Duffields perform for Michigan District AG Family Camp 2015!

Senior Days at the Michigan District AOG Family Camps gets #HYMNPHONIC this year! June 30th at Lost Valley Bible Camp,...

Posted by Sue Duffield Ministries on Thursday, June 4, 2015

Michigan District AG Camp

HYMNPHONIC!

A sneak preview of "HYMNPHONIC", the new album by Jeff & Sue Duffield! 

To order, CLICK HERE!

From My Perspective: Our Days With Sammy Hall

I was sitting on a beach in New Jersey when Mike, a friend of mine who was running the snack shop, walked toward me said, 

“Your mom’s on the phone.”

 

Now in those days, this wasn’t unusual, especially since there was no other way to connect. Find a community pay phone, park by it and give your mom the phone number. That’s what the Salem County Sportsmen’s Club Snack Shop/Beach phone had become: A community. Everybody used it to find their kids.

 

My mom said that Sammy Hall called and was offering both Jeff Duffield (my then boyfriend) and me a job. I gathered my stuff and jumped in my ’73 Plymouth Gold Duster and headed home. I’m thinking during the drive, “Who in the world is Sammy Hall?” 

 

Jeff had a prior knowledge of Sammy after hearing him perform in Atlanta around 1971. I forgot I recorded one of Sammy’s songs, “Jesus Is the Man For the Hour”. Wow. That song was from one of my favorite Oak Ridge Boys albums, “Light”. But still, I knew nothing about Sammy. We said yes.

 

This was a huge step for these two yankee kids who just graduated from high school. We soon make the trek to Sevierville, Tennessee and join a group of rock ‘n roll ruffians who learned to play gospel music! What an eclectic group. Lenny Stadler, on bass, came from a hard rock music background. Mike Cain, drums, was playing clubs when he got the call. Row Jennings was a young Church of God girl. And together with Sammy, Jeff on keyboards and me on vocals, we rounded out a whirlwind of over 400+concerts in a year. Sometimes we’d sound like ‘The Mamas & The Papas” and other times we’d sound like a cross between contemporary Christian and southern gospel.

 

Sammy recently went home to be with the Lord and Lenny passed away also from cancer. But the legacy of these two will live on. Weekly, if not daily, I receive messages either on Facebook or by email from people who found God at a Sammy Hall Crusade. Our music at the time was years ahead of most. It was also hard to pigeon-hole Sammy into a venue. One week we’d do a series of Orrell concerts in the mid-west, then the next week, sing in High Schools all over the south, doing more of a British rock flare.

 

I had the privilege to sing for Sammy’s home-going service. I sang Elmer Cole’s classic, “Ten Thousand Years”. This was a signature song for us in the ‘70s and one that Sammy graciously gave me the lead. 

 

I’ve just spent ten minutes of your time telling you facts. Some you may have known. But now, let me just share a piece of emotion that I’ve probably never shared before.

 

We left the group the next year. We didn’t leave because we didn’t agree with the philosophy of Sammy’s ministry. If anything, that alone could have kept us there for decades. We also didn’t leave because we weren’t getting the industry “looks” and accolades. We got plenty. And many top record labels were offering Sammy and his “new” group a chance at doing some great things. Gary S. Paxton, for one, grasped the concept and talent of this band. Jeff and I didn’t even leave because we thought our specific talents weren’t focused enough. No. Truthfully, I always thought that we had way TOO much focus. Jeff was the first American gospel keyboardist to play a Mellotron, a Clavinet and a Wurlitzer electric piano - all at the same time on stage. And I was featured way too much vocally. We also didn’t leave because we had difficulty with getting along with band members. No way. Rick Sandidge, who drove the bus for us, still remains to be one of our closest friends. And the connection piece has always been there with all the band members. We really had no clue how much we had.

 

The reason Jeff and I moved back to New Jersey was to start our own ministry. We could barely make it on $99 a week back then. So, soon after we were married, we began a music ministry in the northeast. Forty-plus years later, we are still in that ministry. It has taken on all kinds of dimension and changes, but I have to say, if it wasn’t for Sammy Hall and the gift he gave us, I doubt we would have taken such risk. Ironically, we moved back to Tennessee four years ago..

 

It’s a different world now. Groups come and go and change personnel like dirty socks. But for one very brief moment in time, Sammy Hall’s group, the one that turned heads, still continues to be discussed and written about. We saw this energy at his funeral. It was a surreal moment for me, because back in the day, I didn’t really think anyone paid attention. And maybe that was a good thing. God was protecting all of us from letting it go to our heads.

 

Sammy later traveled internationally doing huge business events and other outreach venues. But still, as far as I’m concerned, he was at his best when we all shared one cause, one voice, one band, one hope, one mission: To reach young people for Christ. And to do it well - musically.

I'm Bent Over Backwards

One early morning, I was carelessly and speedily driving to my morning shift at WNRK Radio in Delaware. I stopped quickly on the side of the road to pick up the local paper from a coin-operated newspaper "rip-off" box. Pulling over to the opposite side of the road and frivolously jumping out of the van with two quarters in hand, I thought I set the gear shift to "P" for "PARK". But stumbling out to the curb, my two ton van began it's backward escape. IT WAS IN REVERSE INSTEAD OF PARK! Within seconds, my mind was sure I could just jump back in the van and slam my foot on the brake pedal. Good instincts. Great reaction. But my body, however, foolishly took the brunt and helm and decided to intervene. Stopping it or slowing it down while grabbing the driver's side door seemed futile. Uh-oh. I could NOT stop the rolling beast!

Take note: If you're ever in this situation, the one thing that WILL stop a moving driver-less vehicle is a stationary telephone pole. It works every time. The door and I were hanging on for dear life. The pole caught the open door bending it backwards like a scene from a PBS special with a Ken Burn's slo-mo effect. It completely bent all the way around forward and I was jostled between the pole and the side of the van. I maneuvered myself around the door, jumped inside and jammed my foot on the brake. I sat there for about 60 seconds wondering who in the world just witnessed this amazing acrobatic scene. Grabbing the door again from the driver's seat, I attempted to bend the door back to a closed position but by then it was almost 5:45am and I needed to be on the air in fifteen minutes.

SO picture this; here I am, driving the busy rush hour highway with my right hand on the steering wheel and my left hand gripping the door which was wide open - facing the wrong direction! "Jeff is never going to believe this!", I muttered to myself.

When I got to the station, I had one minute to spare before linking up satellites, grabbing the program log and saying, "Good morning - Oldies Radio!" I called Jeff during a commercial break and told him "..something strange happened to the driver's door of the van, honey..."

"Strange" and "honey" -  two unique words in the same sentence - a dead give away to my husband that this wasn't good. His reaction was priceless. After some hundreds of dollars later everything was back to normal. Well, somewhat normal. That not-so-euphoric experience was a conversation piece for some time.....until Jeff had his own "come-to-Jesus-meeting" with a vehicle and a pole at an ice cream stand. But that's another story...

How in the world could that heavy metal door just bend and mold itself around the stationary telephone pole with amazing ease? It reminded me of my friend Brandt Gillespie and his song. His lyrics still stay with me after all these years. Although I don't remember them all, it goes something like this..

"Move me with Your message once again.....and bend my heart once more around the tree..."

(Bend my heart once more around the tree? What could that mean?) 

Here's a few interpretations..

    •Mold my heart around the cross, the stationary immovable depiction of a painful, gruesome method of execution? How strange..

    •Take my most prized life-sustaining organ and exchange it for God's act of love in Christ's sacrifice? How weird is that??

    •Better yet, live each day with a "cross" impression on my heart, much like a piece of metal bending around a telephone pole?? Sounds somewhat foolish..

I'm thinking it makes sense. It makes perfect sense to those of us who, for the Kingdom's sake, desire hearts that are bent over backwards, forwards, sideways - whatever it takes - to make a "God impression" in this world.

1 Corinthians 1:18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.