Is it Biblical to Ask Jesus Into Your Heart?

Trevin Wax has put up a very interesting article at Gospel Coalition on the subject of the Biblical legitimacy of using metaphorical or content-less phrases to describe what one must do to be saved.  In other words we have all heard the mandate to "ask Jesus into your heart" or "accepting Christ," "receiving Christ" etc.  As Wax has pointed out there is an entire new generation of young pastors who are calling these phrases into question out of a genuine concern of offering false assurance.  On the other side of the debate are pastors that have used this terminology their entire career not seeing any problems with it and find no reason to change it.  These pastors will even point to single line passages in the Bible that say "accept" "receive" Jesus.  Here in lies the problem.

Wax-I think-rightly explains that "the conversation about “the sinner’s prayer” and “asking Jesus into your heart” is not really about the legitimacy of such methods or the biblical justification for using expressions like “having a personal relationship with Christ” or “receiving Jesus.” I believe that properly understood and explained, any of these methods and terms can be used, to good effect."  "Properly understood" is the key in this debate.  I know there are people at Church who I can use terms like "accept Jesus" and they would not only fully understand what I mean but have the same understanding.  However, generally speaking I would say there is a large majority that would not believe that terminology requires an explanation whats so ever.

Why would this be the case?  Because, as a Church culture those catch phrases have been the language of our discourse.  There meaning was assumed but rarely explained.  To the point that children are taught to ask Jesus into their heart without out any explanation of how that is accomplished or what that might mean.  It is wrong to assume that this is only simplistic language to help children understand.  That type of reasoning seems to trivialize sharing the truth of Christ to our little ones.  Moreover this isn't just a problem for children.  As it turns out this is a problem with many adults too.

My final point is simply that the difference between the two camps that we are discussing are the result of different hermeneutics.  Without getting into too much detail here it seems that those who find proof texts for catch phrases like "accept Jesus" are not using the analogy of faith which is Scripture interprets scripture.  The end result is a proof text without content.  If we allow Scripture to interpret itself some of the passages that we would think are vague or ambiguous find there meaning in the passages that are more straight forward.  Make sense?  Tell me your thoughts.