I Lost My Best Friend, Paul "Prying1" Young

By Douglas V. Gibbs

My good friend Paul Young, who I was on the phone with for 45 minutes last night from 3:15 pm to 4:00 pm as I drove home from the radio studio, passed away just before he went to bed last night.  Paul has been a blessed friend and brother, and an important part of my radio program with his Book of the Week segment, and his offer of a free book to listeners who answer the Constitution Quest Question of the Week accurately.  He has been an important prayer partner, and a Godly voice when I have needed an ear.  We have been very good friends for seven years, and I am going to miss him dearly.  Please keep his wife, Rene, in your prayers, who was in the hospital at the time of Paul's death.

We first met as fellow bloggers, commenting on each other's websites back in 2006.  By 2007 we had become good friends, and he was a regular listener of my BlogTalkRadio program.  A couple years later, he was a member of a choir performing "Handel's Messiah" in Temecula, California.  After the performance we met face to face for the first time in the parking lot after the concert, munching on cookies and shivering in the cold December air.  Immediately, the reality that both of us have been blessed with the gift of gab became apparent to our wives.  The discussion was furious, but somehow we found a way to get a word in edge-wise without interrupting each other.  The women were amazed, and cold in the night air.  Finally, they put their foot down, and Paul and I parted ways for the moment.

The once a year meeting at the concert extended to lunch before the rehearsal the day before, too - at the same Chinese place.  Then, we went to events together, a convention where we listened to the speeches of former Muslims for example, and he and his wife came to my public speaking events that were down towards his Los Angeles area home, such as in Los Alamitos and Seal Beach.  Our phone calls became a daily occurrence, and our friendship became a brotherhood.

Once a month his church also held a Sunday Night service at a local church in Temecula, and we got together for that too.

On August 6, 2011, I left BlogTalkRadio and began to broadcast out of KCAA 1050 AM, and Paul joined me as a listener, and a participant.  He encouraged me and inspired me, helping spread the word about my radio efforts (and Constitution Class efforts), and became a weekly part of the program with his Book of the Week, and Book Giveaway.  He also handed my business cards to everyone he came across interested in the Constitution, and at his concerts in Temecula, handed out my flyers.  At the Handel's Messiah concert last December, as we were talking shortly after the concert ended, Paul asked me if I had any flyers and cards on me.  I pulled them out, and he stood at the door handing them to people as they were leaving, pointing them in my direction, saying "That's the teacher of the class right there," if they began asking questions. It got to the point that I had a line of people waiting to talk to me.

His boldness was amazing.

Last June, in Manhattan Beach, California at the A Summer Night for Human Rights event, Paul, Rene, and I got the opportunity to meet in person a number of folks working to educate people about the danger of Islamism, and the Islamization of the United States, like Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs, and Walid Shoebat (Paul's first time to meet him).

In the image to the right, Paul is sitting on the right side of the picture, three rows back, between me and his wife, wearing a white shirt, a bald head, and his gray beard.

One of the speakers, Dr. Bushra Qader, is a former Muslim from Iraq who fled the Middle East (Pakistan at that time, if I remember properly) with her children because of the attacks against her children because they bucked Islam as individuals.  She moved to Dearborn, Michigan where she took on the job of being a teacher, and it was then that she began to realize that Islam was non-relenting in its pursuit to force her children to conform to the Koran here in America, as well.  Her story was incredible, and her testimony brought tears to us all.

In the corridor, after the event, as we were preparing to leave (Paul and his wife had ridden with me), we bumped into Dr. Qader, and Paul said to her how blessed he was to have had the opportunity to hear her testimony. She thanked him, and then he asked if he could pray for her.

He held Dr. Qader's left hand, his wife held the other one, and I placed my hand on top of Paul's and Dr. Qader's.  Paul's prayer was uplifting and encouraging, thanking the Lord for Dr. Qader, and asking that He continue to bless her life and keep her and her children safe.  After the prayer Paul asked his wife to pray for Dr. Qader's healing, and Rene did so.  After the prayers were over, Dr. Bushra Qader looked up with tears in her eyes, and thanked him, saying that no one had ever done something like that for her before.  It was an appreciated gift, and a meeting that Dr. Qader would never forget.

This is the kind of man Paul was.  He was caring, placed others before himself, and he was bold in his Christianity.

Paul believed in America, in the United States Constitution, and he loved The Lord so much.  I know that as Paul stands there at the Gates of Heaven, the chorus from those waiting for him are singing, "Welcome Home."  And God, with his arms outstretched, is saying, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful.  Welcome home, and rest."

We don't have a soul.  We are souls that have a body.  His body was finished, and Paul's soul is home.

Welcome Home, my friend.  I will miss you.

Keep a seat saved for me, just like you did at the concert in Temecula.  I will know it is mine because you will drop a copy of the Constitution on it, to keep it ready for me.

You inspired me.  You encouraged me.  And you gave me a great example to follow as a bold Christian.  For that, I am forever grateful.

-- Political Pistachio