A Gift For Hymn

NBA PLAYERS often bestow gifts upon their parents--cars, houses, jewels--but Michael Redd really found that special something for his dad. Shortly after signing a six-year, $90 million contract with the Bucks last summer, the 6'6" guard bought his father, James, a 500-seat church in Columbus, Ohio. "That was his heart's desire," says Michael, 26, who as a kid played countless hours of basketball with his father, a former point guard at Columbus's Capital University. "When you get," says the younger Redd, "it's always good to give."

James Redd, 50, worked in a Pepsi bottling plant in Columbus, where Michael grew up with his parents (his mother, Haji, was a schoolteacher) and his younger sister, Michelle. Shortly before Michael was born, James began studying to become a minister. In 1991, four years after he was ordained, James founded the Philadelphia Deliverance Church of Christ (so named because Philadelphia means brotherly love in Greek) in a storefront in a poor neighborhood on the west side of town. There, James preached to about 25 congregants on Sundays. At age 12 Michael began playing drums in the church band, and he later promised his father that he would make the NBA and buy him a proper church building. When he actually did it, James says, "I was shocked." Since the church moved in June to its new location in a middle-class residential area, about 20 miles from the old storefront, Sunday attendance has risen to 300.

Michael has visited and drummed at Philadelphia Deliverance three times this season ("He has to go out the back or side door," to avoid being mobbed by fans, James says), and he has used his celebrity to book three-time Grammy-winning gospel singer Kirk Franklin to perform at the church later this year. Michael says he may want to take over for his father after retiring from the NBA--"Preaching and teaching is something I want to do." For now, James invokes Michael's journey from second-round draft pick to All-Star to inspire his congregants. Says James, "We use Michael as an example for the young people, to show them that if you strive for your dreams and put God first, anyone can make it."

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