Where did the idea of "asking Jesus into your heart" come from? That figure of speech is not explicitly from the bible or probably even early church history. Can anyone find its first use and maybe why it's become so pervasive?
I'm looking for something like "Pastor John Smith used the saying once at a conference in 1850" or something like that. I can assume that people use the bible to come up with this phrase. I'm wondering more about the historical origin of its usage.
There is a famous painting called "The Light of the World," painted by William Hunt in 1853. By his own statement, it comes from Revelation 3.20, and represents Jesus knocking at the heart of an obstaninate sinner, on a door with no handles, and which must be opened from the inside.
The image itself has been copied many times, and this is the version I always think of:
While the context of Revelation 3.20 ("Behold I stand at the Door and Knock") is not about salvation, it is often used in services as an altar call, thus identifying it with "opening your heart to Jesus." Here for example, is a church using that call exactly.
This concept appears in a sermon for children from 1845, by Alexander Fletcher:
Oh! my young friends, how happy you shall be, when Christ enters into your heart! I should like every little child this afternoon, to present the following beautiful petition to Christ; it is a very remarkable one; but oh! He loves it. It is this: 'Oh! Jesus, enter into my heart. May Thy grace enter into the soul of a little child, there to dwell for ever.' (source)
The word ask does not appear, but the context makes it clear that the child is to make a "petition" to Christ using these words.
A similar version, this time a prayer following a sermon on Revelation 3:20, appears in 1878:
Then the good gentleman told him that he had only to pray, "Lord Jesus, come into my heart," and He would come and dwell with him for ever. (source)
More exact wording appears in 1931:
For kids, it's enough just to be a Christian, to ask Jesus into your heart. (source)
More generally, however, Google Ngrams shows that the exact phrase did not gain traction, at least in print, until the second half of the 20th century:
Here is a good article that talks about the history of this phrase, which I think was your original question. It started out with the anglo-american puritans in the 1600s - 1700s, if the article is correct. It grew with the missionary movement in the 1800s, and became a staple in children's ministry in the 1900s.
I think it comes from Ephesians 3:17. See eg the New Living version of Ephesians 3:17a:
Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him.
It seems that the expression was already in use at the time of the evangelist Billy Sunday. The hymn "Into My Heart" was composed in 1924, about the same era.
In any case, the expression could be closely associated with the practice of altar call, whose history can be traced back to the 1800s.
As to a specific time or place in history it was first used- iI don't know any one can prove that. However , according to Hebrew and Greek scholar, and professor Dr Alan Brown, in the Middle East the heart is the seat of the emotions. This is not the case in every culture and in some cultures - "You live someone with your whole liver". https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/12/health/liver-bodily-function.html#:~:text=%E9%98%85%E8%AF%BB%E7%AE%80%E4%BD%93%E4%B8%AD%E6%96%87%E7%89%88,to%20share%20the%20same%20root. There are several specific verses that confirm the concept of the heart being the center or seat of emotions in Hebrew thought. "The heart is deceitful above all things who can know it.?" And 'Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks". Matthew 12:34 This connection of the heart as the seat of emotions is also used and confirmed in the New Testament and it is used in Roman's 10:10 to show the connection between believing and a verbal confession as the basic essential for salvation "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that His has raised him from the dead you will be saved." Romans 10:10
It started with Catholic Catechism teachers helping young kids to understand that when they eat the Body of Christ, Jesus literally comes into our hearts as His becomes one with our bodies
