The Angels share. It’s all well and good talking about the Angel community. But who are these people? Who are you? It’s time to start sharing some stories and putting some human faces on that Angel body. First up, Geoff and Sherry Maddocks (and their son Isaac) from the Kentucky USA (yes, Angels come from all over). Geoff is an Australian, the son of a pastor. He grew up around John Smith and the God Squad. He came to Kentucky for graduate school and fell in love with a Southern Belle and her crazy country ... Sherry was born and raised in Georgia. She graduated in exercise physiology but her world was turned right-side-up when she was called to be a missionary and she went to work in Paraguay, Bangladesh, and Lexington ... [Isaac is four years old. He’s got a hybrid Aussie-American accent and an obsession with super heroes … and Bono (his Dad says they’re not the same thing).] They met while studying missiology at Asbury Theological Seminary in 1998 and then helped pioneer a mission community called Communality in Lexington. They felt led to live out their missionary calling and training in the West. They became entwined in the emerging-newmonastic-church movement. And they continue to serve their faith community while living in an impoverished, inner city, African-American neighbourhood. They garden, cook, pray, wonder about sustainability, work on reconciliation in their neighbourhood, keep an eye out for Jesus, and long for shalom. 7
So how did you come to Greenbelt?
What do you love about the Festival?
Geoff I first came in 1986. My family was travelling with the [John] Smith family. My mum wanted to meet Cliff Richard and I wanted to meet U2. Neither showed. But we did meet Deniece Williams. And I have gleefully returned five times since.
We love being outdoors in the English countryside for five days with thousands of others – without a mosquito in sight! We really appreciate the food available on site – local, organic, and delicious. We love Martyn Joseph, too. His music is the soundtrack and poetry to our lives in mission. Billy Bragg and Duke Special were wonderful at GB07. The communion service is always a high point. We are mentored and challenged by Greenbelt speakers past and present like Tom and Christine Sine, Richard Rohr and John Bell. Beer and Hymns in the Organic Beer Tent is simply heaven on earth. And no Greenbelt Day is complete without Last Orders.
Sherry My first Greenbelt was in 2005 and I returned in 2007. We have a dear friend who serves as a Trustee (Andy Turner) and our Greenbelt memories are inextricably linked with camping with his family (see, Trustees do camp, ed!). What made you become Angels? We are Angels because it connects us with Christians all over the globe and we sense a kinship with Greenbelters. The Festival nourishes us and inspires our imaginations to better serve in our context according to the radical and loving ways of Jesus. How did we actually sign-up? Well, in 2005 we were talked into being Angels by a very charming and not-at-all-pushy Mr. Andy Turner (a Trustee of some repute we understand). What a delightful young man. Funny, too.
What sustains you? We are sustained by growing our own food and making bread. We are renewed when we think of all the saints across time and across the globe who didn’t tire in doing good. Greenbelt offers us a glimpse of the Kingdom and whiff of what happens when heaven and earth interlock and overlap. Words, songs, and images (many we can trace back to Greenbelt) help us lament and celebrate our mission context.