November 19, 1885, Stord Island, Hordaland Fylke, Norway.
August 18, 1959, Aspen, Colorado.
Forest Hill Cemetery, Kansas City, Missouri.
Haldor was the son of Ole Paulson Lillenas and Anne Marie Jonsdtr Tveital. He married twice, to Bertha Mae Wilson and Lola Dell Kellogg.
He emigrated to America with his family as a child. They settled first in South Dakota, then moved to Oregon in 1889.
Lillenas attended Deets Pacific Bible College in Los Angeles, California (later renamed to Pasadena College). He studied music at the Siegel-Myers School of Music, Chicago, Illinois, and received an honorary Doctor of Music degree from Olivet Nazarene College.
Haldor and his wife Bertha were elders in the Church of the Nazarene. Haldor traveled as an evangelist, then pastored several churches. His first pastorate was in Lompoc, California, in 1910. He later served in Redlands, California, and Indianapolis, Indiana.
In 1924, he founded the Lillenas Music Company (bought by the Nazarene Publishing Company in 1930), working as an editor there until retiring in 1950.
In his lifetime, he is said to have written 4,000 hymns, and supplied songs for many evangelists. His works include:
Whosoever,That Means Me