David Yule was born in Scotland in 1873. He emigrated to this country at the age of sixteen. Yule attended Wooster University and Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati. He graduated in 1903.

At Wooster, Yule developed a "high scholastic ability" and "rare oratorical powers." He won several awards playing halfback on the Wooster football team. He was described as having a "pleasing address and social manner which won him many friends in this locality."

Yule served as an assistant minister at Westminster Church in Utica, New York and the High Street Presbyterian Church in Newark, where he worked in the Sunday School and the Young Men's Club. Yule became the minister of FPCN in 1906. At FPCN, he started a Bible Class in the Sunday School and the Men's Club.

In 1910, he resigned from the FPCN pastorate, citing his inability to support his family with his salary of $1,200 per year. Contemporary newspapers report that the church ignored his requests for a salary increase. Yule became an Episcopal minister and eventually became a salesman.