Waitress Receives Huge 'Gift From God' Tip

A Cracker Barrel waitress in Nebraska received a special tip the other day: $100. But that was nothing compared to the $6,000 in checks the customers also left behind, the Journal Star reports. The customers walked in asking for the restaurant's grumpiest waitress, hoping to make her laugh, but the hostess said they had no grumpy ones. So she gave them the establishment's happiest: Abigail Sailors, an 18-year-old who told the customers about her painful journey through foster care—which started when her parents were badly injured in a car accident.

The youngest of five siblings, Abigail said they were moved to an abusive foster home until she and her sister moved back in with their father, who was later arrested for abuse. But the clouds lifted when a terrific family took them in. "I don’t know how I would have turned out if I didn’t have them," she said. "They shaped the person I am today." So despite everything, she was happy and studying hard at Trinity Bible College in North Dakota. Clearly impressed, the men (one of them Trinity graduate) left her the $100, a $1,000 check for whatever she needed, and $5,000 more for tuition. "I couldn’t believe it," Abigail said. "I tried to thank them, and they said, 'Thank God.'" (More waitress stories.)