Harry Orville Philips was born January 8, 1921, in Olathe, Kansas. He was saved as a teenager and after returning from a tour in the Navy during World War II, attended the University of Kansas and received a medical degree. He was medical director for Lone Star Steel where he and his wife, Maxine, became heavily involved in a new independent Baptist church in Hughes Springs, Texas. 

In 1962 they went on vacation to the Navajo Reservation and God impressed them that they should minister there. Using their own resources they moved to the field in 1964. In May 1967 they were approved as Baptist Bible Fellowship missionaries. Dr. Phillips ministered to their bodies but more importantly, to their souls. God gave him 32 years of faithful, dedicated, consecrated service to Him and the Navajo people. 

When he died in his sleep on Thursday, February 8, after preaching on Wednesday night, the Navajo pastors that he had loved and trained, came to Maxine and asked that Dr. Philips be buried on the reservation because as they said, "He belongs to us." 

He was survived by his wife, Maxine, 6 children, and 12 grandchildren.