Growing up in Keyworth in south Nottinghamshire, going to school there, as part of a family, with his membership of youth and church groups, as a student… even at 23, and then as the youngest ordained person in the country at the time of his entry into the church in 1998!
It is a thread being woven firmly into his work as the Vicar of Longridge, an appointment taken up just six months ago and, he says "one of the reasons I took this job in Longridge was that I knew I as going to work with children."
Looking at his involvement over half a year, that could almost seem an understatement. Since his arrival, the umbrella of David's work now covers almost every aspect of children's lives in the community.
In his report to the annual church meeting, he says "One key thing I have been involved in so far has been our schools and the work with children and young people that goes on in the wider parish."
He has become a governor at the CE primary and Longridge high schools, takes regular assemblies there and at Barnacre Road primary school, teaches and is booked to teach RE at all three, has been a guest speaker at St Cecilia's and has visited Hillside School for Children with Autism.
He has also enjoyed meeting Brigade members, the parish Walkie- Talkies, the young members of the new Junior Choir as well as the adult organisations such as the Mothers' Union, the Tuesday Club, the British Legion, and visiting those in the Community Hospital and residents in the town's sheltered accommodation and nursing homes.
When David arrived in Longridge from his previous parish of Harworth in his home county, he brought with him his wife Claire – whom he met at school - five year old son Thomas, and an unusual team of helpers.
They can only be described as a quartet of quite zany characters, popping out of boxes at family services, endearing themselves with quick repartee to the children and their own noisy responses, illustrating David's Sunday messages with fun, but also with depth and clarity, to both old and young alike.
The zany characters are, of course, puppets…Wake Up Will (always naughty and trying too hard), Lovely Lucy (gentle but firm), Amazing Alex (the confident sort) and Grumpy Grannie – who needs no defining!
"Children love to imagine and can relate puppets and things they do or say to their own lives," says David.
"Much of the magic of storytelling has been destroyed nowadays, so it's a way of bringing it back and giving a particular base to the gospel stories.
"Kids don't care what you know until they know that you care – it's all about relationships."
As a youngster himself, David would have relished some of the care he now feels every child should have.
"I didn't go to church then very often except to 8 o'clock communion with my dad two or three times a year," he recalls.
"We always sat at the back, and I was told the service started on page 109 – but I could never find it so always felt uncomfortable!
"Then my gran Edna, stayed with us. She was a big churchgoer and so she started taking me to the family service every month.
"I was about 12, and that was my real introduction to the church."
Despite admitting to not being 'terribly enthusiastic' at this turn of events, David says he got on well with his grandmother and started to realise the meaning and values of the services they went to together.
He joined the church youth group, became a server, was confirmed and continued to attend services regularly.
"It was very high church, with lots of services, choirs – in fact, an old fashioned village church in Keyworth with lots of good role models," said David.
Another particular role model for him, and a further influence on his
care for people, came from mum Margaret, a theatre nurse at Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham, where David got a job as a porter during A-levels.
His experiences of the many sides of hospital work proved a learning curve for him about life and death, miracles and great sadnesses, the results of operations and the birth of babies.
"There were wonderful occasions and those full of grief," he says.
He had grown up, however, with a passion for electronics, loved gadgets and radios – and still does.
A-level subjects were physics and chemistry – plus, and perhaps tellingly, religious education – but his thoughts were mostly on a career as an electrical engineer.
But his experiences in hospital – where he was also involved in the work of the chaplaincy department – made him think more deeply about his life's role.
Aged 18 he says "I thought and prayed – and decided to study theology at Westminster College in Oxford.
"My dad Martin, an accountant, wasn't too keen as he was worried about the money side for me – but he came round in the end!"
Selection for the ministry took David to theological college at Cuddesdon, also in Oxfordshire, for two years.
"Then," he recalls "I had to wait to be ordained. You have to be 23 to be ordained, so I had to wait until that birthday in July 1998 and was ordained at Michaelmas in September.
"It then turned out I was the youngest ordained person in the country!"
Ten years on means that claim to fame is a thing of the past for David – albeit a bright memory – and he now has a growing church in Longridge with children, young families and people of all ages worshipping together, having been given that all-important warm welcome by the church family
In his annual meeting report, David stresses that with the church nationally in decline, having a growing church is something to rejoice in.
He says "Nationally, the number of children and young families leaving the church is alarming – over the last few months I have spent time with Bishop Geoff and diocesan advisors thinking about how we can encourage other churches in the diocese to develop their work with children and young people.
"Perhaps recognition already of what we are achieving here in Longridge, and how we are bucking the trend."