{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"Houston's First Baptist Church","title":"Strange Gods","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":2436,"description":"In this sermon the speaker warns that \"strange gods\"—ideas and belief systems not found in Scripture—are infiltrating American culture and threatening the church. He begins by recalling Jacob’s command to remove foreign idols before building an altar at Bethel, using it as a biblical illustration of the need to purge false worship. He then describes a spiritual vacuum in America caused by the failure of science, education, materialism, and a lack of authentic gospel preaching, which leaves people vulnerable to heresies, Eastern religions, and various modern philosophies.\n\nThe preacher categorizes these erroneous teachings into five major fallacies: the nature of God (atheism, deism, humanism), the nature of the Son of God (denying Jesus’ deity, virgin birth, or historicity), the authority of Scripture (claims that the Bible is incomplete or erroneous), the role of the Holy Spirit (exalting or ignoring the Spirit), and the nature of humanity (human exaltation, self‑deification). He critiques each, emphasizing that any doctrine that diminishes God’s sovereignty, Jesus’ unique mediatorship, or the full sufficiency of Scripture is a \"strange god\" that must be rejected. The sermon concludes with a call to uphold the faith once delivered to the saints, to keep Jesus Christ at the center of worship, and to pray for protection against pride and the seductive errors of the age.","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/o5yzRQYlXr9ParDz0W15WXJmDEyj_QNDo8tzYNqSRoc/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS8wN2Ew/Yjg4MTI1YTdmNDVi/Mjc2NWZiNDkwYTBi/OTU4MS5qcGc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}