OAKLAND - Helen Taylor, 87, of Oakland began doing mission work when she was 61, an age when most people are beginning to think about retirement. In fact, Taylor thought she had retired.

An ordained minister, Taylor had been pastor of Hugo Church, an interdenominational congregation in the tiny town of Hugo northwest of Oakland.

When the church closed, Taylor planned to retire in Florida to be near four of her six children and away from Illinois' cold, blustery winters.

"The Lord had a different plan," she said.

Instead, she began a career of service in Florida, from a refuge in Orlando for women released from prison, to a mission in Sanford, Fla., on a street that locals called "Crack Avenue," and back to Oakland where she opened a mission.

"My husband had passed away, so I sold my little place and went to Florida. My youngest son was on the board for a halfway house, Living Hope Renewal, for women who had been in prison, and they needed a house mother. I gave them my resum© and was hired."

Led to serve

Later, recuperating from cancer surgery at the home of her daughter in Sanford, Taylor said she felt led to serve as a volunteer at a mission that was opening there to feed and clothe the city's street people.

"My daughter and I were both volunteers," she said. "I went every day and helped clean and get the mission ready to open.

"I think every time the Lord opened a door for me, he put a bucket of soap suds and a mop in my hands."

Taylor also worked for three years in a crisis pregnancy center in Florida.

"I've seen it all, and it's heartrending. It does depress me," she said. "The only way I can find peace is to go to the Lord and tell him I did what I could. And, he knows that."

After moving back to Illinois, Taylor also worked with Tuscola Jail Ministry.

At 73, she began a mission near Oakland called House of Refuge Christian Outreach, operating under the auspices of a five-man board of directors.

House of Refuge opened Thanksgiving Day 1993, providing food, and later clothing, for those in need.

Taylor started the mission in her home, a small house on the flat Illinois prairie outside of Oakland.

"It's quiet here and has a good view," she said. "I can see Oakland and Brocton, and I can almost see Newman."

Taylor set out to provide food for people who needed help from a small room off of her kitchen, stocking it with food she purchased and produce from her garden before churches in the Oakland area heard about her work.

"I always raised a big garden and canned all the food," she said. "We didn't have electricity when the children were small. We lived down a muddy lane, and we were the last ones to get electricity.

"It was God putting in my heart a compassion for hurting people. If I hadn't lived it, I wouldn't have thought about it. It was all God's doing. All I've done is obey the Lord."

Until another bout with cancer forced her to close the doors in September, the House of Refuge was open three days a week.

Information included in a newsletter Taylor mailed to those who had helped the mission revealed there were 1,559 families served in 2005; food provided for 4,359 family members; and clothing for 1,698 family members. More than 333 children received Christmas gifts, 109 children received school supplies and 115 new blankets were given at Christmas.

"The Lord supplied our needs," Taylor said. "People have come in to help as they felt led," she said. "I couldn't have done it without them or the churches who have helped so much.

"I'd go to the door, and there would be boxes of canned goods sitting there, and different churches would take up offerings and bring them to me.

"One of the ladies who was in the Hugo church when I ministered there has been with me from day one. She drives from Villa Grove to help."

Pam Biggs of Oakland has helped Taylor with the mission since 1997.

The Rev. Justin Grimes, a member of the Oakland Ministerial Association, called Taylor an inspiration not only to those she has helped, but to the surrounding community.

"Everybody sees the sacrifice she has made in her life and the faith she has," he said. "It inspires them to have a deeper faith and be better servants."

With the mission closed, the clothing distributed and the food taken to a pantry on the Oakland square, Biggs said Taylor "will keep looking for what the Lord wants her to do until her last breath.

"People will still come to her for counsel or prayer or teaching - nothing organized, just whoever the Lord sends to her," Biggs said.

Taylor would like to continue her mission work in some way "if that's what the Lord wants," she said.

"I look at Joshua in the Bible, and I look at Moses and Elizabeth; I look at all these people, and in their old age, God still used them."

Bonnie Clark can be reached at bclark@jg-tc.com or 238-6847.

jr

Pull quote

'I think every time the Lord opened a door for me, he put a bucket of soap suds and a mop in my hands.'

Helen Taylor of Oakland