me to me. Um what's that shift? Talk talk about the shift from from me to we, but then also I want to dive into this idea of like sometimes I think it's really easy to have faith or salvation be this like very personal experience, and somehow then we miss out on the communal aspect of what that decision uh you know does. Totally. Talk to us about that.

SPEAKER_00 3:47

Well, we we talk at Plum Creek often about how God created us for a community. So the first aspect is that there needs to be a personal decision, there needs to be a change in Doug. But when I choose to say yes to living the Jesus way, I'm also doing that in the context of community with others. And that's where church comes into play. That's where our relationships come into play. And so because we've said yes to Jesus, we've stepped across the line of faith, and he's doing this work in us, then that should and must change the way that we live and we behave and we interact with one another and we love differently and we forgive differently, we care differently. And so that's the big shift from the me to the we, where, yep, God's done something in me and it's unmistakable. But now I have a responsibility in the context of community to live this out, and we do that together. And so the thing that we have been saying too throughout the the series, there's this thread that runs. The way we do that becomes something the world around us observes. And you can imagine in the context of the church at Ephesus, there's this, there's factions and disagreements and opposition to one another. And Paul knows if that doesn't get addressed, this thing's not moving forward here. And this community so desperately needs to understand the life change that comes when I say yes to Jesus. The only way that will be compelling is if this church understands the responsibility they have to now live not as two separate people groups, but as one family. And that's that's the heart behind the local church. And the message isn't just for this church 2,000 years ago, that that's a message for each of us today, that as we've said yes to God, then we live different in the context of community. And that should then become compelling. You can imagine the world around the church in Ephesus going, What's going on? Yeah. These two people that literally have been fighting with one another for centuries now are going to church together. They care for one another, they love one another, and that would be super compelling to the world. Like, how did that happen?

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

The change that Jesus did in me, and I'm just living that out in the context of community. Why don't you come and join us? So that's the whole heart behind it.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

I love that. I love that. Okay. So one other thing. I just wanted to give you a couple minutes because we're on the heels of Camp Creek Kids, uh, our summer VBS for kids. And it was really cool like how you uh took a moment at the beginning of the service just to kind of recognize the impact that that makes. Um, but I want to give you a moment here. Talk about CCK and what it means to you for our church.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

Well, I mean, I think it fits even in the context of what we're talking about this weekend, right? Like we should live different. And Plum Creek's trying to live. We don't get it right all the time. I love what Eric says. You know, I might not always get it right, but I can make it right. And we're doing our best to live, you know, in an intentional way in our valley that's making a difference and impacting lives. And so, you know, I first of all, man, kudos to our to our kids team. Yeah, unreal. They just so great. And lead with excellence. I mean, this place was beautiful, and the energy that was in the room, and the contributors that said yes. And then what people wouldn't know is that our staff, everybody, stepped in and stepped uh into be contributing and helping, whether it was leading a small group or behind a camera or helping lead worship or whatever it is, you know, working in the parking lot. Like there was just a collective, um, a collective yes that came from 300 contributors, staff, and volunteers that uh just poured into these lives and it's exciting to me. I said too, this isn't uh just a thought the Lord had given me one of the mornings when I got up and was praying for the crew. We don't ever get to see our collective influence like that very often. Yeah, but our kids team are ministering to five over 500 kids every single weekend. Sure. It's just spread over four services and in a whole bunch of different rooms. Yeah. So for our team to see, hey, this is this is the kind of influence that we're having in this community. And I'm hoping and praying that those that came that may not have been part of uh the Plum Creek family yet would be compelled and say, wow, that was incredible. The way you guys invested in our children, the way the contributors stepped in and were just like so amazing. And even the decorations and the worship and the teaching and all the things just made a different in my difference in my kids' life. And I want to be part of this too. So that feels like Ephesians 2 living to me right now. Absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

It's amazing. All right. Well, if you want to hear the entire sermon that this conversation was based on, you can head to our YouTube channel or you can get it wherever you get your podcast. Until next time, thanks so much. See you guys.