His Life:

John Nash was born on May 17, 1939, in Kilgore, Texas, the third of nine children of Cecil Christopher Nash and Ruby Grace (Reed) Nash. Throughout his childhood and teen years, his family moved around East Texas as his dad found jobs in cotton patches and oil fields. He graduated from Quitman High School and attended Henderson County Junior College before joining the Marines in the late 1950s. He spent much of his time with the military on the West Coast, where he was asked to stay on and play football for what amounted to military club teams that served as a recruiting tool for the military.

While he was in California, he went on a date. And at the end of that date, the girl he went out with knew beyond a shadow of a doubt…that this was not the man for her. She did, however, know someone for whom he would be the perfect person, and that someone was her sister, Diane Havens. John and Diane married, and they returned to East Texas, where they would have three children, Ken, Karen, and Joe.

John attended TJC and then East Texas State University and what would become UT Tyler, where he was a few hours short of receiving a teaching degree when he received and accepted an offer for a full-time job at Tyler’s Kelly Springfield tire plant. He worked for Kelly/Goodyear for thirty years, where he served as the union President, fighting to ensure that workers were treated fairly and were given wages and benefits that matched their labor. He didn’t just fight for Kelly Springfield workers, though. Over the course of his career, he served in various positions with the Smith County Central Labor Council, the Texas AFL-CIO, the Texas Workers’ Compensation Commission, and the East Texas Workforce Board.

Outside of his labor organizing, he also helped found Champions for Children of Smith County to provide helpful resources for parents and childcare centers, and he also founded the Henderson County Alzheimer’s Association after Diane was diagnosed with the disease.

It’s difficult to determine where he most wanted to be—on the front lines of the battles for fairness and equality, fighting the powerful on behalf of the weak, or at his home, working the land. Over time, he bought and expanded his property, where he hosted labor events, tilled the ground for produce, and raised all kinds of animals. On that land, he built a softball field and hosted tournaments for teams from across East Texas. He fought a perpetually losing battle against a dam on his pond that was determined to wash out and collapse, but he never stopped fixing that damn…dam. Also on that property was where our very large extended family gathered for holidays. There, he took four generations of Nash children on hayrides, let us climb on his tractors, and pop off fireworks. We sat around tables and ate a lot. We laughed and played games, and sometimes we fought and left, but we returned to the shelter that uncle Johnny built and upheld with his strong hands.

John passed away in Tyler, Texas, on February 6, 2026. 

(Because of how much Ruby and Cecil Nash loved each other, this next part will take a long time.)

He was preceded in death by his parents, Ruby and Cecil Nash, who he never stopped talking about, and by his wife, Diane, who he never stopped loving and caring for; by his sister, Mary Lou Nash McQueen “Sister,” who, according to John, was a protector; his brother Cecil “Sonny,” who John believed was the greatest football player of all the Nash boys; his sister Ruth Ann Nash Wood, the baby he called “Rudy”; his brother Tommy, who never stopped seeing Johnny as his big brother, and who John never stopped taking care of as his little brother; and by his brother Jerry, who John was always intrigued by and protective of.

He is survived by his children—Ken, Karen and her husband Jamie, and Joe and his wife Kathy, who he loved deeply and admired for their intellect, nurturing nature, and hard work; he’s survived by his brother Clarence, “Bo” Nash, who is the only sibling who could match John’s intensity; by his brother Jackie, with whom he once traveled all the way to Texas from California with by hopping trains; and by Dorothy “Dottie” Nash Petty, who he referred to as “Ditzy Jane” and who he never stopped doting on as his baby sister.

John is survived by his granddaughters, Kaylan Santos and Kaylan’s husband Eliu, and Amanda Meier and her husband Landon. Kaylan and Amanda, the only children he believed were more intelligent than you are your children, who is he also survived by–Viviane, Tahlia, and Victoria Santos, and Calleigh and Cain Meier.

He is survived by too many nieces, nephews, great and great-great nieces and nephews to count.
And he is survived by all of us here today.

We are here today to remember John, to celebrate his life, and to lean on God, the source of all life.

—

John Nash: A Sermon of Rememberance

Through the dust and the smoke of this man-made hell
Walked a giant of a man that the miners knew well
Grabbed a saggin’ timber, gave out with a groan
And like a giant Oak tree, he just stood there alone, Big John

And with all of his strength, he gave a mighty shove
Then a miner yelled out, “There’s a light up above”
And twenty men scrambled from a would-be grave
Now there’s only one left down there to save, Big John

With jacks and timbers they started back down
Then came that rumble way down in the ground
And then smoke and gas belched out of that mine
Everybody knew it was the end of the line for Big John

Now they never reopened that worthless pit
They just placed a marble stand in front of it
These few words are written on that stand
At the bottom of this mine lies a big, big man, Big John
— “Big John” by Jimmy Dean

When I heard that song as a child, I thought I knew exactly who it was about. Some of the details are different, such as the fact that uncle Johnny worked in a factory, not in a mine. But many of the ideas carry over to his life’s work: A strong man walks into a system that is collapsing on the backs of workers, and singlehandedly creates a pathway for them to walk out into the light.

John Nash was a big, big man.

—

(The following commentary on Amos 1:1, 2:6-8 is mostly an excerpt from an upcoming Good Faith Magazine Bible study, written by Tyler Tankersley, pastor of Ardmore Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.) 

The words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa—the vision he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake…(1:1)

This is what the Lord says: “For three sins of Israel, even for four, I will not relent. They sell the innocent for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the heads of the poor as on the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed. Father and son use the same girl and so profane my holy name. They lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge. In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines.

The book of Amos begins with a surprising detail: “The words of Amos, a shepherd from Tekoa…” (1:1). Right from the start, we meet a prophet who did not fit the usual mold — no palace connections, no formal prophetic lineage, no advanced training — just a shepherd called to speak into a world that did not want to listen.

Each accusation reflects something real in Israelite society:

• “Selling the poor for a pair of sandals” likely refers to debts so small, such as the price of a cheap pair of shoes, that the wealthy could foreclose on a poor person’s land or force them into debt-slavery. Deuteronomy specifically forbade such practices, yet Amos shows that these legal safeguards were routinely ignored.
• “Garments taken in pledge” (v. 8) refers to a cloak given as collateral for a loan. Exodus 22 commands that such cloaks be returned by sunset since, for the poor, it doubled as their blanket. To keep it overnight was to jeopardize a person’s very life. In modern terms, this resembles predatory lending.
• “Drinking wine purchased with fines” points to a corrupt court system where the wealthy profited from penalties imposed on the poor, then used the proceeds to fund religious festivals.

____

Through the dust and the smoke of this man-made hell, walked a giant of a man that the miners and the poor in ancient Israel and the factory workers knew well—shouting prophetic words of doom for the lofty and the rich and the powerful, but words of life for the downtrodden. If we look hard enough, we can always find an Amos among us.

Now listen…I know comparing John Nash (or anyone) to a person of God in the Bible can be problematic.

Johnny was not a perfect man. He didn’t always prioritize the right things. He had a temper that could go beyond righteous indignation and into the territory of rage. I won’t ask for a show of hands, but I know more than a few of you in this room today have had a conversation with him that ended with John asking some variation of the question, “Why don’t we take this outside?”

But if you are one of the many people who have ever been on the receiving end of that question from John, and have come to verbal blows or actual blows with him, you know this: He could turn on a dime and fight for you just as quickly as he would fight against you.

He had a laser-like radar for injustice. He could sniff it out from a mile away. If you were dishing it out, he’d be in your face, and if you were on the receiving end of it, he would be by your side at the snap of a finger.

John Nash had a back-and-forth relationship with the church. If there was a lightbulb to be fixed, a toilet that needed repair, a food drive that needed organizing, or a play that needed a Joseph, he was there.

He had an even more complicated relationship with preachers. (Which is why for many years he didn’t quite know what to make of me.) A preacher and an active church member have a unique relationship. It includes serving on committees, visiting one another for coffee, and praying together at hospital beds and at funerals—but that relationship also includes a good amount of time with the church member sitting down and listening to what the preacher has to say. And, in most churches, the only talking back that is accepted is when you have an utterance or word of agreement.

Listening wasn’t easy for John, but he could do it. 

Sitting still was even more difficult for him, but he could muster the strength once a week to plant himself in a pew.

But sitting still and listening without talking back? That was not John Nash’s gift, and it contributed to a cycle of strained relationships with preachers when they said things from the pulpit that didn’t sit well with him. (And they said a lot of things that didn’t sit well with him.)

Sometimes, because of my background in ministry and my relationship with Uncle Johnny, the preacher would reach out to me to figure out what to do. Once, one of them was at his wits’ end and so exasperated with John that he asked me, somewhat sheepishly, “Do you think he has a personal relationship with Jesus?”

That question is like a preacher’s judo move to reestablish dominance when they’ve lost it. It’s their way of saying, “I don’t like what’s going here, so I’m going to carry the conversation to a plane I’m more comfortable talking about.”

Here’s my four-part answer to that question. (It could just as easy be a thousand parts):

1. In the late 1980s, a man named Bo Pilgrim walked onto the floor of the Texas Senate and handed out $10,000 checks to legislators, along with a list of concerns about the workers’ compensation system in the state. The result was a set of “reforms” that essentially gutted the system and left workers without representation in workers’ comp claims. A few years later, an investigation into the Pilgrim’s Pride plant found late and missing reports of injuries, late payments in benefits to injured workers, and accounts of injuries that included severed limbs, and reports of physical and sexual abuse of women, mostly Hispanic immigrants.

The leader of that investigation was a man who had been appointed to the Texas Workers’ Compensation Commission by Governor Ann Richards—a man named John Nash.

The August 4, 1994, issue of the Texas Observer tells the story of John hearing about the issues at Pilgrim’s Pride and putting the commission to work to address the concerns in ways they hadn’t done before. The story was called “The Man in the White Hat.” A critic of the commission told a reporter, “Nash wears the white hat. Until he came to the commission, no one had access to the commissioners.”

2. In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans, sending many Louisianans into East Texas seeking shelter. People around the country sent up prayers and gave money. John Nash went to work. Along with his buddy, Bill Lockwood, he convinced the pastor of their church to let them convert unused space in their building as shelter for Katrina refugees. They took nails and hammers to that old building, putting a roof above the heads of people who had lost everything.

3. Several years after that, John began what I think he considered the most important job of his life—caring for Aunt Diane as her Alzheimer’s progressed. Before she got sick, when I came to visit, Diane would let me know that John was out on the farm doing something. Slowly, as time and her Alzheimers progressed, he started to be in the house a little more often. Then he was there all the time—feeding her, changing her, getting her in and out of bed, singing to her. The toughest man I ever knew turned into the most tender caregiver I had ever seen.

But naturally, as you would expect, John didn’t just focus on his own family’s struggle with the disease. That’s not how his brain worked. He knew, if this was hard for him, how much more difficult it was for the families without any resources to manage the ravages of Alzheimer’s. So he did what came naturally for him–he organized, founding the Henderson County Alzheimer’s Coalition that offers assistance for family members and caregivers.

4. Uncle Johnny didn’t know a lot of scripture. But there was one passage he always returned to and knew by heart. He read it at funerals and referenced it in every conversation I ever had with him regarding faith. When I looked at his Bible, it was as I expected. There wasn’t any markings, but it opened up very easily to this one passage, indicating he had read it more than any others. It was Matthew 25:31-46, the parable of the sheep in the goats. It’s an apocalyptic parable, with Jesus revealing who is “in” and who is “out.” Those who are “in” are the ones who fed the hungry, clothed the naked, provided shelter for the homeless, and cared for the sick. Those who are “out” are those who didn’t. 

Now look, I have degrees in theology. I’ve read Romans. I’ve studied all the atonement theories and I know that we have to look at all of scripture to get a full picture of what salvation looks like.

But in this passage, to those who originally heard these words from Jesus, to and those who read the blessings and woes Jesus preaches in Luke 6—access to the Kingdom of God is limited. Not to those who have asked Jesus into their hearts, nor to those who have prayed some sort of prayer, but to the poor and the hungry and the thirsty and those without a home and those who are sick and those who are in prison and ALL of those who have taken physical, concrete steps to ensure they have living wages and are fed and are given homes and tended to when they are sick and visited when they are in prison.

In this passage, justice isn’t a byproduct of salvation. It is a requirement.

Jesus said, whatever you did to them, you did to me. Or, another way of putting it–your relationship to them is your relationship with me.

Did John Nash have a personal relationship with Jesus? If he didn’t, I don’t know a person on this planet who does. 

“God has shown you what is good, and what does the Lord require of you?” the prophet Micah asked. “To do justice. To love mercy. And to walk humbly with your God.”


Benediction by Ruth Fox:

May God bless you with discomfort
At easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships,
So that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger
At injustice, oppression and exploitation of people,
So that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with tears
To shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger, and war,
So that you may reach out your hand to comfort them

And turn their pain into joy.
And may God bless you with enough foolishness
To believe that you can make a difference in the world,
So that you can do what others claim cannot be done
To bring justice and kindness to all God’s children.

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