Heaven's Smile

I got a call yesterday that absolutely made my birthday more than perfect. Let me give you a few details that led up to this phone call...

My nephew, Christopher (aka Chris, Topher, Cristo) had accepted a pretigious internship this summer in Dallas. It was, by his explanation, the cooder graw of all opportunities for someone in his position. He is a chemical engineering major at Texas Tech and is, in my opinion, brilliant! The one drawback to the internship is that he was not going to be able to go on a mission trip to Tanzania this summer with our church. He took the answered prayer of the internship as a closed door as far as the opportunity in Africa. He would soon learn, in his own words, "not to put God in a box". Almost out of a fairy tale, the rest of the story began to unfold as he was pursued by another company for the internship. Even after explaining his current commitment to the company in Dallas, the gentlemen would not budge and continued to discuss the opportunity with Cristo. Long story short, it is a smaller company that is self funded and doing really well. Now, keep in mind I know nothing about either company and just have to rely on Cristo to fill in the gaps within my non-engineering brain. After a meeting, and really no negotiations because they were going to meet his salalry AND pay all of his living expenses on top of a signing bonus...he was set to start down a completely different road for his summer "vacation" that would lead him to Midland instead of Dallas. All the while, the gentleman at our church coordinating the mission trip repeatedly was telling him that he just felt like God was going to get him to Africa.

Yesterday, he recieved a phone call from the Midland company to let him know that they would allow him the 10 days to go on the Mission Trip!!! Looking back over everything that has happened, it is obvious that God is working out the details so that Cristo is in line with His will. While he has less than a week to raise $2000 for the airfare, remember..."don't put God in a box". (AND...if you'd like to help him, he would be more than grateful!!)

Now, while my heart swells with pride for him, my eyes cry. I SO wish Sherri could be here to see how INCREDIBLE he has turned out, and the heart he has for Jesus. I know this is my humanness, because what could be better than heaven, right? I am so proud of her for laying a foundation that Cristo knows is unshakeable...and he is building his life on it. I know that she would be SO proud of him...in fact, I can almost see heaven's smile.