ASK JESUS INTO YOUR HEART?

Many unclear and unscriptural terms are being used today in presenting the gospel. God's Word says, "Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech (II Corinthians 3:12)."

I believe our effectiveness in presenting the gospel is directly related to our clarity. If we are not clear, then how will anyone understand what we are saying? The Scripture says, "For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle? So likewise you, except you utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? For you speak into the air (I Corinthians 14:8-9)." There are many uncertain and unclear sounds being spoken today in the name of Jesus Christ, and the result of ten times is confusion. We need to recognize that "God is not the author of confusion, but of peace (I Corinthians 14:33)." Satan therefore is getting the victory and Satan is the author of confusion.

One such term or expression is "Ask Jesus into your heart". The same expression is sometimes phrased, "Ask Jesus into your life", or "Invite Jesus into your heart". Nowhere does one find anything like this in the Bible. The Bible says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved (Acts 16:31)." Why don't we use Bible terms? Why not drop the unclear ones?

I was raised on the phrase "Ask Jesus into your heart", and yet I was never saved. Every Sunday morning in the church that I was raised we sang a song called "Come Into My Heart, Lord Jesus". The words were as follows: "Into my heart, into my heart; Come into my heart, Lord Jesus." We sang this song every Sunday morning and were given the opportunity to "Invite Jesus into our hearts". Well, I sincerely invited Jesus into my heart each Sunday and yet I was not saved.

My theology was totally based on the words of the song. I would pray something like, "Lord, please come into my heart. If you came into my heart before and left, please come into my heart again. If you never came into my heart before, please come in for the first time. If you came in and left, please come back and stay." The song taught that Christ could come and go at will. I was confused and frustrated.

I invited Jesus into my heart at least 600 times, yet I was not saved because that message is not the gospel. I hardly missed a Sunday at church from the time I was six years old until I was eighteen years of age. To be fair, let's say that from the time I was six years old until I was eighteen on at least 50 Sundays a year I invited Jesus into my heart. Eighteen minus six is twelve years times fifty times a year equals 600 (six hundred) times that I invited Jesus into my heart. On at least 600 occasions I invited Jesus into my heart.

Not until after I had turned eighteen years of age did I understand that I had to believe the gospel message of the death, burial and resurrection in order to be saved. "For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek (Romans 1:16)." I had never understood John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

In other words, "asking" is not what saves. A person must "believe", or trust that Jesus paid for his sins on the cross, was buried and rose again from the dead. In fact, a person can ask to be saved and not be saved.

Both thieves on the cross "asked" to be saved and yet only one was saved. The dying thief that was saved was saved because he trusted Christ as the one who was dying in his place on the cross and would rise again from the dead and head up a kingdom. No one has ever been saved any differently than that dying thief who simply trusted Christ as his Saviour.

"Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity (Matthew 7:22,23)." Many who were counting on being saved are lost according to the above verses. How tragic! They were lost because they were trusting in works and not trusting in Jesus Christ as their only hope for heaven. What about Revelation 3:20? "Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me." First of all, the verse (Revelation 3:20) is not talking about salvation but about having supper or fellowship with the Lord. Second, the door mentioned is the door (read the context of Revelation 3:14-22) of the church of Laodicea. This is not a reference to the door of the heart or the door of your life, etc.

We are often told (and wrongly so) that we have a door to our heart. We hear that the door has a latch on the inside but not on the outside. Christ is knocking on the outside but can not come in unless we unlatch the lock from the inside of the heart. The Scripture teaches no such thing. This is untrue. This is nonsense.

It is sad because children are very literal in their approach to things. They are left confused. They see a contradiction between what they learn in biology and what they hear in church. In biology they learn nothing about a door or latches on the heart.

The devil will do all he can to confuse the lost (II Corinthians 4:4). He will often use our unclear terminology to accomplish this. Why not go back to the Bible terms? "For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son that WHOSOEVER BELIEVETH in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16).

Some will say, "I was saved by asking Jesus into my heart". Actually, they were saved in spite of asking Jesus into their heart, because they trusted Christ to save them. It is either that or they are not saved. In my case, I asked Jesus into my heart on at least 600 different occasions and was not saved, because I had never understood the gospel and had never TRUSTED Christ as my Saviour. I am pleading for the many who are confused and unsaved but thinking they are saved because of the use of this unscriptural expression: "Invite Jesus into your heart". Let's use "great plainness of speech". Let's go back to the Bible.

You may be a member of a church fifty years, but you will be damned at last unless you are a member of Christ. It matters not though you are a church-officer, a deacon, an elder, a pastor, a bishop, or even Archbishop of Canterbury, or an apostle, you will perish as surely as Judas, who betrayed his Master with a kiss, unless your heart is right with God. I pray you, put no confidence in your profession. Unless you have Christ in your heart, a profession is but a painted pageantry for a soul to go to hell in. As a corpse is drawn to the grave by horses adorned with nodding plumes, so may you find in an outward profession a pompous way of being lost. God save us from that!

snip

Say to all those who call you away, "Nay, but I will die here"; for nobody ever did perish trusting in Jesus. There has not been through all these centuries a single instance of a soul being cast away that came all guilty and hell-deserving, and took Christ to be its salvation. If you perish, you will then be the first that perished with his hand laid upon Christ. His love and power can never fail a sinner's confidence. Wherefore, may God the Holy Spirit lead you to resolve, "If I must die, I will die here." Listen to me, soul, whoever thou mayest be out of the crowd, man or women, whatever thy life may have been, even though it should have been that of a harlot or a thief, a drunkard or a profligate, if thou wilt now believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, thou shalt be saved; for, if not, then God himself will have missed his greatest design. What did he give Jesus for but to save sinners? What did he lay sin upon Jesus for, but that he might take it off the sinner, and let him go free, and be pardoned? If, then, Christ fails, God's grandest expedient has broken down. That method by which the Lord resolved to show what his almighty grace can do has proved to be a failure if a believing sinner is not saved. Dost thou think that such a thing can ever be? It is blasphemy to think that Jehovah can be defeated. He that believes in Christ shall be saved; nay, he is saved.

If thou art not saved believing in Christ, then Christ himself is dishonoured. Oh, let them once know, down in the dark abode of fallen spirits, that a man has trusted in Christ and yet has not been saved, I tell you that they will make such exultation over Christ as Philistia made over Samson when his eyes were put out. They would feel that they had defeated the Prince of Glory. They would trample on his blood, and ridicule his claim to be the Savour of men. If any soul can truly say hereafter, "I went to Christ, and he refused me," then Christ does not speak the truth when he says, "Him that cometh to me I will in nowise cast out." Then he has changed his nature, foregone his word, and foresworn himself. But that also can never be. herefore, dear heart, cling to Jesus, and say still, "If I die, I will die here."

Moreover, if thou canst perish trusting in Christ thou wilt discourage all the saints of God; for if Christ can break his promise to one, then why not to another? If one promise fails, why not all the promises? If the blood has lost its power, how can any of us ever hope to enter heaven? I say it will breed great discouragement in the hearts of all people if this be true; for what a wet blanket would e throne over all thy fellow-sinners! If they are coming to Christ, they will start back, and say, "What is the good of it? Here is one that came to Jesus, and he did not save him. He trusted in the precious blood, and yet his sin was laid to his charge." If one fails, why not the rest? I must give up preaching the gospel when once I hear of a man trusting Jesus and not being saved; for I should be afraid to speak with boldness, as I now do.

If one poor soul that puts his trust in Christ should be cast away it would spoil heaven itself. What security is there for glorified spirits that their splendours shall endure except the promise of a faithful, covenant-keeping God? If, then, looking down from their celestial seats, they behold the great Father breaking his promise, and the Son of God unable to save those for whom he died, then will they say, "We will lay our harps aside, and put our palms away, for we, too, after all, may perish." See, then, O man, heaven and earth, ay, God and his Christ, as to their credit and their glory, do stand and fall with the salvation of every believing sinner. If I were in your stead tonight, I think that I should bless God to have this matter put so plainly to me. I know that years ago, when I was under a sense of sin, if I had heard even such a poor sermon as this I should have jumped for joy at it, and would have ventured upon Christ at once. Come, poor soul; come at once. You have heard the gospel long enough; now obey it. You have heard about Christ long enough; now trust in him. You have been invited and entreated, and pleaded with; now yield to his grace. Yield to joy and peace by trusting in him who will give you both of these as soon as you have rested in him.

Look! sinner, look! A look out of thyself will save thee. Look away from all thy works, and prayers, and tears, and feelings, and church-goings, and chapel-goings, and sacraments, and ministers. Look alone to Jesus. Look at once to him who on the bloody tree made expiation, and who bids thee look, and thou shalt live.

God make this present hour to be the period of thy new birth. I pray it, and so do his people. The Lord hearken to our intercessions, for Christ's sake. Amen.

Taken From:

Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit

Vol. 31, No. 1826Charles Spurgeon

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