Question

In Acts 16:31--I have many friends of mine; I come from a Pentecostal background, and they use this Scripture to claim their family's salvation.  I have read the Scripture myself and I don't believe it--I believe that a man has to give an account to God for his own salvation.  It says here, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house" and I think people should deal with this with other Christians and let them know that is not so.

Answer

The verse itself, of course it is the Apostle Paul and he was in jail, and the earthquake came and the jail doors were thrown open, and all the stocks and chains were broken, and everybody started to leave, and the jailer knew that he would lose his life and all of this.  He was going to kill himself and Paul stops him and says, "don't harm yourself," and the guy must have known that Paul was an evangelist.  He must have known the message that he preached because he comes in and says, "Sir, what must I do to be saved?"  And what is his answer?  "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house."  What these people [Pentecostal friends] are saying is that if you believe--that means salvation for your whole house.

There are several problems with that: the man says "what must I do to be saved?" and he said, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved," and then he says, "and thy house the same."  In other words, what does everybody in his house have to do?  "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ."  The construction forbids that it mean anything else.  He doesn't say, "believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou and thy house shall be saved."  "Thou shalt be saved," and the offer is extended to thy house.  By the way, that thing doesn't hold water anyway, because the term here for house involved everything that was in his house: family members, servants, and everything.  The people who advocate "family salvation" out of that verse don't necessarily want to extend it to the mailman, the gardener, or anybody else who works for him. 

Obviously, even back in the Old Testament, very clearly God identifies individual salvation, and the same thing is all the way through the New Testament.  And when people will take one little verse like this and build a doctrine of "family salvation" on it; it is completely imposed on the text, rather than in the text.  I am glad that you pointed that out, because a lot of people are claiming that, and you can't claim that.  Your house can be saved the same way you can.  What he is saying to the jailer is, "I'm telling you--you must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved, and it's the same for anybody else."  In other words, this isn't something special just for you--this is available for anybody in your house.

It says, "they spoke the word of the Lord," and here is the key, verse 32, "And they spoke unto him the word of the Lord," and they just didn't just speak to him, but it says, "And they spoke to him the word of the Lord, and to all that were in his house."  Why?  Because, everybody else, if they were going to be saved, had to hear the same message and believe the same message, otherwise, they could have just spoken it to him and just let it go--if everybody was saved on his salvation.  "And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed their stripes; and was baptized, he and all his.  And when he had brought them into his house, he set food before them, and rejoiced, believing in God with all his house."  Did you get that?  What does that mean?  That everybody in the house--what?  Believed!  It is very clear. 

I tell you, it just boils my blood when people take verses out of the middle of nowhere and build theology around them, when all you have to do is to keep reading.  I don't know what it is in the human mind that makes people want to come up with their own little doctrines.  I can't imagine anything worse than misinterpreting the Scripture.  Inside of myself, I would rather die than do that--I just wouldn't want to do that.  Truth is the most sacred thing that we possess--isn't it?  That is why I am a believer in good training, so you can handle the Scriptures accurately.  I mean, this isn't somebody's ideas that you are throwing around--this is the Word of the Living God!  I mean, you had better get it right.