An Update| What’s happening and what’s coming?

Well, at this point it seems I barely have time to talk to my own Momma. Which is possibly the worst of it.

Pastor Phil and Jamie (who were over harvestKIDS) have resigned due to changing seasons and God’s leading them onto other endeavors. Which, for me, was a complete and total shock and I honestly panicked. I went to every worst-case scenario in my head almost instantly. And I cried. A lot. Mostly because in the short 3 months (or less) that I worked under them I learned so much from them, I couldn’t imagine what was going to happen to the group of us who were left without leaders within our ministry stream.

But, as always, God knew better than any fear any of us had. Of course, He deals in ways that don’t make sense and often leave me feeling a little bit like a rubber-band. (I’ve noticed that is the nature of this internship…) Currently, I am running the Preschool department along side Jessie who is running NG Studios, our Elementary program. This is all temporary while Pastor Kirk and his team hire the new Children’s pastor. In the mean time, though, Jessie and I are very busy.

This summer is going to be quite a bit different from that, though. I am one of four Team Leaders for Games during our Youth America Summer Camps. Which basically means that we are responsible for the FUN aspect! I was daunted by this at first because I’m not the craziest, most out going person that ever lived. But apparently leadership sees something that I don’t because this is the second time I’ve been given this role since I have been here. The more I think about it, though, the more excited I get. I get to give out poinst to campers for doing completely off the wall things, or volunteering to serve? FREAKING YEAH. It’s going to be so cool to experience Youth America for the first time. (I’m one of few interns who have come into NGI without having attended Youth America at least once.)

What this means for me as far as being able to work during the summer is.. that I won’t be able to. Up to this point I have been BEYOND blessed to be able to make all of my bills through family, working at Sprouts, and randomly being connected to a family who pays generously and abundantly for watching their kids. It’s the most insane experience seeing how God works when I’m not looking. This leads me to that thing I absolutely despise doing: support. First and foremost, I need prayer for my sanity. I feel stretched to my limit some days, and those days I really need to be reminded that I wouldn’t be in this position if it WAS, in fact, my limit. Under that, if you are reading this and feel compelled to help me along financially* throughout the Summer, you can mail any kind of support you can offer to:

Brittany Tomaszewski
6800 N. Bryant Ave.
Oklahoma City Oklahoma 73121

* To my FREAKING AMAZING family + friends who have been so supportive emotionally, spiritually and financially while I’m here…. FREAKING THANK YOU! I can’t even tell you enough how much it means to me. I have learned so much about myself, what I want to do with my life and what I really believe about God in just the few months I’ve been here. I still have 8 months to go! I love what I am doing and I cannot believe that I am here- that God saw something I couldn’t see; that I was able to trust Him enough to quit my job and come here, to walk in the Strength He had ALREADY given me so that He could show me that His vision for me went far beyond anything I had ever pictured for myself. This is the most rewarding, life-giving experience I have ever had. I am truly, truly amazed that I serve a God who doesn’t make sense to me. He is SO good. It kills me. So, thank you for supporting my pursuit of His plan.

How to: become an escape artist

The messier your life is, the easier this will be.

When you graduate high school, choose the boy who gets your heart going. The one who shows up late at night and never offers any explanations. Choose him over the boy who wants to impress you, but he’s just not… Slick.

Choose him over every one you call loved and your deep-down-gut-knowledge that he’s not good for you.

Once you do that, give him too much. Give him your time, your sleep, your love, your words.

When he leaves, tell him that you miss talking to him and hold onto that pain until you can’t breathe anymore.

After he leaves, drink until you can’t taste the stars you hung him from. Drink until every boy tastes like him, has calloused finger prints like him.
Drink until you can’t feel the weight on your feet.

Quit your job and sign your name to a ball and chain you will regret. Move away because your life is so hard, so hard. Try to make it on your own. When you fail, crawl back to your roots: the ones you all but ripped from the
ground.

They embrace you like you never left, go deep like you have always belonged.
Hide your failures with the sand from your eyes: sleep until you have to face the sunlight.

When you dress like a flower and pour glass after glass of Everclear, give everything you have left to Jesse. Let them fall when you find yourself in bed with someone else.

And then when he calls, when he asks you to come out, wait for him in the driveway, chilled October air holding you together.

When he kisses your lips at three in the morning, don’t say anything. When he gives you his heart, put it in your pocket. When you make love for the first time on the hard mattress in a New York City Hostel, forget about the boy and the sex and the Everclear and the roots and the moving. When he wants you close, forget about what it is that draws you to him, forget about what makes you hurt when you’re alone.

When you’re awake at night, sick with child, mortified and thrilled all at once, forget that your dad chose the bottle over you. Forget that you have taken the morning after pull before and that you don’t deserve this. When he offers to marry you, to never leave you and that little monkey, forget that you’re only 20 and you don’t know who you are or what you want.

When you lose it; your mind, your heart. When you lose the baby and you cry in his arms and you call him Oliver… When you lose him, forget what joy feels like.

Months later, when you find yourself under the weight of a man you’re afraid to say no to: forget you have a voice. When he’s finished, scream because you just betrayed the only man you’ve ever loved. Forget that you were betrayed there, too.

When he leaves because of this, forget your worth. Forget that you have value outside of his care. Forget that what you have to offer isn’t his to give.

When he finds new love, remind yourself that you’re the only one who feels it.

And when you want to die, when you think that the only way to fill this hole is with those who don’t want to know you- forget what you’re worth.
Forget that you are precious and honored. Forget that you were called by name a long time ago and you are His. Forget that the number of people you used to fill that hole, that hole that only grew deeper, they never changed your name. Forget that your name, Redeemed, covers all of you.
But when you notice how empty your soul is, when you hear that comforting voice, “baby, I’m not done with you.” When you hear your name, don’t run. Stay. Hold on. It gets so good from here. You are Redeemed.

Adventure, seven + a half years, 25, and birthdays

I was driving through the night to get home for Spring Break when I noticed the time meant the date had flipped. It was Justin’s birthday.
He would have been 25 this year.

It turned over in my mind; he would have been 25. We’ve hit about seven and a half years since he died. I have far exceeded the age he lived to.

The thought that reoccurred and made me want to publicly acknowledge his birthday other than on Instagram and Twitter was this: he lived his life as though he knew he wouldn’t last very long.

He chose adventure over sleep. He chose passion over expectation. You could ask him to sit at the kitchen table and focus on a math assignment and then spend the next 36 hours fighting with him to finish. But ask him to dismantle a lawn-mower motor and then create art with the pieces? not. a. problem.

I can’t count how many nights I over-heard frustrated murmurs or angry yelling because he had snuck out yet again to experience what life was like after dark.

I hated it. I hated every moment of it. As the “peace-keeping’ middle child from a blended family, those nights raged against my very nature.

But now, seven and a half years after he died, I can’t help but wonder if maybe I’m the one living against my nature.
Maybe rule-breaking and bending isn’t the best way to go about it, but I don’t remember him ever regretting his live-and-learn approach toward life. It was when he was cooped up inside that he regretted days wasted.

So, I wonder: am I choosing adventure? Am I choosing passion?

As I learn and discover new things about why I believe what I believe and different characteristics about myself and how they reflect my Creator, I’m discovering new passions. I’m discovering that my taste for travel and a rootless home isn’t tied to a fear of commitment.

It never occurred to me that nearly eight years later his short life he would be teaching me about living mine. I always wished he would just ACT like my big brother when he was alive. It turns out that he was, I just didn’t know enough about myself to learn from how he lived; to glean the positive from what others viewed as negative.

I know that I have been given a passion for little ones and a passion for travel and a passion for so many new and old things. I have become more and more direct with the things I think and the things that I value. I have so much blossoming in my life that sometimes my reaction is to hide, to sleep because it feels like too much. But what if I start to live in such a way that it would be a shame, a waste to not embrace what it is I’ve been taught. To seek life and adventure and passion in every moment.

Happy Birthday, J-Bird. Your life still reaches, it still matters.