Thirty Days

In thirty days you can:

• enjoy a grace period before making your credit card payment
• use up the recommended monthly supply of skin cream or acne lotion you ordered from a late-nite infomercial
• purchase and wrap all your Christmas presents
• get one third of the way through any season
• serve a stint in the county jail
• save the money for your next mortgage or rent payment
• read one of those books you’ve been meaning to read
• get to the end of April, June, September or November
• return unwanted purchases to most retail stores
• enjoy another month’s .025% interest on your savings account
• enroll in a trial period with Jenny Craig or Nutri-System
• guarantee another month of Project Runway with your paid cable bill
• make it through your wardrobe without having to do laundry
• see results from that new Pilates workout

Or, if you’re really ambitious, in thirty days you can change your life. The general consensus of experts is that thirty days is the minimum amount of time it takes to replace a bad habit with a better one. It is the minimum amount of time needed to create a new routine; the minimum daily repetition that leads you to changed behaviors.

For the past month, I’ve watched my daughter dig deep. I’ve watched her struggle. I’ve watched her call out her demons and kick them to the curb. Through it all, she has been tougher than a heavyweight fighter and more courageous than a cliff diver. Today, as she celebrates thirty days of her new life, her father and I stand in awe of the person she’s become. We kneel in gratitude to God for giving us our daughter back and we look forward to being a part of her future victories.

Thirty days. It’s more than enough time for God to work miracles.