THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 16, 1995 TAG: 9504140208
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 16 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY NANCY LEWIS, CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Long : 104 lines
When Margaret Reddick was a child hoeing crops in North Carolina, she had every reason to sing the blues.
``When you're working on a farm, you just sing. . . the long rows, then you sing a lot of blues,'' she says.
But not anymore.
Now, half a century later, Reddick bears melodious witness to God's mercy for churchgoers and prison inmates alike.
William H. Perry, Reddick's pastor for 25 years, likened her voice to that of well-known gospel singer Mahalia Jackson.
``She's got a beautiful voice,'' said Perry, pastor of Virginia Beach's Upper Room Church on the Rock. ``She's a great singer.''
When the 60-year-old Reddick belts out ``Amazing Grace,'' she is singing from the heart; she knows firsthand, she says, how God can change a life.
Reddick says she was miraculously saved 29 years ago this coming November. Before that fateful day, she had spent her time ``partying, drinking, carrying on.''
``After that, I didn't do bad things, didn't say bad things, didn't go bad places anymore. I didn't want to,'' Reddick remembers of the day that changed her life. ``I found something better. My mind was cleared, and I had peace of mind, joy.''
The faith Reddick found and never lost kept her strong through the death of her eldest son from AIDS. Hilton Reddick was 33 when he died about 10 years ago in the Virginia State Penitentiary in Richmond. By then, his mother had been singing to him about God's love through seven years of incarceration.
It is that same faith in God's mercy that has sustained Margaret Reddick through the five-year imprisonment of her younger son, Troy, 28. He is still serving a sentence on drug charges.
The matriarch's life has never been easy, though you might think so watching her eyes smile and her face light up when she talks about her musical ministry and her family.
Reddick, who never married, raised her own three children and then helped raise seven grandchildren. Now she opens her ample arms wide to enfold her four great grandchildren.
``Give Grama a kiss before you leave,'' she says to the youngest of her great-grandchildren, 1-year-old Natiya Reddick as the child's mother, Lakeysha Reddick, 16, ties her daughter's hair up with a big red ribbon.
Margaret Reddick lives just off Virginia Beach Boulevard near Birdneck Road in a neat little house given to her by a former employer. The gift was one of the examples Reddick carries with her as proof that ``whatever you need from the Lord, he's got it.''
Despite crippling arthritis, Reddick still goes twice each month to the Virginia Beach jail to croon to a roomful of inmates. One of their favorite hymns is ``This Little Light of Mine.''
``I talk to them, too, about the Lord and how he changed my life.''
She also sings in a number of Virginia Beach churches to the delight of parishioners and visitors. She uses a cane now, and those who come to hear her sing must be patient as she makes her way to the front of the church.
Her fans agree with the Rev. Perry about Reddick's similarity to Mahalia Jackson. But Reddick says, ``They say I sing like her, but I just glorify God.
``I like the way God dealt with me, the way people respond to the songs.''
Reddick takes a deep breath and recounts the story of how her life was changed:
``I was at a revival meeting listening to a preacher teaching about tearing up foul ground.
``I thought he was talking about me - thought someone had told him all about me. Every word seemed to be about me.
``I thought, `if I find out who told him about me, I'm going to get him,' '' she recalls.
But suddenly the 32-year-old mother realized that she hadn't gained anything living her life the way she had.
``I said to myself, `I'm tired of the life I'm living.' ''
Then she said a silent prayer: ``God, if you're ready for me, I'm ready for you.
``All of a sudden a warm feeling came over me, and I knew I was going up before God.''
Since that day, Reddick has been singing in testament to ``the Lord's goodness.''
``I made the choice,'' she says. ``I crossed over and lived my life for the Lord.''
She can no longer do the domestic work she did in her younger years. But then she no longer has to worry about a roof over her head.
The story of how she came to own her own home is one she tells in witness of God's grace.
Reddick had been cleaning house and caring for the children of Maurice Fine for 13 years when Fine gave her the house. She had been saving toward a down payment on the house, meanwhile living in motels and apartments.
But one day Fine told her that he had noticed that she was limping. Then he told her to use the money she had saved for the house for something else - that he was giving her the home.
``When I think about how the Lord has helped me,'' says Reddick, pausing, then shaking her head from side to side to relish the thought. ILLUSTRATION: Photo by NANCY LEWIS
When Margaret Reddick, 60, belts out ``Amazing Grace,'' she is
singing from the heart. She knows firsthand, she says, how God can
change a life.
by CNB