by Randy Speck

Clinton County has lost a good man. David Gene York began teaching in 1969 and was teaching when he died last Thursday. Always kind, caring and compassionate, he instructed hundreds of us over the years in different subjects, but the biggest lesson he taught us, one that we definitely should learn from, was how to be an example of Christ.

His daughter, Sherry, said “My daddy would want everyone to know he was different because Jesus Christ was his Lord and Savior and the Holy Spirit lived inside him. He wanted to be as close to God as he could be. Daddy loved everyone and he strived to be Christ-like. He would say that he couldn’t do anything but God used him and worked through him.”

We all need around us biblical and godly models like David Gene York who possess a largeness of soul, and qualities of human experience worth imitating and striving for. His Christian walk should inspire us to focus on the Lord regardless of the situations we are in. God calls us to be examples to others and that’s what David Gene York was.

Another school teacher, Thomas Obadiah Chisholm of Franklin, Ky, wrote the 1897 hymn “O to be like Thee.”

The second verse says:

“O to be like Thee! full of compassion

Loving, forgiving, tender and kind

Helping the helpless, cheering the fainting

Seeking the wand’ring sinners to find”

If we could make those words real and practicable in our daily lives, the world would be won for Christ. May God give us grace to live it out in Jesus’ name, just as David Gene York did.

Randy Speck

Randy Speck writes on his blog, The Notorious Meddler, at randyspecktacular.com. He is a 40+ year radio broadcaster and is presently on the air at WFLW-AM in Monticello, Kentucky and at WKYR-FM in Burkesville, Kentucky.