You and Your Household

Modern evangelical Christianity usually views faith and salvation exclusively as the result of a unique personal choice.  It isn't something you inherit from your parents, the way that Jewish heritage is passed down.  It isn't something that other people do for you, like being baptized into the Catholic Church as an infant.  Just because you were "raised Christian" doesn't mean you are automatically "saved."  Salvation is viewed as the result of "accepting Jesus into your heart" as a motivation for repentance.

So what are we to do with the numerous passages in the New Testament that reference the idea of one's entire household being saved due to their faith?  Acts 10:24 is about Cornelius and his entire household being saved, and Acts 16:15 is about Lydia and her entire household being baptized.  As a female dye merchant, presumably her "household" would have likely consisted of her serving staff.  Now I see nothing preventing servants from becoming Christians, but I am not convinced that my employer changing their beliefs would lead to me changing mine in all cases.  Now in their favor, they did have Paul evangelizing to them, and he was pretty good at that I hear.  But he didn't have a 100% success record, so that is not the magic solution to the puzzle.  Now God can bring all of those people to him through an experience of his presence and the Holy Spirit and such, so that could be the "magic solution" that would explain that outcome.

But the best example of this is in Acts 16:31 where Paul tells the Philippian jailer “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.”  Now that statement could be taken a number of ways, and is followed by a description of Paul sharing "the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house."  But it is a strange offer or promise none the less.  I don't think we usually should presume upon God to save others, regardless of what we have seen in the past.  That is where the gift of free will is supposed to take effect.

Now I know God can do whatever he wants, and those stories are hardly impossible, especially when compared to other things going on at the same time.  I just think it is interesting to examine how those events are presented in the Bible, as household events.  It causes me to rethink my preconceived ideas on the mechanics of salvation, that come from a very Americanized individualistic perspective.  Not to dramatically change them, just to re-evaluate them.