Christianity is often mistaken for a religion that includes activities such as praying and worshipping in a church or temple. It could be said that Christianity is actually a process that takes place because we have a relationship with God. Paul identified the particulars of this process in his letter to Titus. He stated:

There was a time when we were foolish and did not obey. We were fooled in many ways. Strong desires held us in their power. We wanted only to please ourselves. We wanted what others had and were angry when we could not have them. We hated others and they hated us. But God, the One Who saves, showed how kind He was and how He loved us by saving us from the punishment of sin. It was not because we worked to be right with God. It was because of His loving-kindness that He washed our sins away. At the same time He gave us new life when the Holy Spirit came into our lives. God gave the Holy Spirit to fill our lives through Jesus Christ, the One Who saves. Because of this, we are made right with God by His loving-favor. Now we can have life that lasts forever as He has promised. (Titus 3:3-7, NLV)

If you were to translate this process into a formula, it might look something like this: sins washed away + renewed by the Holy Spirit = justified by God’s grace. The mechanism God uses to take away our sins is called regeneration, a spiritual rebirth that is somewhat like a renovation project that turns an old house into something that is desirable again. “The new birth stresses the communication of spiritual life in contrast with antecedent spiritual death; regeneration stresses the inception of a new state of things in contrast with the old” (G3824). That is what Paul was referring to when he told the Corinthians, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). The Greek word translated passed away, parerchomai (par-er’-khom-ahee) means “to come near or aside, i.e. to approach” (G3928). Paul was most likely talking about our identification with Christ’s death on the cross through baptism. When Christians are baptized, they are publicly expressing their identification with Christ’s death and resurrection. It could be said that baptism is when we experience the reality of being born again. It spiritually connects us to the event that took place 2000 years ago when Jesus died and rose again to pay the penalty for our sins.

Being justified by God’s grace means that we have been determined to be innocent, “being the legal and formal acquittal from guilt by God as Judge, the pronouncement of the sinner as righteous” (G1344). It is clear from Paul’s explanation of the way Christianity works that our religious activities do not cause us to be acquitted from guilt. According to Paul, Christians demonstrate to others that they have already been acquitted from guilt by doing good works (Titus 3:8). Therefore, apart from preaching the gospel, the only thing that God expects believers to do is to display or express to others the result of having their sins forgiven.