Terry Rush aims to bring out the ‘MVP’ in readers

The cover of Terry Rush’s new book.

Terry Rush e-mailed to tell me how much he loved The Christian Chronicle’s recent profiles of Washington Nationals slugger Josh Willingham and Oakland A’s reliever Brad Ziegler.
Knowing how Rush feels about baseball, his affection for those stories came as no surprise.
At the end of August, the minister — perhaps best known as the director of The Tulsa Workshop — has a new book coming out.
It’s called “MVP,” and Rush tells me:

‘MVP’ is written for the person who feels they’ve drawn the short straw in life. While it has a baseball flavor due to former Cardinals endorsing it, the book is completely Bible-based, simply targeting the sports world.

Two years ago, I traveled to Florida and wrote a feature on Rush’s St. Louis Cardinals’ ministry:

JUPITER, FLA. — After a performance praised by former baseball manager Whitey Herzog, the hotshot center fielder brushed off fans as he left the field at the St. Louis Cardinals’ spring training complex.

Terry Rush warms up before a 2008 baseball fantasy camp game in Jupiter, Fla. (photo by Bobby Ross Jr.)

“I can’t sign right now,” he proclaimed. “I’m sorry.”
Then No. 14 burst out laughing at his own joke.
Minister Terry Rush of Tulsa, Okla., swings a 34-inch Louisville Slugger and believes in a mighty God.
Although he had to wear bifocals that he said turn every pitch into a “bump ball,” the senior minister of the Memorial Drive church had just raised his batting average to .333 at the Cardinals’ recent Legends Camp.
Named after the late Terry Moore, the captain of St. Louis’ 1942 and 1946 world championship teams, Rush, 60, is a lifelong Redbird fanatic and a 25-year veteran of the club’s fantasy baseball camps.
As much as he enjoys putting on the white home jersey of his Cardinals and lacing up his red, size 9 rubber cleats, Rush returns each winter not for the sweet smell of leather, grass and infield dirt, but for the opportunity to minister.

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For information on ordering the book, contact Kelly Press Inc. at (800) 365-5212 or [email protected]