Sweet Resilience

John Ross Edmiston owned a small postcard shop along the boardwalk in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in the early 1880s. Not long after he opened, Edmiston hired another man, David Bradley, to sell taffy from his shop, and one night waves rose so high that they flooded the entire store, soaking the taffy collection in salty sea foam.

When a little girl came into the shop the next day looking for taffy to purchase, Edmiston joked that the only taffy he had left was "saltwater taffy." The girl bought some anyway and carried it to the beach, where her family proclaimed it a hit.

Is salt water taffy actually made with salt water? No, not salt water ... and certainly not ocean water. The name is simply a reminder of a New Jersey summer when a near-disaster turned into a fad that eventually spread from coast to coast.

After the flood, salt water taffy was sold from stands along the Atlantic City boardwalk until store owners began boxing up the treats to sell to visitors to enjoy at home. Now salt water taffy is a popular treat sold along both the East and West coasts -- including small towns up and down the Oregon Coast.

God promises he will make all things new, and yet how often do we truly believe him? Consider these verses:

Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past.
See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland.   -- Isaiah 43:18-19

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”   -- Revelation 21:5

How might you re-envision the floods in your life as opportunities for growth and creativity this summer, setting aside the despair of the wreckage and instead embracing the new ideas that so often catch us by surprise?