I don't forward a lot of things but in light of so many shallow 
presentations of the gospel, these days, I thought this article by 
brother David Cloud, worth reading.  It isn't long.

Text of forwarded message follows:
>~~~
>GIVING MY LIFE TO JESUS AND ASKING JESUS INTO MY HEART
>
>Oftentimes an individual tells me, "I have given my life to Jesus," 
>or "I have invited Jesus into my heart."
>
>I have no doubt that some people who describe their salvation in 
>these terms are genuinely saved, but these are not biblical 
>descriptions of salvation and I am convinced that to use such 
>terminology is not a harmless mistake. To "give my life to Christ" 
>or to merely "invite Jesus into my heart" gives the wrong idea, in fact.
>
>TO "GIVE MY LIFE TO CHRIST" implies that I have something good or 
>worthwhile to offer to Him and that there is something good in me 
>that God would accept, which is definitely not true. "As it is 
>written, There is none righteous, no, not one" (Rom. 3:10). The 
>Bible says that even our supposed righteousness is unacceptable 
>before a thrice holy God: "... we are all as an unclean thing, and 
>all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags" (Isaiah 64:6).
>
>TO "INVITE JESUS INTO MY HEART" is not the same as acknowledging my 
>wicked sin and my frightful unsaved condition and putting my trust 
>in what Jesus Christ has done on the cross for me as the only means 
>of salvation. To "invite Jesus into my heart" implies that my heart 
>is not the filthy thing that the Bible says that it is. "The heart 
>is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know 
>it?" (Jer. 17:9). It is true that the Bible says Jesus Christ comes 
>into the life of the believer. In 2 Cor. 6:16 God says, "I will 
>dwell in them, and walk in them," but this is only after the 
>individual is redeemed and cleansed and sanctified by faith in 
>Christ's atonement.
>
>The term "invite Jesus into my heart" is usually based on 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, this is not an invitation to an 
>individual but to a church. See verse 19. "As many as I love, I 
>rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent." Jesus is 
>graciously knocking on the door of the wayward church and inviting 
>individuals to respond to His rebuke by repenting of their apostate 
>condition. I do not doubt that there is an application of this verse 
>that extends to Christ's blessed invitation to individual sinners, 
>but we know that one verse cannot contradict everything else the New 
>Testament says about salvation.
>
>To tell the sinner merely to receive Jesus into his or her heart 
>gives the wrong idea UNLESS we carefully explain about his sinful 
>condition and God's judgment of sin (Rom. 1:18 - 3:18) and Jesus' 
>sacrifice for sin (Rom. 3:19-24). This is the true Roman's Road plan 
>of salvation.
>
>The Gospel is not inviting Jesus into my heart; it is summarized as 
>follows by the Lord's apostle: "For I delivered unto you first of 
>all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins 
>according to the scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he 
>rose again the third day according to the scriptures" (1 Cor. 15:3-4).
>
>Biblical salvation is described in Acts 20 as repenting of my sin 
>and self-will, which means to surrender to God, and putting my faith 
>in Jesus Christ as my sin bearer. This is the message that Paul 
>preached. "Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, 
>repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ" (Acts 20:21).
>
>Biblical salvation is described in Romans 10 in terms of believing 
>in the heart that God has raised Jesus from the dead (Rom. 10:9).
>
>Biblical salvation is described in John 3 in terms of being born 
>again by putting my faith in what Jesus did when He was lifted up on 
>the cross (John 3:3, 14-16).
>
>Biblical salvation is described in Acts 4 in terms of believing in 
>Jesus Christ as the only Lord and Saviour (Acts 4:10-12).
>
>Biblical salvation is described in Acts 8 in terms of believing with 
>all one's heart that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that He paid 
>the sacrifice that was demanded by God's law and that is described 
>in Isaiah 53 (Acts 8:26-27).
>
>There are many other descriptions of salvation in the New Testament, 
>but nowhere is salvation described as "giving my life to Jesus" or 
>merely "inviting Jesus into my heart."
>
>We need to be very careful about salvation, because nothing in this 
>life is more important than finding the right way of salvation and 
>the Bible warns that there are false gospels and false christs and 
>false spirits (2 Cor. 11:1-4).
>
>We are saved by believing from the heart "that form of doctrine 
>which was delivered" to us, which refers to the doctrinal content of 
>the biblical Gospel. "But God be thanked, that ye were the servants 
>of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine 
>which was delivered you" (Rom. 6:17).
>
>Shallow presentations of the gospel can become "another gospel" if 
>the individual is left with a wrong concept of what it means to be saved.
>
>It is instructive that many of those who are victims of the "Quick 
>Prayerism" method of evangelism and who have merely prayed a 
>sinner's prayer but do not show any evidence of regeneration 
>describe their salvation in the aforementioned terms.
>___________________________
>
>SOME RESPONSES TO THIS ARTICLE:
>
>"I agree completely. Most of us have probably been guilty of 
>repeating terminology we have heard, even if it is not biblically 
>sound, including these phrases. However, I think it is important to 
>use the language of the Bible. These two phrases are not descriptive 
>of Bible salvation, reflect a shallow understanding and presentation 
>of the gospel, and could easily deceive someone about the true 
>nature of repentance and faith" (Thomas Smith, Pastor, Mt. Zion 
>Baptist Church, St. Clair, Missouri).
>
>"I think this is a subject that needs to be dealt with frequently. 
>Tozer pointed out many years ago that 'accepting Jesus into my 
>heart' is not biblical terminology, and that  'receiving Christ' 
>(John 1:11,12) conveys a much more serious truth" (Buddy Smith, 
>Pastor, Grace Baptist Church, Malanda, Queensland, Australia).
>
>"The whole message of 'ask into the heart' is very recent in the 
>history of the Lord's churches. It looks to me like Baptists 
>accepted it from evangelicals of other denominations. It was not the 
>preaching of the old Baptists. There are several songs along the 
>same line as this also. Sadly, it seems that a lot of people get 
>their doctrine from their songs instead of getting their songs from 
>their doctrine. Is there a sense in which the Lord dwells in our 
>hearts?  In light of Gal. 4:6 and Eph. 3:17 the answer is yes, but 
>we still are never commanded to preach 'Ask Him into your heart,' 
>nor do we see the Gospel heralds in the New Testament preaching 
>that. When I preached on this recently, the immediate reaction of 
>one man who has been saved for years was, 'This sounds like 
>borderline heresy,' simply because he had always heard this, even in 
>his years at BJU, other sound churches, etc.  When I opened the Word 
>and we looked together he agreed that what I preached was Biblical. 
>My dad has been preaching for years that we are not telling people 
>to ask Jesus into their life or give their life to Jesus.  Their 
>life is wrong; it is a mess; it is wicked. We are preaching that 
>sinners need 'new life in Christ'" (Bobby Mitchell, Jr., Pastor, 
>Mid-Coast Baptist Church, Brunswick, Maine).
>
>"I think the reason for the problem terms you mention ('I have 
>invited Jesus into my heart,' etc.) grow out of a shallow or weak 
>presentation of the Gospel. If the lost person would be led to see 
>himself as the wicked & lost hell bound sinner the Word of God says 
>he is and that he is under the wrath & condemnation of a Holy God, 
>he would recognize that there is not one ounce of good in him. If 
>the purpose of 'The suffering Lamb of God' on the cross would be 
>plainly preached and the lost sinner would be made to see the great 
>sacrifice of the Christ -- as He bleeds and dies, as He is making 
>the Atonement in His blood sacrifice for the sins of the whole 
>world, as He is suffering the wrath of God poured out on Him, as He 
>bears the sins of all mankind, as He is personally bearing the sins 
>of the sinner who is being witnessed to. And if the Holy Spirit 
>would then convict this sinner of the desperately wicked condition 
>of his own heart and life and he would then see his hopeless, 
>worthless position outside of God's grace, surely he would repent of 
>his sins and be saved. At this point it would seem like the only 
>words the lost sinner would then be able to utter would be 'God be 
>merciful to me, a sinner.' Seeing God's great love for lost sinners 
>in Christ on the cross and being convicted by the Holy Spirit would 
>surely produce believing faith in the finished work of Christ for 
>the salvation of the soul" (Wilbert Unger, Pastor, Bethel Baptist 
>Church, London, Ontario).
>
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>other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. OUR GOAL IN THIS 
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>
End of forwarded message text:

John