1. What is it, though, that makes bedtime so fraught with anxiety?
  2. Luther saw that God demands not that we become perfectly righteous like God but that we simply receive the gift of righteousness; a gift that actually makes us worthy.
  3. Repentance means to turn or change your mind. It is not a turn from sin to righteousness. It is a turn from sin to the righteous Son of God who has defeated all sin.
  4. The truth is we’ve always mixed up the roles of penitent and priest.
  5. If sin is only a matter of “doing,” then “undoing” and/or “redoing” would serve as the equivalent savior necessary to find redemption.
  6. Being able to tell the difference between truth and lies is at the core of repentance.
  7. Repentance means being cut down by the law’s declaration of judgment. It’s not an activity we do to prepare for grace, but a point of despair worked by God himself.
  8. Our ears are opened by the Spirit through the word. Then, faith in Christ is present in us.
  9. There is joy in Lent, but it is the kind of joy that comes in being made whole.
  10. Because of my Advocate, there is no judgment or condemnation by God in my suffering.
  11. Repentance comes on account of suffering, loss, failure, and death. It happens when the promise of forgiveness of sin given in Jesus’ death is proclaimed to us down-and-outers.