Walking God’s course

William Lobdell

This time, because of Payne Stewart, he had them all.

Lee Trevino, Gil Morgan, Jim Colbert, Chi Chi Rodriguez, Gary Player --

nearly all of the pros on the Senior PGA Tour had gathered last week

around the 18th green at Wilshire Country Club in Los Angeles. They

wanted to hear the tour’s part-time chaplain, John Huffman, make sense of

what had happened.

In past tournaments, Huffman usually preached to 25 or so in a hotel

meeting room Friday evening after the day’s round of golf. (By contrast,

in Huffman’s day job as senior pastor at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church

in Newport Beach, about 2,000 hear his message each weekend.)

But now, still in shock over Stewart’s stunning death, the old pros had

quietly marched behind the lone bagpiper from the Wilshire clubhouse down

to the 18th green, where the memorial service was held.

Golfers, caddies, wives, friends and fans sat on the fringe of the green

while some of the world’s best golfers -- Dave Stockton, Hale Irwin,

Hubert Green, Gary McCord, Raymond Floyd -- took turns eulogizing their

fallen comrade.

The stories of Payne Stewart -- his mischievous smile, his silky smooth

swing, his dramatic putt to win this year’s U.S. Open -- were touching,

but all seemed to come up short, like a nine-iron shot from 150 yards out

that looks straight and true but fails to reach the green.

The talk of grooved swings and winning major tournaments -- things that

had consumed their lives -- seemed trivial when measured against the Big

Question that had loomed over them since Stewart’s plane went down in a

South Dakota field: What was this life really all about? Their defenses

stripped, their emotions exposed -- they were ready to listen.

“There’s a Greek word, o7 kairosf7 , which means a special moment in

time when everything comes together,” Huffman said later. “This was a o7

kairosf7 moment.”

Huffman had spent seven years ministering to these players at up to five

tournaments a year.

“They can’t get to church,” Huffman said of the pros who spend more than

30 weekends on the road each year. “What we do becomes a substitute for

church for them.”

He had built friendships on the driving ranges and putting greens. He had

walked the courses with the wives during play. He had met with them in

hotel rooms across the country.

Still, many of the touring pros either didn’t know him, or knew him but

kept their distance.

Now at the 18th green at Wilshire, he had everyone’s attention for the

first time.

“The invincibility that goes along with being in the top echelon of

sports was cracked by Payne Stewart’s death,” Huffman said. “I sensed a

kind of hunger for answers.”

He began by saying people usually define themselves in three ways.

Number one, they’ll tell you what they do. Or even sadder, they’ll tell

you what they have done, which had poignancy for the senior golfers,

whose last big win might have been years ago.

Two, people define themselves by what others say about them. Huffman

asked the pros lining the green -- who’ve been praised all their life --

if they remember the one sportswriter who really took a jab at them. Nods

all around.

And three, people define themselves by what they have -- their

possessions. Huffman talked about his own experience as an 11-handicap

golfer, always thinking the latest technological advance in golf clubs

will somehow make him a better player.

“I always think they will iron out the flaws in my game,” Huffman said.

“But they never do. The old inside-out swing is still there.”

The problem with defining your life in those three ways, Huffman

continued, is that you’ll never be able to fill that empty feeling inside

with what you do, what people say about you or what you have.

You may have fleeting moments of happiness, but your life will be a

roller coaster -- with how you’re feeling depending on your latest job,

the last comment someone’s made about you or the last thing you’ve

bought.

I’m not sure exactly when the tears started to flow, but nearly everyone

at this point was wiping his or her eyes.

“I felt there was an intensity of attention that a pastor does not

usually experience,” Huffman recalled. “Every pastor is painfully aware

of people trying to stay awake during a sermon. This was the opposite.”

And then Huffman gave them the secret to happiness: God. God doesn’t care

about what you do, what people say about you or what you have. God loves

you because you are perfectly human, full of flaws. And the good news is,

Huffman concluded, if you haven’t invited God into your life, you can do

it right now.

Standing in the shadows as the sun set, the bagpiper played “Amazing

Grace” and the pros bowed their heads and cried.

The next day, as Huffman walked the course, a marquee player -- one who

had never attended the tour’s Friday night worship services -- pulled

Huffman aside.

“He said, ‘I sure appreciate what you did yesterday,’ ” Huffman recalled.

“And then he asked, ‘Do you have a card?’ ”

* WILLIAM LOBDELL, who attends St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, is the

editor of Times Community News. He also writes a Saturday religion column

for the Orange County edition of the Los Angeles Times. His e-mail

address is o7 bill.lobdell@latimes.comf7 .