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For nearly two decades Mike Sturgill lugged a heavy load of clubs, golf balls and make-it-or-break-it advice as a caddy for the country’s elite golfers on both the National and PGA tours. Years earlier, he wobbled under the unrelenting chains of drug addiction.
Today, as the grassroots publicity coordinator for the festival arm of the Luis Palau Association, the load Sturgill carries is even more significant since its stakes are measured in heavenly, not earthly, standards. But unlike his previous cargo, Sturgill’s burden, he said, is light.
“I know that’s what God wants me to do, share my story with everybody in the world that I can,” said Sturgill, a Florida resident who is in San Diego this summer to promote San Diego CityFest, a daylong evangelism festival. “The Lord is way more important to me than missing caddying.”
Although he enjoys golfing at local courses and still caddies from time to time with the National Tour—equivalent to baseball’s minor leagues—his life these days is focused on sharing his own personal story of redemption that led from jail to his two-year stint as caddy for American golf legend Arnold Palmer.
Loss of friend
Intrigued with golfing at a young age, Sturgill said he began caddying as a young teen in Hartville, Ohio, a small town in Amish country. He spent his adolescence on the golf course, and gallivanting with friends, including his best friend, Cris Schlabach, a born-again Christian. After Cris suffered life-threatening injuries in a go-cart crash, Sturgill said he numbed his sorrow with marijuana and cocaine.
“The doctors said there was no reason for him to live even one second after that (accident), but he lived four years,” Sturgill said. “After he died, my whole life went out the window.”
The next decade was a revolving door of legal convictions for what Sturgill described as non-violent, white collar offenses that landed him in jail a half dozen times.
“It was all to support my drug habit,” he said.
Sitting in jail in 1986 while awaiting sentencing of up to 50-plus years for eight felonies tied to his drug use, Sturgill called his late friend’s father seeking help. The elder Schlabach, whose name was also Chris, but spelled with the more traditional “h,” talked to Sturgill about Jesus and sent him a copy of “Lessons in Victorious Living,” a book he wrote in tribute to Cris’ short life.
“It was pretty much the same story as mine because we grew up together, we were basically inseparable,” the caddy said.
About three-quarters of the way into the book, Schlabach’s words turned Sturgill’s life around with the father’s deeply personal account of his son’s dying wish.
“I never knew that happened on his deathbed,” Sturgill admitted.
Prayer of salvation
Young Cris, the dad wrote, knew his death was imminent and asked his mother, who was feeding him, to pray.
“Mom, it’s time to go home,” Cris told her. In is his final prayer Cris asked God to show Sturgill the way home.
“He asked that his best friend would accept Him as Lord and Savior,” Sturgill, choking up even now, recalled. “I got down on my knees on the floor of that cell and accepted Christ. I told Him, ‘I’m yours wherever you want me to be. If you want to use me inside the prison, I’m yours. If you want to use me outside of the prison, I’m yours. It doesn’t matter.’”
Days later, as he faced the judge for sentencing, he surprised himself by humbling himself before the court and apologizing for his actions.
“I started crying profusely, I was shaking so hard I had to sit down,” Sturgill said. “That was the Holy Spirit shutting me up so I wouldn’t say anything else.”
The second miracle in 24 hours emerged as the judge told him to stand for sentencing.
“I’m baffled at what I am about to do,” the judge told a repentant Sturgill.
Ignoring the steep sentencing guidelines, the judge sentenced him to just one year in jail, five years of probation and ordered him to pay restitution, plus interest.
“The judge told me he was going to throw the book at me, but he didn’t because God had something else in mind for me,” he said. “God answered that prayer of (Cris’). I knew exactly that God wanted to use me in the world to change others.”
The grass is greener
A few years after his release from jail, Sturgill’s youthful passion prompted him to travel to the Texas Open in San Antonio in hopes of landing a coveted caddying job. In a development as likely as a hole in one, golfer Kurt Byrum showed up the day before the tournament looking for a caddy. Sturgill landed the job on the fly, after lying to Bryum about his experience. Within minutes Bryum realized Sturgill was out of his element and confronted him. Sturgill came clean but, faced with limited options for another caddy on such sort notice, Bryum used him for the tournament.
“We finished fifth that week,” he said. “That was 19 years ago and I’m still caddying.”
Since then, Sturgill has peppered his caddy jobs with speaking engagements in local jails through Prison Fellowship and wherever else he finds an audience, captive or not. Several years ago he learned about the Luis Palau Association and its CityFest evangelistic outreach while the team was ministering in Orlando.
It was there that he met Chris McFarland, who is now serving as director of the San Diego event, planned for Sept. 11. Sturgill, who at the time was a regular caddy at Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club in Orlando, offered his services to the association. McFarland said he had a contract job available for the festival, but Sturgill said he looked at the requirements and realized he wasn’t qualified.
“I didn’t know how to turn a computer on,” he said.
Learning from his experience with Bryum, during an interview Sturgill told McFarland he was short on the requested skill set. Afterward the caddy prayed about the job prospect, asking the Lord to clearly open one door and close the other. When several interviews produced no results, Sturgill focused on his caddying job, until a manager pulled his caddy privileges for a violation of the club’s tipping policy. Humiliated by the firing, especially after serving as Palmer’s caddy years earlier, Sturgill said he cried as he made his way home.
“I spent all these years building my reputation,” he said.
Another door
Sturgill didn’t get much time to feel sorry for himself. As soon as he arrived home there was a voice message from McFarland, offering him a seasonal job with the association.
“Then I realized I had prayed that prayer (about opening the door),” he said, saying the answered prayer removed the sting of his firing. “It’s not hard because I know this is where God wants me to be. I realized God had closed the door at Bay Hill.”
Two and a half years later, Sturgill is still serving the Lord and the association. In his spare time he is working on a pastoral degree.
“This is like a mission trip, there was little money and nowhere to stay,” Sturgill said, adding that a local family has provided housing for him while the team is in San Diego.
As part of his association with CityFest, Sturgill approaches businesses, civic organizations and churches to use the ministry’s promotional pieces including banners and posters. All of it feeds into his deep desire to talk to strangers about Jesus, including the lady at a local car wash who hadn’t been to church in years.
“She didn’t say the (sinner’s) prayer, but it planted a seed,” he said. That’s what God has called me to do. These are the kind of opportunities God has allowed for me by working for Luis Palau.
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