"The Truth Lived Out"

"Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again." (John 3:5-7) Alright, this is getting a little old! This is not some new revelation that I am talking about; in fact, it is really quite simple. The problem is, that many people think that they are saved (and I cannot judge who they are, nor neither can you), but they truly have not yet been 'Born Again'. What this basically means is, that they have freely believed in Jesus Christ, received Him into as Saviour, and even confessed Him before man; however, they have not been 'Born Again'. But you might say, 'I thought we just needed to believe, receive, and confess, and then we are Saved?'; like I said earlier, I don't think it is quite that simple. It is simple, don't get me wrong, but not quite that simple; because there is still the matter of being Born Again. You see, there are many who have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour outwardly, but have not actually made the transition inwardly; and to truly be Born Again, what must take place, is that the old man must die. In other words; before you can have a True New Birth in Christ, there must be a passing away of the old, which is what takes place through 'Regeneration'. So then, we can try and determine, if we want to waste our time, who is Saved and who is not; or we can focus on ourselves, and determine whether or not we have been Truly Born Again! No one knows but you and God what is true in our own case; because in reality, we all sin, and we all are not perfect; but the real difference is, whether or not the old man is still alive and well. All I know is this: The reason that so many 'Fall from Grace' is that they never really had 'Grace' to begin with; and as I said before, and I will say it again: There is a difference between Mercy and Grace! The reason that I say this is quite simple: those many, many, many people that have received God's mercy, as I have described above, have done so believing that they are truly saved; and if it were just dependent upon God's mercy, then that would truly be the case, because Jesus Christ died for 'ALL' sin and sinners; so, we could just say "Thank You Jesus", and then rest assured that we are not going to hell. However, then there is Grace; which takes over where Mercy leaves off; because God's Mercy saves the man, but God's Grace regenerates the man, and makes him new. The real problem that we have in this whole twisted ordeal, is this: Mercy and Grace go together and are not able to be separated, because they are inter-twined together as one. We can not have one without the other; which means, that we can not receive salvation from our sin without receiving New Life too!!! Besides, remember what we are talking about here, 'Living Out The Truth'; and what is Truth? Well, for one, to answer today's question: If we are Truly Born Again, then we will be able to deny ourselves, because we have truly crucified the flesh; and if you find yourself with the inability to deny the flesh, well, you need to figure that out! The main question that we must face is really this one: Are we believing with our heart, or is it an intellectual belief? There is a difference!!! "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus Christ, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." (Romans 10:9 & 10)