Lillenas em­i­grat­ed to Amer­i­ca as a child; his fam­i­ly set­tled first in South Da­ko­ta, then moved to Or­e­gon in 1889. He at­tend­ed Deets Pa­ci­fic Bi­ble Coll­ege in Los An­ge­les, Cal­i­for­nia (later re­named to Pa­sa­de­na Coll­ege); stu­died mu­sic at the Sie­gel-My­ers School of Mu­sic in Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois; and re­ceived an hon­or­ary Doc­tor of Mu­sic de­gree from Ol­i­vet Na­za­rene Coll­ege. His first pas­tor­ate was in Lom­poc, Cal­i­for­nia, in 1910; he lat­er pas­tored in Redlands, Cal­i­for­nia, and In­di­an­a­po­lis, In­di­a­na. In 1924, he found­ed the Lil­le­nas Mu­sic Com­pa­ny (bought by the Na­za­rene Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny in 1930), and worked as an ed­it­or there un­til re­tir­ing in 1950.

Haldor mar­ried Ber­tha Mae Wil­son, a song­writ­er like him­self. He and Ber­tha were el­ders in the Church of the Na­za­rene. Hal­dor tra­veled as an evan­gel­ist, then pas­tored sev­er­al church­es, 1914-24. In his life­time, he wrote some 4,000 hymns, and sup­plied songs for ma­ny evan­gel­ists. His works in­clude:

• Special Sac­red Songs, 1919
• New Sac­red Songs
• Strains of Love
• Special Sac­red Songs No. 2

• Hustad, p. 273
• Schwanz, pp. 69-76

1. And Yet There Is Room
2. Are You De­ny­ing the Mas­ter?
3. Beautiful Gates of Gold, The
4. Bible Stands, The
5. Church of God, Awak­en
6. Climbing Up the Hills of God
7. Come Just as You Are
8. Don’t Turn Him Away
9. Dear Old Bi­ble, The
10. Dusky Hands
11. Garden of My Heart, The
12. Glorious Free­dom
13. Have You Thought?
14. He Has Called Me by My Name
15. He Is Com­ing
16. He Is Mine
17. He Set Me Free
18. Higher Than the Moun­tain
19. Holy Spir­it, God Most Ho­ly
20. I Have Found a Pre­cious Rest­ing Place
21. I Have Set­tled the Ques­tion
22. I Know
23. I Know a Name
24. I Lost the World
25. I Will Arise and Go to My Fa­ther
26. In the Home­land
27. Jesus Rolls the Clouds Away
28. Jesus Will Walk with Me
29. Leave Your Bur­den at the Place of Pray­er
30. Look for the Sil­ver Lin­ing
31. Lord, I Am Plead­ing
32. Loyal and True
33. More Than a Friend
34. My Bur­den Is Gone
35. My Mo­ther’s Old Bi­ble Is True
36. My Won­der­ful Lord
37. My Won­der­ful Friend
38. No Com­pro­mise
39. O Love of Cal­va­ry
40. O My Heart Sings To­day
41. Once I Was Bound by Sin’s Gall­ing Fet­ters
42. Peace That Je­sus Gives, The
43. One Day I Tra­veled a Toil­some Road
44. Pull Up Stream
45. Savior Have I, More Pre­cious to Me, A
46. Soldiers of Im­man­u­el
47. Soul That Sin­neth Shall Die, The
48. Standing on the Word
49. Storm the Forts of Sin
50. Surrender to Je­sus
51. Sweeping This Way
52. Tell the Bless­èd Sto­ry
53. There’s a Bless­ed and Tri­umph­ant Song
54. Under the Aton­ing Blood
55. Walking in the Beau­ti­ful Light of God
56. What Have You Writ­ten?
57. When Je­sus Whis­pers, Peace
58. When the Ho­ly Ghost Abides
59. Where They Need No Sun
60. Why Car­ry Your Load?
61. Wonder-Working Name, The
62. Wonderful Grace of Je­sus
63. Wonderful Peace
64. Word of God, The
65. Yielded to Thee
66. Your Ros­es May Have Thorns

1. Church in the Vil­lage, The
2. Count Me
3. Glory Just to Walk
4. His Won­der­ful Love
5. I’m Abid­ing in Ca­naan Land
6. In the Prom­ised Land
7. Jesus Has Lift­ed Me
8. Jesus Intercedes for Me
9. King of Glo­ry, The
10. Steady, Bro­ther, Ste­ady
11. Years Can Not Take Him Away, The